Legal teams in the election petitions challenging the parliamentary eligibility of Prime Minister Godwin Friday and Foreign Affairs Minister Dwight Fitzgerald Bramble return to the High Court in Kingstown on Tuesday morning, two weeks shy of the administration’s first anniversary in office.
Justice Gertel Thom is scheduled to hear oral submissions from Tuesday to Friday, according to the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court cause list.
The four-day sitting follows the conclusion of witness testimony on Oct. 1 and the scheduled filing of written submissions on Nov. 4.
Friday’s New Democratic Party (NDP) won 14 of the 15 seats in the Nov. 27, 2025 general election, ending almost 25 years of Unity Labour Party (ULP) rule.
Friday was sworn in as prime minister the following day, and Bramble and the remainder of the Cabinet were sworn in on Dec. 5, 2025.
Defeated ULP candidates Augustus Carlos Williams and Luke Browne, both of the Unity Labour Party (ULP), filed the petitions following the vote.
Williams contested the Northern Grenadines seat against Friday, who won 2,185 votes to Williams’ 339, with 11 ballots rejected.
Browne challenged Bramble in East Kingstown, where Bramble won 2,728 votes to Browne’s 1,727, with 19 ballots rejected—marking Browne’s fourth consecutive unsuccessful bid for the constituency and his second defeat to Bramble.
Both challenges also name Supervisor of Elections Dora James, the Attorney General, and the respective returning officers –Devon Ollivierre for the Northern Grenadines and Jacqueline Browne for East Kingstown — as respondents.
Williams and Browne are asking the court to declare both elections invalid under the “wasted vote” principle. They contend that Friday and Bramble were disqualified from being nominated or elected to the House of Assembly under Section 26(1)(a) of the Constitution because they voluntarily acquired Canadian citizenship.
At the heart of the challenge is whether holding citizenship in Canada, another Commonwealth country, places a candidate under an “acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience or adherence to a foreign power or state” under Section 26(1)(a), or whether their status as Commonwealth citizens protects their eligibility under Section 25 of the Constitution.
The evidentiary phase of the trial unfolded across two sittings in late July and from late September through Oct. 1.
During the petitioners’ case in July, Justice Thom deferred a preliminary application by defence lead counsel Anand Ramlogan, SC, to strike out the petitions, opting instead to hear the full evidence.
Williams, Browne, and four campaign workers testified about distributing and posting pre-election notices warning voters in the Northern Grenadines and East Kingstown that ballots cast for Friday or Bramble would be “wasted votes”.
Two of the campaign workers struggled under cross-examination regarding those notices, while Canadian immigration lawyer Sarah McKinnis testified virtually as an expert witness for the petitioners.
When the respondents opened their case in late September, they called 21 witnesses over four days, alongside Caribbean constitutional scholar Professor Hamid Ghany, who testified as an expert witness on Commonwealth citizenship and parliamentary qualification.
On Sept. 29, both Friday and Bramble took the witness stand and acknowledged under cross-examination by petitioners’ lead counsel Stuart Young, SC, that they voluntarily acquired Canadian citizenship by naturalisation — Friday in 1990 and Bramble in 2005 — and hold Canadian passports, while maintaining they are constitutionally qualified to sit in Parliament.
Speaking to reporters outside the court, Bramble declined to answer questions on whether he would renounce his Canadian citizenship if the court rules against him, saying he would not deal with hypotheticals.
Justice Thom also heard testimony from Bequia residents and NDP supporters who testified on Friday’s behalf, as well as East Kingstown residents called by Bramble’s legal team.
Under cross-examination, defence witnesses faced questioning over their political loyalty to the NDP, their personal and professional relationships with Bramble and petitioner Luke Browne, and when they first became aware of objections to the candidates’ nominations and their dual citizenship.
Following the closing testimony on Oct. 1, Friday dismissed the petitioners, telling reporters outside they court they “sour grapes and sore losers”, while Ramlogan called the bid to overturn voters’ choices “anti-democratic”.
Outside the court, defence attorney Shirlan “Zita” Barnwell maintained that continuing the case rather than renouncing Canadian citizenship is essential to secure a clear and definitive constitutional interpretation regarding dual citizenship.
On the petitioners’ side, Young told reproters that his team remains “very confident” in its case, saying the outcome comes down to “the interpretation of the Constitution”.’ “.
He said that Friday and Bramble had “ample opportunity” to renounce their Canadian citizenship before the election but chose not to, adding that the petitioners feel “very confident” in the evidence presented.
Browne also rejected suggestions that the petitions were only filed because the ULP lost, noting the party had already raised the issue during the campaign, and adding they might have been filed even if he had been elected.
Justice Thom is expected to reserve her decision following the conclusion of the oral submissions.
Counsel Young, alongside attorneys Al Elliott and Carlos James, represents Williams and Browne while Ramlogan appears alongside UK barrister Kate Temple-Mabe and local counsel Kay Bacchus-Baptiste, Barnwell, Zhinga Horne-Edwards, and Samantha Robertson for Friday and Bramble.