At its most recent general meeting on 3 October 2020, Anguillian and Montserratian attorney, Jean M Dyer, was elected President of the OECS Bar Association for the next two years 2020-2022. Ms Dyer is only the second female president of the Association since its formation in 1989. She holds her first law degree from the University of the West Indies. Additionally, she holds a Master of Law degree from Cambridge University where she read Advanced Trusts, Commercial Insurance Law, and International Commercial Tax Law. She has represented clients in the courts of the region for the past seventeen years and has at times acted as a Master and as a Judge of the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court. Ms. Dyer is the Immediate Past President of the Anguilla Bar Association.
Attorney Yvette Wallace also of Anguilla, and Jamaica, was re-elected first Vice President. Ms. Wallace is a graduate of the Faculty of Law of the University of the West Indies and the Norman Manley Law School. October 22nd will make twenty-eight years since she was admitted to the Bar. She has significant experience in corporate transactions, regulatory, and compliance issues. She has also on occasion acted as a Master and as a Judge of the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court. Ms. Wallace is a Past President of the Anguilla Bar Association.
Anguilla thus provides two of the five-member Executive Committee of the regional association.
The OECS Bar Association is an umbrella organisation, consisting of both the constituent Bar Associations of the nine member states of the OECS and individual members.
The Association was conceived originally by its founders as an organisation dedicated to improving the terms and conditions of the judiciary of the region at a time when the Judges and Magistrates of the region had no advocate on their behalf. It has over the years grown in responsibilities both to the judiciary, the profession, and to the public.
The four main objectives of the OECS Bar Association are:
• To promote the improvement of the administration of justice;
• To support the independence of the Judiciary and to maintain cordial relations among members of the Bar and between the Bar and the Bench;
• To encourage good relations and understanding between the Bar and the Public; and
• To deal with all matters affecting the legal profession.
The OECS Bar Council meets four times a year at one of the member territories in rotation to discuss problems affecting the profession. The Council also carries out continuing legal education for its members throughout the year. The last meeting of the Association in Anguilla took place in the year 2016.
– Contributed
