The Guyana Human Rights Association (GHRA) today called for retired Chief Justice Carl Singh and the other members of the Constitutional Reform Commission to resign. The Commission was appointed by the President last year.

In a statement today, the GHRA said both the Chairman and Commissioners should resign “as a matter of principle,” as a result of the new political dispensation in the country.

Already, former Leader of the Alliance For Change, Nigel Hughes has tendered his resignation, as he was a representative of the APNU+AFC.

Though established more than year ago, the Constitutional Reform Commission (CRC) has made little progress.

The Chairman of the Commission was quoted in the Sunday Stabroek as providing a number of issues that may have been responsible for the Commission’s sloth in getting work done, ranging from the need for furniture for the Commission’s office to the border issues with Venezuela.

The GHRA has taken umbrage to the Chairman’s statement, and has indicated that while non-performance in itself is sufficient to conclude that the life of the Commission ought to be closed down, a more cogent reason for reaching the same conclusion is the fact that the Commission from its inception was not seen as part of organically evolving law in Guyana.

The human rights body explained that towards the end of the Constitutional Reform programme 1999-2000, the then Commission made a case for continuous review and reform.  

Citing Article 119 (1) A of the Constitution, the GHRA said the Constitutional (Amendment no.6) of 2001 laid the foundation for the establishment of a Parliamentary Standing Committee for Future Constitutional Reform Process as envisioned by the Constitutional Reform Commission.

Article 119A (1) states “the National Assembly shall establish a Standing Parliamentary Committee for Constitutional Reform for the purpose of continually reviewing the effectiveness of the working of the Constitution and making periodic reports thereon to the Assembly, with proposals for reform, as necessary.”

The Constitution provides for that Committee to co-opt experts or enlist the aid of other persons of appropriate expertise, whether or not such experts or other persons are members of the Assembly.

GHRA argues that these constitutional provisions, which are intended to guide the continuous process of Constitutional Reform, have been ignored by the Ministry of Legal Affairs, Parliament and the Constitutional Commission.

Singh, in his interview with Stabroek News, proposed that the Commission should be re-structured for legal reasons since the People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) no longer makes up the main opposition, and has been replaced by We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) as leader of the Parliamentary opposition.

“The badly written law creating the CRC specifically named the PPP and the PNC to occupy the 50% of the seats on the Commission,” the human rights body said, adding that “no matter what motivated the former Chancellor to raise this matter it provides an opportune moment for both the PPP and the PNC to adjust to the new facts of political life created by WIN.”

The GHRA said WIN has changed the political calculus in ways that require both the ruling party and the PNC to obey the rules, adding that to a lesser extent, the same conclusion applies to the Forward Guyana Movement (FMG), especially in matters related to regional politics.

“The obvious action required to correct all of the above obstacles is for Parliament to create the Standing Parliamentary Committee in order to create the appropriate mechanism to address Constitutional reform,” GHRA argues.

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