On December 10 last year, a year-long celebration of the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was launched by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour.
Crafted in 1948 on the principles of the 1945 Charter of the United Nations, the UDHR is the foundation on which the post-World War II global human rights architecture was painstakingly constructed and it remains a bill of rights of sorts for every human being. While not binding, the declaration is perceived as representing an overarching moral imperative as it was the first internationally accepted definition of the rights of people. Importantly, the declaration underlines the commonality and interdependence of all rights as restated at the Vienna World Conference on Human Rights in 1993.
Appended to the UDHR are the human rights treaties and optional protocols and, importantly, the treaty bodies which oversee the adherence of UN member states to these rights.
The treaties cover a vast array of issues ranging from torture to child pornography to the death penalty to the rights of migrant workers and have been of longstanding interest to human rights advocates here and to the average Guyanese although not enough of them are knowledgeable of the framework.
Hopefully, this will change as the government through its Presidential Adviser on Governance, Ms Gail Teixeira, has signalled that the administration is keen on greater involvement of the public and civil society in the reporting process to the UN human rights treaty bodies.
Thus far, Guyana’s posture has been a very relaxed and lethargic one. In relation to the all important International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Guyana’s third periodic report has been due since 2003 – the last one being in March 2000. A 2nd periodic report on the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has been due since 2000, the last having been considered in May 1997. The first ever report on the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment was only considered in November 2006 and the next report is due this year. The initial report on the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination was considered in March 2006 and the next report is due this year. The 3rd to 6th reports on the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) were lumped together and considered in July 2005 and the next report is again to be consolidated and entered sometime this year. The initial report on the Convention of the Rights of the Child was considered only in January 2004 and the next report is due this year.
It therefore means that this year, if it was to fulfil its reporting obligations, the government would have to make at least four major submissions and be grilled by the relevant treaty bodies on whether all obligations under the treaties were being met and if the various recommendations made by the treaty bodies were being implemented.
There are two good reasons why the public should take a great interest in this process. The first is that the treaty bodies and the treaties and optional protocols they preside over represent a significant force for moral suasion that state parties like Guyana would ignore at the risk of international rebuke. This force is not to be underestimated and its impact can be immeasurably heightened if there was a counterpart here in the form of public input and agitation for the promotion of all human rights. Allied to this, the treaty bodies do intensive work in discovering the real truth about local circumstances so that when they state party appears before the examining bodies in New York or Geneva they can’t paper over problems or deny that they exist. When Guyana appeared before the Committee Against Torture in 2006 searching questions were asked and a series of pertinent recommendations were eventually made which the state will again have to answer questions on this year. The same is the case with CEDAW and the other committees.
The point is that issues such as the rampant violence against women and children and police brutality which worry so many people here are also on the radars of the committees in Geneva and New York and they are attempting to hold the State accountable in a rarefied atmosphere and one that the State can’t easily be contemptuous of or have its way as it might have in Parliament here for instance.
The second reason why the public should take note of the state’s reporting to the UN bodies is that it has always been envisaged by the Office of the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights that the reporting cycle would enable public input at several stages as a means of ensuring that the reports were truly national and that the average citizen would be aware of the obligations of the state party and consequently be in a better position to track its record. After a state party submits a report to one of the committees there are several opportunities for public and NGO input and, indeed, for the submission of alternative or shadow reports which are completely outside of the State’s control.
Thus far, the public has not been involved in this cycle because the state party has not done a good job of publicizing its obligations and inviting the public to participate. The public at large was unaware, for instance, of the submissions that had been made in relation to CAT in 2006 and therefore could make no meaningful input. Considering the recent slew of allegations against the police and the army over brutality, torture and inhuman treatment, many persons might have been interested in presenting their positions on the situation and the State may well find itself in an awkward position this year if it is found that it hasn’t done enough to prevent such cases and to deal with them. So, this blocking out of public participation is unacceptable and inexplicable.
Ms Teixeira’s governance unit in the Office of the President has promised that this will change. Clearly the best way for the State to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the UDHR is to earnestly work on presenting the various reports to the UN treaty bodies, complying with the tenets of the conventions, implementing the recommendations of the treaty bodies and inviting the widest public input possible in the process.
Over the years, the Guyana Human Rights Association has done exemplary work in holding the state accountable on the full gamut of human rights and presenting to the public compendia on problem areas such as the shockingly low conviction rate for rape accused and the burdens that rape complainants face. It is to be congratulated for this. In the latter part of last year, a new group, the Guyana Partnership for Human Rights was launched. It has among its objectives public education and monitoring the state’s compliance with reporting requirements to the UN rights committees.
All in all the celebration of the UDHR’s 60th could see significant steps in popularizing its fundamental principles here and greater accountability and transparency by the State party.
