Pointing out that only one member of the APNU+AFC was present when the Parliamentary Standing Committee for Constitutional Reform met last week, government members say that the opposition is not serious about the process.
“The Opposition fails to turn up to the Parliamentary Standing Committee for Constitutional Reform meeting scheduled for today. Throughout (David) Granger’s Chairmanship of the Standing Committee (between) 2011 and 2015 NOTHING happened. Between 2015 to 2020 again very little happened. So when they tell you they want reform, you are allowed to laugh.PS: One member shows up half an hour late,” Priya Manickchand, PPP/C member on the committee wrote in a Facebook post.
Other members of parliament also criticized the opposition.
However, AFC Leader Khemraj Ramjattan dismissed the claim, saying that while he cannot account for the other members of the committee, he was only absent last week and had relayed that he had been delayed in Court and could not make it.
Ramjattan blazed the government saying that it was nitpicking and making excuses about a process that if it was serious about, it would have made the necessary arrangements for it to go forward, with or without all the members present, as there was a quorum last week.
“I missed the last meeting at 11 am but not much happened as I got a report from Amanza [Walton-Desir]. I had indicated to them that I would be at court and had court. But Amanza was present and there was a quorum to move the process forward. I indicated that I would be supporting the movement of the forwarding of the consultancy process. Even at the last meeting, and the Hansard can show this. I indicated to let us move it like we did the last time around. Let us get the draft and Act and so and move forward,” Ramjattan told Stabroek News yesterday.
“If the government wants to move the constitutional reform process forward it could do that because it had the quorum. In any event, they were left with the message very firmly from me that we should move the process forward,” he added.
On the Opposition’s side are members Ramjattan, Walton-Desir, Raphael Trotman and Nicolette Henry. Henry has resigned from Parliament and a replacement is yet to be named.
Ramjattan pointed this newspaper to Leader of the Opposition Aubrey Norton saying that a decision on a replacement for Henry has to be taken up with him.
Several calls and messages to Norton went unanswered yesterday. Messages and calls to APNU+AFC Chief Whip Christopher Jones also went unanswered.
In January of this year, Attorney General Anil Nandlall SC had said that work aimed at constitutional reform had already begun. He had noted that the Standing Committee on Constitutional Reform met in the National Assembly to map out their work plans.
Nandlall who chairs the committee said that it will cater for the inclusion of all the work done by previous committees, singling out primarily the Constitution Reform Commission of 1999/2001.
Formed by the Constitutional Reform Commission Act of 1999, Nandlall said there are certain recommendations that came out of that 1999/2001 process which were never implemented; but noted that the current committee will be compiling those amendments to form part of its work.
Pointing out that some constitutional reforms can only be achieved by a two-thirds majority, the Attorney General said that it would necessitate bilateral cooperation between the two major political parties in the Parliament.
It will “require a consensus if anything substantive and substantial is to be achieved… So we will have to have a lot of consensual decisions going forward,” he said; while adding that it is significant that “what I believe all the political parties have agreed to, is a publicly consultative engagement.”
Last July, Nandlall had disclosed that the committee met only twice for the year due to COVID-19 constraints but at the same time had said that that should not be seen as non-commitment to the process by the PPP/C government.
For Ramjattan, the APNU+AFC is equally committed to the process but says that the PPP/C will engage in blame sharing to stall it and distract from the fact that it could go on as is.
“I told him [Nandlall] …let us know who and who are doing the consultations and so on. This was already done. Why we have to go and reinvent the wheel and you got to go and refer back to your Cabinet and party and all that? They don’t want Constitutional Reform so they will place the blame at our doorstep. The quorum is three and if you want constitutional reform, proceed with the quorum that you have. This is only the preliminary things. It is not as if you are starting off the process,” he said.
