In October 2008 the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) undertook a review of its Code of Conduct which sets out the general principles and guidelines to which its members ought correctly to commit themselves as good corporate citizens. The chamber’s executive director and its Security and Governance Committee are responsible for the enforcement, implementing and monitoring of the code though there are few details of the instruments through which those pursuits are realized or any information regarding sanctions – if indeed any were envisaged – for non-compliance with the Code of Conduct.
On paper at least, the Code of Conduct is an impressive and presumably well-intentioned document which covers seven Statements of Principle: ‘legislation’, ‘employment’, ‘consumers’, ‘suppliers’, ‘competition practices’, ‘community’ and ‘environment’. Moreover, there appears to be an expectation of the part of the GCCI that its members will take the Code of Conduct seriously. “Members and their employees, including directors, the chamber says, “are expected to maintain high ethical standards in their actions and working relationships with the regulatory bodies, fellow employees, competitors and communities. Furthermore, members are also required to abide by the rules of the chamber, its reputation, profile and status.”
In essence, the GCCI’s Code of Conduct seeks to hold members of the chamber up to high standards of legal and moral probity. Indeed, many of the strictures articulated in the Code of Conduct attests to the chamber’s own acceptance, in principle, of the virtues of both good corporate governance and corporate social responsibility.
Some sections of the Code of Conduct attract particular attention if only because they appear to go to the heart of what ought to constitute law-abiding and morally responsible private sector, and, by implication, point to a number of profound and serious deficiencies in the manner in which business is conducted in our country. Indeed, implicit in the GCCI’s Code of Conduct is a rejection of the notion that things must be as they are and a repudiation of what has become the fairly commonplace view that an absence of conscience, a single-minded preoccupation with profit and a proclivity for breaking the law are par for the course in the conduct of business in Guyana.
The code speaks, for example, of the desirability of private sector compliance with its obligations to the Guyana Revenue Authority and the National Insurance Scheme, compliance with Occupational Safety and Health and environmental considerations and recognition of the legitimacy of trade union activity. Equal opportunity for employees “without regard to race, colour, sex, religion, age, marital status, disability, veteran status or national origin also form part of the code as well as fair trading practices that take account of both consumers’ rights and fair competition, and the promotion of the principles of corporate social responsibility. Frankly, in its own way, the GCCI’s Code of Conduct points unerringly at much that is wrong in our contemporary business community.
Righting those wrongs is a decidedly weighty responsibility. In the first instance, one doubts that the GCCI is in a position to pronounce on the compliance of all of its members with each of the seven principles enshrined in its Code of Conduct. That apart, of course, the point has been made in a column published in this issue of the Stabroek Business that even if we assume that the GCCI were in a position to fully enforce its Code of Conduct, most of the commercial entities operating in Georgetown and its environs are not members of the GCCI and would not, therefore, be bound by the Code of Conduct. A third consideration is whether or not the conduct of business may not have become far too tainted by bad habits to seek, at this stage, the implementation of a Code of Conduct which essentially calls for a full and complete turnaround.
Immediate Past President of the GCCI Chandradat Chintamani has made an argument for mandatory membership of the GCCI as is the case in some other countries in the region and elsewhere, a circumstance that would go at least part of the way towards ensuring that all businesses in the capital and its environs sign on to the Code of Conduct though this of course does not address the challenge of enforcement. That depends on the will of the chamber, whether or not it has at its disposal the tools with which to ensure effective enforcement, whether it can secure the full support of its members and if it can secure the support of those other stakeholders without whose cooperation much of the code is rendered useless.
All of this, of course, amounts to saying that there is still much that the GCCI can do and ought to be doing to create an enhanced business environment. If it can at least make some measure of progress in ensuring full compliance by its membership with its Code of Conduct, that alone would contribute considerably to ensuring a regimen of better business practices, in which corruption is minimized, employers honour their various obligations to employees, the protection of workers rights are assured, consumer rights are respected and inducements or favours designed to secure competitive advantage are reduced if not eliminated.
Two weeks ago, during an interview with this newspaper, newly-elected President of the GCCI Komal Ramnauth said the effective enforcement of the chamber’s Code of Conduct was one of his administration’s highest priorities. Contextually, Ramnauth’s statement is a bold and praiseworthy one though the extent of its seriousness can only be judged in the practical action which the chamber seeks to take, to ensure that its Code of Conduct is thoroughly implemented and that its own members and, hopefully, the wider business community, take the provisions of the code seriously.
