An expert is expected to testify on Wednesday as the trial of the two election petitions filed in St. Vincent and the Grenadines moves into the second of three days of scheduled hearings before the High Court.
Several witnesses testified on Tuesday, as East Kingstown MP Dwight Fitzgeral Bramble, whose election in the November 2025 general election is being challenged, welcomed the commencement of the legal proceedings.
“The court case has begun and it’s in process,” said Bramble, who is minister of foreign affairs, foreign trade, foreign investment, and diaspora affairs, in the New Democratic Party administration.
“That’s the most I can say. It has begun and legal proceedings are underway,” said Bramble, who was declared winner of the East Kingstown seat for a second five-year term after the November 2025 election.
Luke Browne, of the opposition Unity Labour Party, who has failed in four attempts to become MP for East Kingstown, is challenging Bramble’s election, saying he was not qualified to be a candidate because he is a Canadian, in addition to his Vincentian birthright citizenship.
Browne attracted 1,727 votes — 1,001 fewer than Bramble — while 19 ballots were rejected.
The ULP’s Carlos Williams, who lost his deposit when he made a second attempt to defeat the NDP’s Godwin Friday, who was then opposition leader, has filed a similar petition against the election of the now prime minister.
Friday, who is now prime minister, minister of finance, legal affairs and justice, economic planning, and private sector development, is into his sixth five-year term as MP for the Northern Grenadines.
Friday amassed 2,185 votes, compared to Williams’ 339, even as 11 ballots were rejected.
Friday and Bramble were in court on Tuesday as witnesses gave evidence and were cross-examined by defence counsel.
Speaking to reporters after Tuesday’s hearing, Senior Counsel Anand Ramlogan, a former attorney general of Trinidad and Tobago, the lead counsel for the government in the petitions, said “the law is taking its course.
“This is a very interesting election petition, given the overwhelming mandate given by the people to Prime Minister Friday and his government, and you know we see the wheels of justice and democracy interacting, and we are very confident about this matter,” Ramlogan said.
Friday led the NDP to a 14-1 victory, the second-most decisive election outcome in the electoral history of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, surpassed only by the 1989 polls, when the NDP won all 15 seats.
“We feel that justice will prevail in the end, and the honourable prime minister will be vindicated in the position he has taken,” Ramlogan said.
He pointed out that Friday had never made his dual citizenship a secret.
“And I think that the population voted for him, knowing full well his democratic credentials and his commitment and dedication as a servant of the people, and we intend to ensure that it remains that way,” the lawyer said.
“Tomorrow (Wednesday) we’ll have the expert witnesses, and we have a couple others. … it’s a day-by-day trial,” Ramlogan further stated.
He said that the judicial proceedings are “a very exhausting and intense process, but ultimately, we feel this is a very momentous day to see that the prime minister would clear his schedule, come to court, be there respectful towards the court and the citizens who are entitled to a quick resolution of this matter in the interests of democracy”.
Meanwhile, Senior Counsel Stuart Young, a former prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago, who is the lead counsel for the petitioners, said the first day of hearing was as expected, with “the commencement of these very important election petitions. And we will see how it goes.”
Acting High Court judge, Justice Gertel Thom, a retired justice of appeal, is hearing the case.
The ULP candidates have filed the petitions despite their leader Ralph Gonsalves having repeatedly stated in the past that elections are won on election day, at the polls, rather than in the court.
Leading up to the 2025 vote, notices were published in the media, urging constituents not to vote for either candidate.
The respective notices to constituents of Northern Grenadines and East Kingstown said that voting for the NDP candidate in each of those constituencies amounted to “A WASTED VOTE”.
The notices said each of the candidates “is not qualified to be elected as a member of Parliament”, and pointed to section 26 (1) of the Constitution of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, which says:
“No person shall be qualified to be elected or appointed as a Representative or Senator (hereinafter in this section referred to as a “member”) if he —
(a) is by virtue of his own act, under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience or adherence to a foreign power or state”.
The notices pointed out that the statutory declaration that a candidate is required to sign states:
“That I am duly qualified to be elected as a member of the House of Assembly for this constituency, and that — … I am not by virtue of my own act, under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience or adherence to a foreign power or state”.
The notices pointed out that Friday and Bramble are each citizens of Canada.
“Canada is a foreign state,” adding that such citizenship was not forced on Friday or Bramble.
“He voluntarily applied for and obtained Canadian citizenship and a Canadian passport, and he has been using the passport. He was therefore on nomination day under an acknowledgment of allegiance, obedience or adherence to a foreign state namely, Canada, by virtue of his own act of applying for Canadian citizenship and a Canadian passport, and the using of the passport. He is therefore absolutely disqualified from being elected as a member of the House of Assembly,” the notices said.
They said that in the case of each candidate, an objection by electors of the Northern Grenadines and East Kingstown, respectively, was lodged to his nomination on Nomination Day, Nov. 10.
“Do not be fooled, nomination as a candidate for election is a legal prerequisite to election, and a valid nomination is a legal prerequisite to being validly elected. The nomination of a person who is not qualified to be elected is not a valid,” the notice said, adding that constituents can be assured that the nomination of Friday and Bramble “will be successfully challenged”.
Also, in the lead-up to the polls, Vincentian legal scholars Linton Lewis and Jason Hayne, each with a doctorate in law, wrote commentaries on the matter.
Lewis, a former NDP senator and chairman, who has fallen out of favour with the party, argued that a case against the nomination of Friday and Bramble would succeed.
However, Haynes argued that a proper reading of the SVG Constitution would show that it is peculiar and provides for Commonwealth citizens to contest elections.
He argued that any challenge to the election of Friday and Bramble based on their Canadian citizenship would, therefore, fail.