The Council for Responsible Political Behaviour has labelled the Prime Minister’s recent statements on a political platform as inappropriate and insensitive.
In a media release the Council said with campaigning now in full swing, several concerns of possible violations of the Code of Ethical Political Conduct have been brought to the attention of the Council.
It said in the first instance, a formal complaint was lodged by the National Transformation Alliance with regard to comments made on the political platform by Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley.
The Council said the allegation was that an offensive utterance was made using “inflammatory language with the potential to cause irreparable consequences.”
NTA Political Leader Gary Griffith complained about the Prime Minister’s statements in St James where he claimed the UNC’s stand-your-ground law would cause one race to attack another.
“The Council, having reviewed the speech made by the Prime Minister, is of the view that the language used was clearly inappropriate and insensitive,” it said.
The Council added that to be sure, the statement from the Prime Minister runs counter to clauses in two sections of the Code, the ‘Commitment’ section as well as the section on ‘Prohibited Conduct.’
“As Prime Minister, one would have expected that Dr Rowley would be promoting unity in our diversity, and while it may not have been his intention, the utterances can easily be interpreted as underscoring our diversity and more critically could have led some supporters to embrace and foster hatred and divisiveness for members of other ethnic communities in our society,” it said.
The Council said in its quest to guard against such possibilities, Dr Rowley as well as all political leaders must set an example for the citizens to follow and must be always mindful to avoid inflammatory statements.