By Dr Bertrand Ramcharan
Human rights constitute the glue that can hold societies together world-wide, especially diverse societies like Guyana. Human rights strategies of governance can help the world negotiate new challenges, such as climate change, environmental damage and mass movement of people across borders.
After the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on 10 December, 1948, it decided that on this day every year the world should celebrate the rights in the Declaration and recommit to their universal implementation. The aim was to entrench a universal culture of human rights.
Due to its historical origins and evolution, Guyana remains a fractured society, and faithful commitment to human rights can help the different parts of its population to go forward together in a just society. There can be no more important issue of policy for the Guyanese body politic than to set a human rights course for the future.
And yet, it would be fair to say that governing parties, of whatever stripe have so far approached human rights opportunistically and with pettiness. The national human rights commission called for in the Constitution has yet to be established after some three decades of inaction.
Governments of different political persuasions have not seen it fit to propound human rights policy statements, or to offer human rights vision statements for the future of the country. Bodies like the Guyana Human Rights Association, which have served Guyana with heart, and deserve the highest recognition for their historic service, are vilified.
Over nearly four decades at the United Nations I have seen how human rights can be the glue to hold together diverse societies. I performed the functions of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and feel deeply that a conscious human rights policy can help take forward the land of my birth on a path towards equity and justice.
So, on Human Rights Day this year, I should like to present six questions for the consideration of our leaders and people. I submit these questions from the perspective of the quest for policy ideas that can help take our country forward on a path towards equitable and just governance.
The first question concerns the need for modernization of the human rights norms in our constitution. The world has entered an era of challenges to the survival of humankind because of global warming, environmental damage, and diminishing living space. Some countries are including the rights of nature in their constitutions. They are also deliberating on environmental rights, and respect for the right to life as people traverse frontiers in search of survival.
Would it not be helpful for the Honourable Speaker of Parliament to arrange for a debate in the house on the need to modernize the human rights provisions of the constitution? Such a debate, enriched by policy submissions from the principal political formations and from civil society, could raise the level of debate in the country and begin the process of searching for a new vision for the Dear Land of Guyana.
The second question concerns the need for legislation to bring into the laws of Guyana the human rights that Guyana has accepted through ratification of various human rights treaties and acceptance of UN human rights declarations, such as the Declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples and the Declaration on the rights of minorities. Might it not be helpful for Parliament to establish a Parliamentary Human Rights Committee, as has been done in other countries, to watch over national legislation needed to implement international treaties, and generally to promote the realization of human rights in the Dear Land of Guyana?
The third question concerns the application of international human rights norms in the courts of Guyana. There is a rich practice, in many countries, of courts drawing upon international human rights law to help interpret constitutional provisions and legislation, and to provide dynamic remedies for breaches of human rights.
The South African Constitutional Court, the Indian Supreme Court, the US Supreme Court, the Nigerian High Court, and the Colombian Constitutional Court have rich jurisprudence on these matters. Would it not be helpful for the Guyana Bar Association to consider and adopt a policy statement recommending the application of international human rights law by the courts of Guyana? In my book on the Guyana Court of Appeal, then the highest court in the land, I cited instances of the invocation of international human rights law by some of our great judges. The invocation of international human rights law in the courts of Guyana can raise the bar when it comes to the equitable rendition of justice to the various parts of the population.
The fourth question concerns the issue of providing human rights education in the schools of Guyana. In a diverse society such as Guyana, teaching the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to our young people can help inculcate a culture inspired by the opening article of the Declaration: All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood and sisterhood. Might the Ministry of Education spell out a national policy on the teaching of human rights in primary and secondary schools? The potent words ‘human dignity’ can enrich such a national policy.
The fifth question concerns the functioning of the rights commissions in Guyana. After nearly three decades, is it not time that Government act to establish the national human rights commission provided for in the Constitution? The establishment of the national commission could be the first step towards putting life into the sectoral rights commissions. Might our youthful President put down a historic legacy in finally acting for the establishment of the national human rights commission?
And the sixth question concerns the neediest parts of our population. A country of conscience should be continuously monitoring the plight of the neediest parts of the population, such as our indigenous people. Who, one might ask, is today monitoring the implementation of basic human rights, economic, social and cultural, as well as civil and political for the neediest parts of our population. Might this be a priority role for the still to be established national human rights commission?
On this Human Rights Day, I ask these six questions of our leaders in good faith and in all humility, and beseech them to act so that a universal culture of respect for human rights can pervade the Dear Land of Guyana.
Dr Bertrand Ramcharan is the Seventh Chancellor of the University of Guyana. He previously served as Professor of International Human Rights Law, Geneva Graduate Institute.
