Success of constitutional rights commissions should be evaluated prior to renewal
the IPC and the entities to be consulted.
At the level of the committee, he said, government uses its slim majority to get its way without consensus, but without consensus, Government will not be able to get the two-thirds majority support required in the Parliament.
“Government must take full responsibility for not appointing new members to the commissions and not try to hide behind the opposition,” he said.
Lost opportunities
The Ethnic Relations Commission (ERC) was constituted in 2003 and Edghill was its first chairman. He resigned in 2011. The ERC was reconstituted in February this year. Dr John Oswald Smith is its new chair.
The RCC commissioners were sworn in in May, 2009. Most of the commissioners appointed then continue to function.
The Women and Gender Equality Commission (WGEC) was constituted in August, 2009 and the IPC in September, 2010. Former Toshao Doreen Jacobis of Tapakuma Village, Essequibo Coast was the IPC’s first chairperson.
Since the three-year term of the commissions ended, no commissioner could say if their term was legally extended.
Of the IPC, Indigenous peoples’ rights activist Laura George, of the Amerindian Peoples Association (APA) said, “The IPC has been inaccessible. I don’t know if Indigenous peoples have been able to access their offices and mechanisms to channel their concerns and recommendations.”
The IPC’s mandate, she said, is a good base to recommend legislative changes to policies or reforms in the interests of Indigenous Peoples.
“I have seen media reports of the IPC submitting reports to the National Assembly but exactly what those reports are or what comes out of them - follow up or implementation - we don’t know,” she added.
To a large extent, she said, members of the IPC have had their own interests, alliances and allegiances when it comes to political spaces.
“The APA has been doing the work of the IPC. For example, we have been making recommendations to government ministries and agencies, including the Ministry of the Presidency, for projects, programmes and policies that we know would affect Indigenous Peoples rights,” she related.
The IPC, which has been submitting reports to the Parliament, George said, has never invited the APA to a meeting, the APA has never contributed to the compilation of the reports, and it has been unable to access the reports.
“Those reports would contain concerns and recommendations from communities and advocacy organisations like the APA. We haven’t heard anything from them, other than meeting up with them at a workshop here and there,” she said.
The secretariat carrying out mundane functions to keep it afloat, she said, is an injustice to Indigenous peoples.
“I think we have lost opportunities where we could have collaborated on a lot of work and make representations and interventions stronger.”
On reports that IPC commissioners were going into areas like the troubled village of Baramita, in Region One, she said, “One wonders what strategic direction they are providing.” The APA, she said, had submitted a report to the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs on the negative impact the extractive industry was having in Baramita. The APA was hoping, she said, it could have been a part of a strategic work team to address the issues. It later learned that a task force without civil society’s involvement.
Tremendous work
Meanwhile, the WGEC, chaired by Opposition MP Indra Chandarpal, continues to meet monthly as it continues to work on a five-year strategic work plan.
Women and children rights activist Vanda Radzik told Stabroek News that the WGEC commissioners were asked to stay on after their term had expired. They have been producing and submitting reports to the Parliament annually.
In relation to representation on the commissions, she said, “We have gone overboard with multi-stakeholders representation. That has its place. If you are a constitutional commission dealing with gender legislation, women’s rights, rights based stuff, what you need is a bunch of experts and not any and every one.”
The work of the WGEC has been tremendous but was never given media coverage, she said.
“Over the last year or two, we have been working on legislation for sexual harassment in the workplace. It is rampant all across Guyana. We have had several workshops where women have said they have been harassed at the workplace. They have told of how they are denied jobs if they refuse to sleep with whoever.”
After years of doing work on domestic violence, she said, “People are now more