Opinion | When the Rules Change, Who Protects the People?

There is something unsettling about George Orwell’s Animal Farm. The pigs never had to tear down the commandments to take control. They simply changed the wording. A few words were added here and there. Then suddenly what was once forbidden became acceptable. The other animals continued living by the rules, believing those rules had not changed. By the time they understood what had happened, the pigs had already secured their power.

Orwell was telling us something important. Those who control the rules can also control the people who must live by them. And when people stop paying attention to changes in the rules, they may not realise what they have lost until it is too late.

I have been thinking about that story as I reflect on what happened in the Turks and Caicos Islands in 2009, and the long road that eventually led to the conviction and imprisonment of our former Premier, Michael Misick.

Let us go back to that period. The Islands were in turmoil. A Commission of Inquiry had raised serious allegations about corruption and the misuse of public office. Public confidence was shaken. Nobody should suggest that allegations of wrongdoing involving public officials should be ignored. Those entrusted with public money must answer for their actions.

But something else happened during that period, and it deserves our attention.

In 2009, the British Government suspended significant parts of our Constitution, removed the elected Government and assumed direct control of the Islands. Among the changes was the suspension of the former constitutional guarantee of an unqualified right to trial by jury. The Trial Without a Jury Ordinance followed, and the 2011 Constitution did not restore that earlier guarantee in the same form. Judge-alone trials became possible in certain circumstances. These were not minor administrative adjustments. They changed the constitutional arrangements under which our people lived.

We must understand what that meant. Our elected representatives were removed, our Parliament was dissolved, and decisions about the future of our country were placed in the hands of people appointed by Britain. Whatever one’s opinion of the former Government, this was a major interruption of our democratic life.

There will always be people who believe the intervention was necessary. Others will remember it as a period when TCI lost control of their own affairs. Both perspectives deserve to be understood. But there is a question that should concern every Turks and Caicos Islander: when political circumstances become difficult, how easily can the protections we take for granted be changed?

And perhaps there is an even more uncomfortable question we should be prepared to ask: Did Britain change the law to restore good governance, or did it change the rules to make it easier to secure convictions against those it had removed from office?

That question deserves consideration, particularly when we remember that the suspension of our constitutional arrangements was followed by legislation allowing certain criminal cases to be heard without a jury. We should be careful not to confuse the timing of these events with proof of intent. But neither should we be afraid to examine the circumstances in which these changes were made.

The implications become even more significant when we consider the prosecution of Michael Misick. The allegations were serious. The investigation was extensive. The case took years to reach its conclusion. Charges were brought in 2011, the trial began in December 2015. In May, he was sentenced to four years and 26 days in prison. He has the right to pursue his appeal, and the courts must be allowed to deal with that process.

Nobody should confuse raising questions about justice with defending corruption. They are not the same thing. If wrongdoing is proved, those responsible must face the consequences. A former Premier should not receive special treatment because of the office he once held. But neither should he receive less protection because he is unpopular, politically controversial or accused of serious wrongdoing.

That is where our Constitution matters. Section 6(1) of the 2011 TCI Constitution guarantees every person charged with a criminal offence a fair hearing within a reasonable time before an independent and impartial court. Notice that it does not say a reasonable time for ordinary people, but a different time for Michael Misick. It does not say that the protection applies only when the public feels sympathy for the accused. It applies to everyone.

Fifteen years between the laying of charges and a conviction is a long time. There were complications, changes in the proceedings and delays along the way. The courts have had to deal with those matters. But the length of this case should give us reason to think seriously about how justice is administered in our country. Justice delayed is not simply an inconvenience. It can affect the accused, the witnesses, the families involved and public confidence in the courts.

There is also a wider lesson here. A government can change. A Premier can leave office. A political party can lose an election. But the constitutional protections of the people should not rise and fall with the fortunes of those in power.

Today, it is Michael Misick. Tomorrow, it could be someone who holds an entirely different political view, someone with no political connections or an ordinary citizen who finds himself on the wrong side of a powerful institution. That is why we should never judge the fairness of a system only by whether we like the person standing before it.

I do not ask anyone to forget what happened during the years before 2009. Nor do I ask anyone to overlook the findings of the courts. What I am asking is that we look beyond the personalities and political loyalties involved. The real issue is whether we are comfortable with the principle that constitutional protections can be altered during a crisis and whether we are sufficiently alert to the consequences.

Future generations will inherit the constitutional arrangements we leave behind. They will not necessarily share our political loyalties, our grudges or our opinions about the people who once governed us. But they will have to live with the laws and institutions we allow to develop.

In Animal Farm, the animals eventually looked at the commandments and discovered that the rules they thought protected them no longer meant what they once did. By then, challenging those who had changed them had become almost impossible. We should not wait until we find ourselves in a similar position before recognising the value of what we have.

We must demand honest government. We must demand accountability. We must also insist that justice is fair, that constitutional rights are respected and that no one is placed beyond their protection. The true test of TCI’s commitment to justice is not how it treats the people it likes. It is how faithfully it protects the rights of those it does not.