[News] Congress approved elimination of parliamentary, president and ministerial immunity

[Dr.Drako]

 

The opinion reached the necessary votes to withdraw the constitutional prerogative that prevented legislators from being processed and arrested without the authorization of Parliament.

The plenary session of the Congress of the Republic approved this Sunday a constitutional amendment to eliminate the parliamentary immunity of the president, the ministers of state, the magistrates of the Constitutional Court, the supreme judges and prosecutors, as well as other authorities that had said investiture.

 

The proposal modifies article 93 of the Constitution and deletes the aforementioned prerogative, in such a way that it was only maintained that the legislators "are not responsible before any authority or court for the opinions and votes they issue".

 

As well as article 99 stating that "the ministers of State do not have a political prejudice, nor any type of immunity during the exercise of office," and 117 ° stating that the president "may also be accused of crimes to the detriment of the State. committed during his mandate or before ”.

This reform was approved with 110 votes in favor, 13 votes against and 0 abstentions after an hour earlier the plenary approved the reconsideration of a previous substitute text that only reached the parliamentarians by 110 in favor, 14 against and zero abstentions .

Last Saturday, the substitute text approved this Sunday was rejected by the national representation with 82 votes in favor, 14 votes against and 25 abstentions.

 

Failing to reach 87 votes, the proposal to eliminate parliamentary immunity must be submitted to a referendum to become law.

At the beginning of the debate, the president of the Constitution Commission, Omar Chehade (Alliance for progress), had pointed out that the measure marked "a turning point" in the history of Parliament, since the objective of immunity "has been contaminated".

"That noble institution with which parliamentary immunity was born, unfortunately in recent decades has been contaminated to the point that the Congress of the Republic is seen in a different way, in a bad way by the people," he said during his speech.

On June 19, Chehade assured that in Parliament there was no "maximum consensus" regarding parliamentary immunity, but considered that this prerogative should be "restricted and diminished".

 

It should be noted that for the measure to take effect it must be approved by a qualified majority (87 votes) in the next legislature because it is a constitutional reform.