The Ethnic Relations Commission (ERC) is expressing its concern over the ongoing political impasse and urges Guyanese to be patient as GECOM executes its mandate to arrive at a date for elections.
The ERC in a press release yesterday issued a reminder that the commission has a constitutional and national responsibility “to promote cooperation, arbitration, conciliation, mediation and like forms of dispute resolution between all bodies concerned in order to secure ethnic harmony and peace.” It added that its integral role “encompasses intervention to mitigate social tension derived from political impasse, which if unresolved, will impact negatively on ethnic harmony and peace.”
The ERC had its genesis in the Herdmanston Accord which was signed on January 17, 1998 by the then President Janet Jagan of the People’s Progressive Party/Civic and Hugh Desmond Hoyte, then Leader of the Opposition and the People’s National Congress.
