In early September, we told you about the landmark case won by the former ombudsman, Lionel Arzu. He successfully sued the government for lost allowances during their salary cuts.
It's a simple breach of the terms of their contract but it could open a major can of worms, which is why the government through the Office of the Attorney General applied to Stay the Execution of the Judgement until the conclusion of their Appeal at the Supreme Court. Well today that was denied. The magistrate who heard the matter ruled that the judgement must be satisfied on or before Oct 31st.
Arzu's attorney OJ Elrington told us about the decision:
OJ Elrington, Attorney for Lionel Arzu
"At the conclusion of the trial, the learned magistrate denied their application and ruled in our favor that the application would not be granted and therefore the government should pay Mr. Arzu his judgement by on or before October 31, 2022. The government argued that very point today in court that it is such a monumental judgement that they feel as though that is grounds enough that the execution should have been stayed. Obviously, the learned magistrate and myself absolutely disagree with that point. But the fact is that the size of the judgement is a small sum for Mr. Arzu alone, but indeed I guess the government believes that it opens up, the term they used, a flood gate and therefore it is for that reason. We knew this to be the case and when the judgement was first granted, we know that they would appeal the matter. So the substantive appeal is still going to be heard, they are still going to appeal the matter, but the issue of the stay of the judgement has not been granted."
Like we said, it is a precedent setting case - and now that it has been established any contract officer can also seek to get back the pay and allowances they lost during the one year pay cut.
Elrington discussed the breach of contract which is the matter at hand:
OJ Elrington, Attorney for Lionel Arzu
"The crown argued what is essentially called acquiescence. They claimed that essentially because he did not bring the claim while these deductions were being made or quickly enough that he essentially acquiesce, that he agreed through his actions for this pay cut. We argued that was absolutely false, not correct and therefore was not applicable in this case. I think that it was a lot more straight forward, a lot more clear cut for persons who were on fix-term contracts. This is your term of employment and this is what you're going to get. There was no conditions on which those adjustments can be made."
The government is still expected to appeal.
