Dear Editor,
I confess to paying only intermittent attention to the exchange in the letter columns between Messrs Eusi Kwayana and Sultan Mohamed on the role and importance of the Preamble of the Guyana Constitution. I never expected their debate to stretch this long. I therefore likely missed several of the points. But as one of the persons who sat “around the table” during the constitution reform process to draft the preamble, and who can lay claim to having a significant hand in its text, I am familiar with the intentions of the drafters of the current preamble. I intervene in the discussion, therefore, to make public an important record, and not to take sides.
First, some background. After the Constitution Reform Commission (CRC) submitted its report to the National Assembly in 1999, reflecting the wishes and demands of the Guyanese people and other society stakeholders, the Assembly established several “Task Forces” to begin the process of translating these wishes and demands into detailed constitutional mechanisms and provisions.
The task force on which I sat as the PNC representative was charged with redrafting the preamble, among several other tasks such as devising the mechanics for the Public Procurement Commission. The team was headed by Dr Rupert Roopnaraine and included PPP MPs. In looking at the preamble, we were quick in agreeing that the wording must accomplish three objectives: first, to capture the thrust and spirit of the public submissions as embodied in the report of the CRC; secondly, to set the broad context for, and to inform, any future changes to the constitution; and thirdly, to simplify and shorten the text of the preamble to make it recitable and more familiar to the general public as our National Pledge and Anthem are. Though we borrowed some of the wording and ideas from the preamble of the original 1980 constitution, we considered its wording too dense and dry.
Instead, each stanza of the new preamble begins with an infinitive clause of purpose (to forge, celebrate, demonstrate, etc) to make it more rhythmic and emphatic. And in line with the first two objectives above, ideas such as “broad-based participation in national decision-making”, “reconciliation” and “collective quest” were duly enshrined.
Of note, the paragraph in the preamble that begins with the words “Acknowledge the aspirations of our young people who, in the own words, have declared that the future of Guyana belongs to its young people” was a submission made by youth groups to the CRC and was proudly included in the preamble verbatim.
Maybe the debate between Messrs Eusi Kwayana and Sultan Mohamed could serve the useful and important purpose of raising the public profile of the Preamble of the Guyana Constitution.
Yours faithfully,
Sherwood Lowe
