The Opposition yesterday defeated the Government on a vote to determine the composition of the key Committee of Selection as the new dispensation in Parliament manifested itself. The committee will comprise nine members: four from government and five from the combined opposition.
Speaker of the National Assembly Raphael Trotman ruled as carried a motion to amend a proposal by Prime Minister Sam Hinds on the composition of the Committee of Selection, after the Opposition outvoted the Government 33 – 31. This was the first order of business after the ceremonial opening of Parliament.
Prime Minister Sam Hinds proposed that there be a ten-member Committee of Selection with five members for the Government, four members for APNU and one member for the AFC. “There is a tradition of observing the Standing Orders having the members reflecting the make-up of Parliament,” Hinds said.
APNU Member of Parliament Amna Ally then rose to propose an amendment to what Hinds put forward. “This 10th Parliament is one of difference and it must so reflect. The reality is that the Government of the day is a minority government. The Committee of Selection is very important since it is this committee that is responsible for the composition of all other committees,” Ally said. “If we go five – five it would be a recipe for gridlock, hence this amendment from ten members to nine members,” Ally said.
“We want unity. We believe in consensus. People voted for change and change we must have,” she said.
After Speaker Trotman invited representatives to speak to the issue before the vote, Presidential Adviser on Governance Gail Teixeira said that the issue is to ensure that there is a balance of the parties’ strength in Parliament.
She referred to Standing Order 94 (1) which speaks to the composition of committees and said that the matter of an Opposition majority was immaterial to the argument of the composition of the committee. She said that it must be based on the number of seats that the parties held in Parliament.
Teixeira noted that at the level of the tripartite talks outside of Parliament, the parties tried unsuccessfully to deal with the issue. “I am appealing to the AFC and APNU that we use the mathematical formula [in the composition of the Committee of Selection],” she said.
Speaking also at the invitation of the Speaker, AFC Member of Parliament Khemraj Ramjattan said that there is no need for the Government to be afraid of a four – four – one scenario. “It should be four from Government and five from the combined Opposition,” he said.
After there was a yea and nay vote, the Speaker called for a division, during which parliamentarians voted individually and a count was taken. At the end of the count by the Clerk of the National Assembly, the Speaker announced that there were 33 votes in favour of Ally’s proposed amendment and 31 votes against it.
On the Government side, the nominees for the Com-mittee of Selection are Prime Minister Hinds, Teixeira, Dr. Leslie Ramsammy and Indra Chandarpal. For the Opposition, the nominees are Ally, Joseph Harmon, Volda Lawrence and George Norton of APNU and Ramjattan of the AFC.
