Attorney General (AG) and Minister of Legal Affairs Anil Nandlall SC has announced that plans are in train for the revamping of Guyana’s Mental Health Act, with specific attention to be paid to persons in the penal system.
The announcement was made by the AG on Wednesday morning during his presentation at the opening ceremony of the mid-year programme review of the Support for the Criminal Justice System (SCJS) programme.
The objective of the ceremony was to address issues relating to Guyana’s over-crowded prison population.
Nandlall said that one way of reducing the prison population is by addressing mental health issues among prisoners and this is why the Act becomes vital.
He said that part of the SCJS project addresses the question of mental health and that efforts are being made to collaborate with the psychiatric department of the Georgetown Hospital to administer a programme with the Judiciary and the Guyana Prison Service, so that persons who require such assistance in the penal system can readily and systematically have access.
On this point he referenced the norm of Magistrates making Orders directing that persons be lodged at the Mental Hospital. He said that that hospital seems unable to facilitate the numbers of persons being deposited there through court orders.
He said that these are all situations which have to be addressed by stakeholders to find an acceptable modus operandi on the way forward, but more importantly he added, would be how mental health is addressed permanently in the penal/legal system.
The AG said that many offenders are plagued by mental health issues, but because the condition “is a sickness,” unless specifically treated therefor, a person would not be cured. For this reason he said, imprisonment would not work.
“So you go into the prison. You receive no treatment for mental health…you come out back…the sickness becomes worse…and that’s what took you in the prison in the first place. So you go right back there, you get worse…you come out back again and it’s a vicious cycle that ends in death.”
Nandlall said that the introduction of a revamped Mental Health Act is a very important component/initiative coming out of the SCJS programme.
On this point he described it as “a completely outmoded” piece of legislation in Guyana as he said that the same can be said for the public health legislation; while noting that all archaic laws will be revamped.
He said that the Mental Health Act is completely out of sync with reality, science, Guyana’s society and what used to be considered mental health concepts, are now radically different.
He said that these are all factors which must be taken into account, while stating that many are facing serious problems of mental health in Guyana which he opined are not recognized as a society.
Broached on the issue by the press of the extent to which a new Mental Health Bill will deal with the decriminalizing of suicide, the AG said that that issue “does not necessarily have anything to do with mental health,” and touted it as being a completely different concept.
He said he would not view it in the same equation, as he believed them to be separate issues.
The SCJS programme is a partnership of the Government of Guyana through the Ministry of Legal Affairs and the Inter-American Development Bank.
