High Court orders gov’t to issue Local Content Certificate to RAMPS Logistics

Last Updated on Saturday, 12 November 2022, 12:42 by Writer

Chief Justice Roxane George-Wiltshire on Friday ordered the Ministry of Natural Resources’ Local Content Secretariat to issue a Local Content Certificate to the RAMPS Logistics (Guyana) Limited whose parent company is headquartered in Trinidad & Tobago.

She ordered the Director of the Local Content Secretariat Martin Pertab to properly fulfill his duties without discretion to register or cause the Secretariat to register the company and issue a Local Content Certificate by noon, Monday November 14 or he “may be liable to be held in contempt of court and/or fined.” The judge ensured that Mr Pertab heard the order.

Having ruled that the Minister and/or the Local Content Secretariat has misconstrued or misapplied the Local Content Act, she said the company has satisfied the statutory requirements and preconditions for the grant or issuance of a Local Content Certificate. “A declaration is granted that the applicant, based on the evidence produced to the Court, as a Guyanese company is entitled to be issued with a certificate of registration and to be entered into the local content register in accordance with Section 6 of the Local Content Act,” she said.

“Having read the application and heard submission, the Court has concluded that the respondents have fallen woefully short in countering the applicant’s application,” she said in handing down her decision on the lawsuit filed by the company against government’s refusal to grant the certificate. She said the Minister and Director of the Local Content Secretariat breached the legislation when they refused to grant or issue the certificate.

She stated the company made one application on June 8, 2022 and was refused by the Minister of Natural Resources Vickram Bharrat via an automatic email on June 9, 2022 and that in doing so was unlawful, illegal, void and of no legal effect.

The Chief Justice said the Minister of Natural Resources has no authority under the Local Content Act to grant or refuse an application for certification. She said the second and third respondents took “irrelevant matters into consideration” in refusing the application.

The court found that the Head of the Local Content Secretariat Martin Pertab’s list of requirements for certification were illegal. “Mr Pertab, from his affidavit in defence, refers to a ‘Form C’- a list of requirements which have no statutory basis. He also refers to charges by the Guyana Revenue Authority which are irrelevant to the determination of an application under the Local Content Act,” the Chief Justice said.

She recommended that government puts in place regulations of the Local Content Act “so as to prevent arbitrary decision-making.”

Lawyers for the company asked for 30 days to file for damages in the case.

RAMPS Logistics, which at the inception had been procuring and moving supplies for the ExxonMobil-led consortium, has been eyeing multi-million dollar contracts to offer similar services for other oil explorations and discoveries in the Stabroek Block.