{"id":12833,"date":"2019-05-30T13:23:44","date_gmt":"2019-05-30T07:23:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/?p=12833"},"modified":"2020-03-11T14:03:02","modified_gmt":"2020-03-11T08:03:02","slug":"what-kind-of-nhrc-do-we-want","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/2019\/05\/30\/what-kind-of-nhrc-do-we-want\/","title":{"rendered":"What Kind of NHRC Do We Want"},"content":{"rendered":"

The National Human Rights Commission, Bangladesh (NHRC,B) was established in 2009 and has been working for the last one decade with a view to supporting the government in its efforts to establish and improve human rights by observing human rights situation, giving recommendations to the government, and ensuring accountability of the government. This year, the chairperson position will become vacant by June as the current Chair will retire by then; while the member posts will become vacant by August. The selection process of the new chairperson and members will start soon. The civil society thinks, in order to ensure an independent and effective human rights commission, the selection process should be made transparent and participatory. This is essential in order to ensure its independent functioning as a state institution. Keeping that in mind, on 30 June 2019 a roundtable discussion titled \u201cWhat Kind of NHRC Do We Want\u201d was organised by Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK) at CIRDAP Auditorium, Dhaka. Human rights activists and representatives from civil society, UN bodies and other development partners shared their opinions in that regard.<\/p>\n\r\n\t

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Ambassad\u00f6r Charlotta Schlyter, Embassy of Swededn in Dhaka<\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Refika Hayta, Deputy Head of Mission at the Danish Embassy in Bangladesh<\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Sharmeela Rasool, Chief Technical Officer, Human Rights Programme, UNDP<\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Sanjeeb Drong, General Secretary, Bangladesh Indigenous Peoples\u2019 Forum<\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Shireen Akhter, Chairman, Women with Disabilities Development Foundation (WDDF)<\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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    According to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) Act 2009, Honorable President of Bangladesh appoints Chairperson and members based on the nominations of selection committee (comprised of 7 members) which is chaired by honorable speaker of the parliament. The discussants of the roundtable demanded that the selection process be done in a transparent, participatory, and neutral manner, without any political influence which can only be achieved by following a formal selection process. They further demanded for the NHRC Act to be reviewed and amended immediately in accordance with the Paris Principles.<\/p>\n

    In many countries, an open selection process is followed when selecting the Commission’s chairperson and members. Open applications are invited publicly where potential candidates can apply for themselves or civil society organisations can recommend names of candidates. The selection committee then prepares a list of possible candidates based on the criteria set earlier and familiar to all. Then they take stakeholders\u2019 opinions and recommendations regarding the listed candidates and subsequently takes the final decision. In the past few years, the selection committee did not make any attempts consult the civil society in any manner. Moreover, very little information on the selection process is public. Everyone present in the roundtable expressed that this time, they expect the selection committee to consult with civil society organisations.<\/p>\n

    Recommendations coming out from the discussion:<\/p>\n

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    1. Ensure participation of civil society in the selection and the election process of the member.<\/li>\n
    2. Institutionalise the selection process by following Paris Principles. Although the Act mentions who will be included in the selection committee, it has not stated how the selection will be done. It needs to specify a policy or criteria and inform the people on how the interested persons will express their interest to be members of the committee, based on which qualities they will be selected, and how far the selection committee will be able to work independently.<\/li>\n
    3. Immediately reform the NHRC Act in order to ensure a more transparent and inclusive member selection process and include a section in the law relating to public notice and open discussion.<\/li>\n
    4. Nominate those persons who have contributions to human rights, law, judicial services, education, social works or human development in accordance with the NHRC Act. While selecting, prioritise those who have in-depth knowledge on human rights.<\/li>\n
    5. Appoint at least one woman in the top two positions.<\/li>\n
    6. Refrain from appointing former secretary or government officials to ensure independent and neutral functioning of the commission.<\/li>\n
    7. Inform the public time to time through the media about what process is being followed in appointing chairperson and members to the commission.<\/li>\n
    8. Apart from the permanent member and the Chairperson, the other five members of the commission are appointed in an honorary basis. They are involved in other full-time responsibilities outside the commission. It is important to make necessary changes by reforming the foundation law. In the interim period, measures also need to be taken to ensure that the honorary members can make meaningful contributions to activities of the commission.<\/li>\n
    9. Include representatives of diverse population groups.<\/li>\n
    10. Ensure presence of opposition party representatives so that no allegation can be brought that governmental candidates have been favored in the nomination. According to the law, presence of at least four members is imperative to fill the quorum of the selection committee. In such case, presence of government representatives only is enough to fill the quorum. The Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (GANRI) has expressed its concern over this.<\/li>\n
    11. Ensure nomination of two names for each member position.<\/li>\n
    12. Give more importance\/value on members\u2019 personal qualifications and credibility rather than the organisations they work for.<\/li>\n
    13. Avoid political nominations in order to ensure independence and effectiveness of the commission.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      There remains concerns regarding the non-compliance of Paris Principles and standards set by GANHRI with regards to the selection of NHRC members. GANHRI, in its general observation (2011 and 2015), clearly recommended to publicise the vacancy of posts and make the selection process transparent. It also recommended that broad discussion with the stakeholders should be held throughout the selection process. One of the significant reasons for NHRC to get \u201cB\u201d status on its assessment was the lack of transparency and accountability in the selection process, as was identified by GANHRI in its report. Interestingly, while our neighboring countries, like Afghanistan, Nepal, India and even many African countries obtained \u201cA\u201d status, we are still in \u201cB\u201d status, which seriously undermines our country\u2019s image. On the other hand, lack of transparency in the member selection process questioned the neutrality and effectiveness of the commission. Therefore, making the selection process transparent, accountable as well as involving civil society in its every step to restore people\u2019s trust on the commission is a demand of the time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      The National Human Rights Commission, Bangladesh (NHRC,B) was established in 2009 and has been working for the last one decade with a view to supporting the government in its efforts…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12839,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[148],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-advocacy"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12833","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12833"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12833\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15079,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12833\/revisions\/15079"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12833"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12833"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.askbd.org\/ask\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12833"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}