Monrovia – Government has failed to win four landmark tenure cases to heads of four agencies.
These Agencies include the Liberia Telecommunications Authority, Governance Commission, Liberia Lottery Authority, and the Liberia National Identification Registry.
By Willie N. Tokpah
These cases were lost based on procedural errors on the part of President Joseph Nyumah Boakai in nominating individuals to these positions, according to a Supreme Court ruling on Wednesday.
“There being no showing of the existence of any of the conditions for the petitioner’s removal from office as stipulated in the Acts Creating the respective entities to which the petitioners are appointed, their said removal from office prior to the expiry of their tenure without due process is ultra vires.
“This decision also affirmed the alternative writ of prohibition issued by Justice in Chambers and granted the peremptory writ prayed for by the petitioners,” the Supreme Court opinion noted.
However, the government managed to win just one out of the four cases. The win was against Prof. Wilson Tarpeh, who had been claiming a tenure position at the EPA.
In its much-anticipated ruling, the Supreme Court on Wednesday, April 24, revoked President Joseph Boakai’s nomination of several individuals to tenure positions.
The Court ruled that the action of President Boakai is not in line with the law, and those occupying the four positions in question were never accorded due process.
The court said the petitioners’ rights were violated, noting that tenure should be respected while unexpired.
The court decision means that the petitioners, Andrew Peters of the National Identification Registry, Atty Garrison Yealue of the Governance Commission, Edwina Crump Zackpah of the LTA, and Reginald Nagbe of the National Lottery Authority, will remain in their respective positions and at the same time, accorded due process as provided by law.
Using Article 89 of the Constitution of Liberia and Article 56, as it relies, the Supreme Court opined that nominating persons to the petitioners’ positions while their tenures are still in force and unexpired is tantamount to their removal from office.
“The nominations giving rise to these petitions are hereby ordered revoked,” the court opinion further maintained.
Earlier to the court’s ruling, the government and the heads of the five agencies have been in a legal feud over the legitimacy of the tenure positions.
The four victorious petitioners who filed separate cases at the Supreme Court against President Joseph Nyumah Boakai’s decision to appoint individuals to various agencies argued that it was a violation of their rights and the Acts establishing these institutions for nominations to be made to tenure positions while their terms have not yet expired.
The petitioners in their separate arguments noted that the action by President Boakai is tantamount to causing injury for which the Supreme Court should place a prohibition on the President’s decision and grant them the rights to occupy these positions in consonance with the Acts establishing them.
They are Andrew Peters, Executive Director of the National Identification Registry, who filed a petition against the government, represented by its legal representative, and Dr. Edward Liberty, Reginald Kpan Nagbe, Director General of the National Lottery Authority versus government legal representatives and all deputies under their authority, Atty. Garrison Doldrh Yealue, Jr. Chairman of the Governance Commission versus government and legal representatives, and Edwina Crump Zackpah, Chairperson Israel Akinsanya, James Gbaryea, Zatowon Titus, and Osborne Diggs, Commissioner of the Liberia Telecommunication Authority versus government and Abdullah Kamara, Patrick Honnah, Clarence Kortu Massaquoi, Ben Fofana, and Angela Bush Cassel.
However, government lawyers on the other hand during the separate arguments informed the court that the issues raised by the petitioners were premature since the President nominated people to these positions which had to be approved by the Senate.
Government lawyers further argued that the fact that nominations have to be approved by the Senate, those contending should have waited for these people nominated to be confirmed by the Senate and commissioned by the President before coming to raise the said issue.
According to a government lawyer, the petition is premature and that President Boakai has Constitutional rights to nominate and that those raising the claims about tenure should not do so when they are in the Executive Branch because those appointed are serving at the will and pleasure of the President.
However, the court’s ruling did not favor Tarpeh who was also claiming to be in a tenure position and desired benefits if being replaced.
The court had previously ruled that EPA Executive Director Wilson Tarpeh was acting and not appointed, contrary to his petition filed before the Court for a Writ of prohibition.
Besides, Tarpeh was never nominated by the EPA Policy Council for appointment by the President, in line with the act establishing the EPA.
The court noted that the fact that Tarpeh failed to establish documentary proof that he was chosen from among a list of three (3) persons recommended by the Policy Council to the former President and that Tarpeh’s appointment was an interim appointment, for which tenure is inapplicable.
The court noted that since it has been established that Tarpeh had served in an interim position, his removal was in consonance with Executive Order 123, signed by former President George Manneh Weah, Sr., on November 22, 2023, in which he stated that all nontenured presidential appointees shall be presumed to have resigned as of the date of the inauguration of the incoming President, Joseph Nyumah Boakai, Sr.
The Supreme Court said in its opinion: “That a Writ of Prohibition will not be granted by the court where, as in the instant case, the respondent, the Executive Branch of Government, did not proceed wrongly by appointing Dr. Emmanuel K. Urey Yarkpawolo as Interim Executive Director of the EPA in the absence of the formation of the Policy Council.”
“Wherefore and in over of the foregoing, the alternative writ of prohibition issued by the Justice in Chambers is hereby quashed, and the peremptory writ prayed for denied.”