Barbados lawyers threaten strike action over Chief Justice Marston Gibson

Well, that didn’t take very long, did it?

Barbados Bar Association President Andrew Pilgrim (photo above) hasn’t received a response to a letter he wrote to the Chief Justice back in July. After ten weeks of waiting for CJ Gibson to say something about the Bar Association’s concerns about the administration of justice in Barbados, Mr. Pilgrim is suggesting to his fellow lawyers that they stage a strike at the Supreme Court building. Although just about anyone who has hired a Bajan lawyer might laugh at the obvious joke (Bajan lawyers strike? What difference will it make? Will anyone notice?), the fact that the Bar Association is considering a strike shows the seriousness of the situation – at least as far as the Bar membership is concerned.

To be fair, Marston Gibson was parachuted into the position with lots of dreams about using various New York techniques for reducing the outrageous backlog in the courts – but aside from the dreams he was given no budget worth talking about. The system was broken long before Gibson arrived with civil court cases regularly taking 10, 15 and even 20 years to complete!

On the other hand Gibson could have kicked some life into the rules had he chosen to: but he is a weak and ineffective leader and manager. The time to make big changes is when the new leader first arrives. After the first year, it’s all over and the status quo wins. That’s Management 101, but I guess Marston Gibson never took that course.

And the next person to hold the position of Chief Justice will be?

Further Reading

You know the routine folks… we have to print the entire newspaper article here because the Nation is known for removing articles when the paper’s agenda changes. So please read the article at The Nation first…

Bar for Action

FED UP with the lack of meaningful response from the Chief Justice to their concerns, the council of the Bar Association has written its members suggesting strike action at the Supreme Court Complex, among other things, as a means of getting their matters heard.

Sherene Mongroo follows trail of money-laundering, fraudulent wills, father’s stolen millions to Barbados and throughout Caribbean

Millions of dollars in assets and cash missing

Sherene Mongroo tells Barbados Free Press that the multi-million dollar estate left by her late father, well-known horse racing enthusiast and businessman Yusuf Mongroo, has been plundered in Barbados and other Caribbean islands. The list of people responsible is a who’s who of prominent lawyers, bankers and government officials with more than a few located in Barbados. Mongroo died on August 12, 2012 after an illness. (At left in the photo above, courtesy of The Nation)

Who is involved? Well, Ms. Mongroo will not name names because she is engaged in a lawsuit involving her father’s estate and there are various official investigations in progress as well.

“When Sherene Mongroo travelled to Guyana from New York immediately following her father’s death, she was confronted by a situation that she has described as horrifying.

She discovered that her father had been kept isolated from his immediate family and grossly mistreated during the final stages of his life by individuals that were supposed to have been caring for him and who conveniently benefited under what now turns out to be a fraudulent will, made just three days before his death.”

Ms. Mongroo is asking Bajans to help her if they know anything about her father’s businesses and assets in Barbados. Readers can contact Sherene Mongroo through Barbados Free Press, and we’ll pass on as much information as you would like to provide to her. Email us at barbadosfreepress@yahoo.com.

“Meanwhile, yet another fraudulent will has come to light in Barbados, where Yusuf Mongroo owned bank accounts, real estate and race horses, limited to those assets in Barbados. Enquiries are continuing in Barbados, where it is believed some of the principal conspirators in this saga may now be located.”

Read the full story at Caribbean News Now: A tale of modern day pirates of the Caribbean