Guyana Signs Agreement For University Of Guyana Graduates To Study Law In Trinidad

GEORGETOWN, Guyana, September 9, 2016 (CMC) – The Guyana Bar Association (GBA), today, said Guyana had been successful in getting a new agreement signed that would allow for 25 top University of Guyana (UG) graduates gaining automatic entry to the Hugh Wooding Law School (HWLS) in Trinidad and Tobago annually.

It said that the agreement was signed between the UG, the University of the West Indies (UWI) and the Caribbean’s Council of Legal Education (CLE) at the just-concluded meeting of the CLE, held in Antigua and Barbuda.

According to the GBA, 20 CLE members voted for Guyana, six against and four abstained. As a result, the new accord states that “The Council of Legal Education shall permit no more than twenty-five (25) Guyanese nationals, who have fulfilled the requirements of the University of Guyana L.L.B. degree U.G. Department of Law, to be eligible for automatic entry into the course of Training at the Hugh Wooding Law School operated by the Council for Legal Education in any academic year”.

A new accord became necessary after the previous one, signed in November, 2009, expired in November, 2012. As a result, UG LLB holders were accepted at the Trinidad facility at the discretion of that school.

The GBA said the Guyanese delegation had objected strenuously to the CLE proposal that the new agreement to accept the Guyanese law students automatically, be based on certain conditions.

“The Council of Legal Education subject to the availability of places and to such conditions (if any) as the Council may require, shall permit no more than twenty-five (25) Guyanese nationals to be eligible for automatic entry into the course of training at the Law schools operated by the Council for Legal Education in any academic year,” the CLE had proposed.

However, Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Basil Williams, and UG’s Deputy Vice Chancellor,  Barbara Reynolds,  argued that such a clause would amount to discrimination against Guyanese LLB graduates from UG.

According to the GBA, the Guyanese delegation further objected to the CLE indicating that Guyanese students could be placed at the Eugene Dupuch Law School in The Bahamas.

Guyana had stated that its objection was based on the fact that Guyana does not fall into the zone that is covered by The Bahamas.

Williams said the objection to the second proposed amendment was based on the fact that the CLE’s Professional Law School Regulation 4 (3) states that those eligible to apply to HWLS should be  ordinarily resident in Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Trinidad and Tobago.