As government moves to craft a bill for the creation of a broad-based commission to spearhead constitutional reform, Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs Anil Nandlall on Friday accused the opposition of shirking its responsibilities in the process.
Nandlall levelled the accusation yesterday following a meeting of the Standing Committee for Constitutional Reform from which almost all opposition members were absent.
The Committee is chaired by Nandlall and includes Minister of Education Priya Manickchand, Minister of Public Service Sonia Parag, Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport Charles Ramson Jr and parliamentarian Sanjeev Datadin from the government side of the National Assembly, and Aubrey Norton, Khemraj Ramjattan, Raphael Trotman, and Amanza Walton-Desir from the opposition side.
According to Nandlall, the Committee was scheduled to meet yesterday for the opposition to make its written submission on the composition of the Constitutional Reform Commission (CRC) and other matters. However, he said only Trotman showed up, virtually, while the others submitted excuses on or before midday yesterday.
Efforts to contact opposition members for comment were unsuccessful.
In a video statement, Nandlall lashed out at the opposition, saying that constitutional reform is an important issue and one that was promised by every political party that contested the March 2020 elections. He added that the government accords constitutional reform a high priority on its legislative agenda.
He explained that their position has always been that a CRC, similar to the one of 1999-2000, will be established with 50% of its members coming from the government and opposition while the other half would come from civil society groups.
“That has been our position in the Constitutional Reform Standing Commit-tee of the National Assembly, which was established nearly a year and a half ago…Since April of this year the Committee made a decision that the government and the opposition will bring their proposals to the Committee [and]I indicated since then, that our position is very clear and it is stated in our manifesto [and] that I’ll bring it at any time.
“A date was fixed for the opposition to bring their contribution and submission in writing because they pointed out that they have more than one party in their Opposition umbrella. Sometime in May was fixed for them to make a submission in writing. They have not done so. We had a meeting fixed for May and they did not turn up and I was forced to postpone that meeting to a date in June,” he explained.
The AG added that the Committee was expected to meet again on June 7 but he was out of the jurisdiction so the meeting was adjourned until yesterday. He added that though Trotman showed up, he made no contribution to the meeting and left the Zoom platform before its conclusion.
As a result, he said that they proceeded with the meeting even in the absence of the additional opposition members.
“I tabled the government’s proposal, which is that the government is submitting that this Constitutional Reform Commission be established by a law, that the members are to be appointed by His Excellency the President, and that 50% of the membership shall come from the government side in the Parliament and the Opposition parliamentarians and the other 50 shall come from civil society organizations, including the labour movement, the Private Sector Commission, the religious organizations, Guyana Bar Association, farmers’ organizations, organizations representing women and organizations representing youth.
“The Chairperson of the Commission is to be appointed by the President in the exercise of his own deliberate judgment. Those basic provisions will begin to be crafted into a bill and then the other consequential provisions will be added to the bill to ensure that the Commission is able to discharge its mandate. The terms of reference will be established, the financing arrangements will be established in the bill as well as how the procedure of the Commission will unfold. Those issues will have to be decided upon in the Committee and of course taken to our respective principals for approval because the bill will be in draft form. Hopefully we find consensus and we can push the process forward,” Nandlall said.
While saying that the government remains hopeful that the opposition would actively participate in the constitutional reform process, since it requires its support for approval in the National Assembly, Nandlall also sounded a warning that government would not sit idly by and allow the process to be stymied.
“So we have decided, unfortunately, to move in the direction that we have today. And if the opposition is not prepared to come on board, well then that’s quite unfortunate. All we can do at this stage is to demonstrate to the public demonstrate to the people our willingness, our preparedness to deliver on what we have promised… the government can’t allow that to cripple us and prevent us from moving the country forward,” he said.
Soon after the PPP/C took office in August of 2020, Nandlall had outlined the legislative agenda for his ministry and he had said that reform of the election laws and constitution were high on the agenda.
