On Thursday, the National Assembly passed amendments to the Defence Act, raising the minimum age for entry to the regular Guyana Defence Force (GDF) to eighteen.
The Defence (Amendment) Bill 2010 sought “to raise the age limit from not under sixteen to not under eighteen at which a recruiting officer may enlist a person in the regular Force” in addition to raising “the minimum age for enlistment with consent, for instance, of a parent from not under fourteen to not under sixteen years.”
While piloting the bill through the House, Attorney General Charles Ramson said that the amendments were necessary after the government acceded to a particular UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) protocol in August.
PNCR-1G MP Clarissa Riehl welcomed the raising of the entry age to 18, saying that she had “a fundamental problem” with 16-year-olds carrying arms in defence of a country, especially since at this age they are not even eligible to vote. However, she queried why the caveat remained that a 16-year-old could join the GDF with parental consent. Riehl also called for the re-establishment of a programme similar to the Guyana National Service to cater for those children who leave school early.
She, however, expressed concern at what she termed the “piecemeal” approach to making legal changes in Guyana, stating that what was needed was in fact law reform and not law revision.
Foreign Affairs Minister Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett said that in 1990, Guyana signed on to the UNCRC which was ratified the following year. She said that all along Guyana had been in compliance with the Convention, and that the minimum age had been 15. She said, though, that the provision was that these children would not carry arms.
However, she added that based on the incidents relating to armed conflict involving children, an optional protocol was introduced which instituted a minimum age of 16. She said that Guyana signed on to the protocol in August and hence it was necessary to make the changes.
Explaining why the amendments permitted 16-year-olds to join the army with parental consent, the minister noted that many young people when they would have completed their secondary education would join the army as apprentices and added that the government did not want to prevent this from happening. Rodrigues-Birkett assured the House that when the recruits are so young they are not allowed to carry arms.
Alliance For Change (AFC) MP Khemraj Ramjattan said his party supported the bill based on the explanation provided by the Foreign Affairs Minister.
The bill was subsequently passed by the National Assembly.
