By Lesroy W. Williams Observer Reporter
lesroywilliams@thestkittsnevisobserver.com (Basseterre, St. Kitts) ” It took 10 years, but for attorney Angela Innis, justice has at last been served. Attorney Innis is to be compensated by the Government of St. Kitts and Nevis for wrongful termination of employment, when she was sacked with a letter dated February 20, 1998. There were no reasons given in the letter for her termination as Registrar Magistrate in the High Court of St. Kitts and Nevis where she was contracted in 1996 to serve two years in the position. Attorney Innis said that it was rumoured that she was a trouble maker and that there were attempts to sabotage her practice. She was fired before she had served out her two year contract as Registar Magistrate, only serving a year and nine months. She took her case to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council and won. The Federal Government will have to compensate her 50,000 E.C. dollars in contractual damages and 50,000 E.C. dollars in violation of her constitutional rights. The Judgment was delivered on July 30 by Lord Hope of Craighead of the Privy Council. Innis argued that when the government terminated her contract as Registrar of the High Court, that her constitutional rights were violated under section 83 (3) of the Constitution of St. Kitts and Nevis. “I feel vindicated,” Ms. Inniss said. “From the beginning, I thought that my termination was in fact wrongful, it was unfair. I thought that it was designed to hurt me personally in a situation that I had not acted wrongfully or improperly. I brought that action in terms of seeking vindication for my own good name, in that normally in circumstances like these, when a government terminates you there is usually a fall out and propaganda which is put out on the road. As a result your credibility, your professional reputation, all of these things are put on the line and I thought I had to do what was necessary to protect myself and also to make a contribution to the law and the protection of future persons who would serve in the position of Registrar and Magistrate,” Attorney Inniss declared. She said that she was fortunate in that she had chambers to go back to and was able to move forward, but that was really critical in terms of what she put before the court is that she experienced a lot of governmental interference in the performance of her job. She said there was the implication that her political affiliation should be put before her professional responsibilities. “In terms of asking young professional people to return to St. Kitts and Nevis to work, there is a critical environment that needs to be in place; the environment that needs to be in place is that the politics of our culture should not deter people from doing what they need to do professionally and politicians and the likes need to understand that,” Inniss emphasized. Attorney Angela Inniss was called to the Bar on October, 31, 1988. She is the daughter of Sir Probyn Inniss, who served as Governor from 1975 to 1981.
