At­tor­ney Veera Bha­jan is to be im­me­di­ate­ly re­in­stat­ed to her po­si­tion as a lay as­ses­sor in the Equal Op­por­tu­ni­ty Tri­bunal (EOT) af­ter the Court of Ap­peal ruled in her favour and dis­missed the ap­peal brought by Don­na Prow­ell-Raphael, chair­man of the Equal Op­por­tu­ni­ty Tri­bunal.

The judges up­held the High Court’s de­ci­sion that Bha­jan was wrong­ful­ly pre­vent­ed from as­sum­ing her role as a lay-as­ses­sor at the tri­bunal and ruled that the chair­man act­ed out­side her au­thor­i­ty. The court found that Bha­jan was valid­ly ap­point­ed and that the chair­man had no au­thor­i­ty to block her ap­point­ment. The judges agreed that the chair­man’s ac­tions were il­le­gal, an abuse of pow­er, and con­trary to the Equal Op­por­tu­ni­ty Act.

The court re­ject­ed the chair­man’s claim that the High Court judge showed bias, say­ing: “Strong lan­guage used in the judg­ment does not nec­es­sar­i­ly trans­late in­to ac­tu­al bias.”