CONFIRMED: Grenville Williams will serve as new Attorney General

By Demion McTair. Updated 5:13 p.m., Tuesday, October 25, 2022, Atlantic Standard Time (GMT-4).

Lawyer Mr. Grenville Williams will serve as this country’s Attorney General beginning November 1, 2022.

The announcement was made by Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves today (October 25), just before the adjournment of the sitting of parliament.

Earlier in October, the prime minister had announced that a new attorney general would begin his/her tenure by November 1, 2022, to succeed Mr. Jaundy Martin who took up the role in September 2017.

Mr. Williams, an attorney by training, has been serving as the Director of the Asset Recovery Unit (ARU) of the Regional Security System (RSS).

In August 2022, Mr. Grenville T. Williams said he was ready to provide the leadership the South Leeward constituency needs by contesting the next general elections expected by December 2025.

It is not clear what this appointment to the post of Attorney General would mean for those ambitions.

Mr. Williams, though a favourite among constituents of South Leeward, was unsuccessful in his bid to be the candidate for the Unity Labour Party – ULP in 2015.

The appointment process:

At an October 4 press conference, Dr. Gonsalves said: “I can say that the process of consultation has been completed under the constitution, and I have been informed by the Judicial and Legal Services Commission that someone has been approved to begin the work as of the first of November.”

He said that based on a correspondence he saw on Sunday, with the information, he sent it to the “relevant entities in the state administration so that they would be alerted because there are some formal processes which have to be done.”

The prime minister did not reveal who the individual would be, but he said the appointment will be one through the public service.

“As you would appreciate, this person is going to be a public service attorney general, and therefore, there is a different process for a public service attorney general than if it were an attorney general as a quote unquote political appointee – and that is to say an elected representative or a senator,” Dr. Gonsalves said. 

The outgoing Attorney General

According to the Ministry of Legal Affairs, “In 1979, upon gaining Independence, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines’ Constitution stipulated in sec. 63, that the Attorney General is the principal legal adviser to the Government. He/she gives legal advice to the Prime Minister and his Cabinet who seek to govern the state lawfully and competently.”

Mr. Jaundy Martin is the current Attorney General of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and he was appointed in 2017, but the prime minister had announced in early September 2022, that Mr. Martin had expressed an interest to move on and spend time with his family overseas. 

“He wants to go and meet family overseas but I’ve asked him to stay on for at least another month. As you know I would have somebody in mind and would have spoken to that person already but am not ready to speak about that,” Dr. Gonsalves said

Mr. Martin’s contract was slated to end in September 2022.