Justice Deborah Kumar-Chetty has issued a mandamus order directing the Town Clerk of the Georgetown Mayor and City Council to remove all vendors operating in the vicinity of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation by May 31, with the court warning that failure to comply will trigger contempt proceedings and seizure of vendor property.
The order names specific streets: Lamaha Street between Thomas and East; East Street between Lamaha and New Market; New Market Street between Thomas and East; and Middle Street between Thomas and East. The mandamus compels the Town Clerk, under the Municipal and District Councils Act and the Civil Procedure Rules of 2016, to remove food, beverage and other vendors along with mobile trucks, carts, pushcarts, drays, barrels, boxes, dust bins, pallets, and any other obstruction left on the street or pavement.
This is the second time in recent months that the High Court has had to issue an order to compel a basic municipal function. City Hall visited the GPHC vendors in January and acknowledged the problem; nothing changed. The judiciary has now stepped in, and the operative word in Justice Kumar-Chetty’s order is “contempt” — a path that could see the Town Clerk personally liable.
For diaspora Guyanese who rely on the public hospital when they visit family, the issue has been a years-long quality-of-care embarrassment: trying to enter Guyana’s main public hospital through an obstacle course of street vending. May 31 is now the date by which Georgetown’s local government will either prove it can execute a court order or invite a constitutional confrontation with the High Court. Either outcome is significant.