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ATTORNEYS for businessman Danny Guerra have demanded that the state of emergency (SoE) review tribunal deliver a ruling on his preventive detention by 4 pm on January 2, warning that its members should resign if they fail to do so. Attorneys said they will seek emergency relief from the High Court if no decision is issued.

In a sharply worded letter dated January 1 and copied to the chief justice, attorney Nerisa Bala accused the tribunal of failing to discharge its constitutional mandate to safeguard the right to liberty during a public emergency and of presiding over delays she said amounted to arbitrary detention.

“The framers of the Constitution were wise enough to understand that the risk to the liberty of the subject in times of emergency was so real that express provisions were made” for an “independent and impartial tribunal” to review detentions, Bala wrote. She added that the tribunal “has failed in the discharge of its constitutional mandate with respect to the review of my client Danny Guerra.”