The long-running and occasionally stalled efforts towards constitutional and electoral reform in Anguilla are now gaining ground again although the process still appears to be incremental, but there is a steady process of work.
This appears to be the current position as related matters were outlined at the Government’s press conference on Tuesday, January 12, by Mrs. Cora Richardson-Hodge, Minister of Home Affairs, who has responsibility for constitutional and electoral reform.
“I had indicated that the Constitutional Committee … was to deliver to the Ministry of Home Affairs a first draft or an update. I am pleased to announce that the update was delivered to us by the end of December 2015,” the Minister stated. “Either this week or next week, the first draft of the update, in terms of the constitutional process, will be going to Executive Council. We still have to commence the continuing meetings after we take the first draft to Executive Council for any further guidance in the constitutional process, and then the Committee will resume.
She observed that a shortcoming so far was that many of the subcommittees had not been fully formed, noting that work was continuing on the Draft Constitution.
Asked to elaborate on the Government’s timeframe for the Constitution, the Minister replied: “We were looking at the first draft, in terms of the Constitution, by the end of December 2015. Of course the mandate of the Constitutional Committee is wider than it has been in the past. For instance, not only is it dealing with the Constitution, it is also dealing with electoral reform. What happened during the 2015 election, in terms of the number of people who were in line for hours, the number of voting booths, and the Voter ID Cards, are now going to fall under that Committee to make a determination on. So the mandate is a little wider than in the ordinary course. The Committee is using a combination of the previous draft constitutions that were prepared and is going through and identifying [areas for consideration].
“There is also public consultation on draft constitutions which has taken place in the past and the Committee is looking at all of this. But what the Committee will come up with will go for public consultation before it [the Constitution] will be approved etc., because the public must be involved and must have a say in terms of the Constitution that will govern us, moving forward. In terms of a set timeframe, initially we were looking at December, but it turns out that the work is much more than we anticipated – so we are hoping that by mid-2016 we will have something more concrete that we can take for public consultation.”
