The Inter-American Democratic Charter (2001) establishes as a fundamental principle of democracy “(…) the constitutional subordination of all state institutions to the legally established civil government and respect for the rule of law of all entities and sectors of society”.

In order for this principle to be effective and to derive responsibility, control, trial and sanction mechanisms have been established among the state’s check and balance systems, one of which is impeachment.

Most Latin American countries establish the intervention of two chambers for the impeachment process, that of the representatives as prosecutors and that of the Senate as an impartial judge who passes the resolution.

In our country, this private procedural law moves away from these universal procedural premises, because it violates the essence of legal proceedings, of any nature, the procedural legal triangle: the existence of the plaintiff, the accused and a third person. which must dictate the solution. The Inter-American Court ruled that the defendant in the impeachment process “must have a guarantee that the said body is competent, independent and impartial…” (Judgment of January 31, 2001, Series C No. 71, para. 77).

In Ecuador, the composition of the legislature makes impeachment an act that lacks impartiality. The absurdity is allowed that the same members of parliament who approved, presented the accusations, and even took an active role, even if only as a club place for expressing party criteria, are in charge of the trial, compromising impartiality from the beginning. it is appropriate for those who judge and violate the procedural principle that: “…for process to exist, not just to be valid, there must be unavoidable assumptions and requirements that are also necessary if we are in the process of impeachment.” (Galo García Feraud. Legal issues. 2005).

The court… although it does not pass a substantive judgment on a political trial, it nevertheless conducts the minimum review that the accusation must contain…

In its advisory opinion to the Court from October 2017, in connection with the impeachment trial, the IACHR stated: “… continuity in the presidential position for which he was elected by popular vote, for a government mandate of a predetermined duration, would depend on him maintaining a favorable parliamentary majority, or that the opposition failed to agglutinate a qualified majority of votes against him to approve his removal, regardless of the reason. This would seriously modify the rules of the game typical of a presidential-type democratic regime, as it would enable a kind of “parliamentary coup d’état or political censorship of the president”.

Although the Constitutional Court does not issue a substantive decision on impeachment, it still carries out the minimum review that the accusation must contain, which requires little consistency and relevance between the misdemeanor behavior, the violated constitutional norm and the evidence. Furthermore, the Court, with its broad powers, will certainly consider the case law of the IACHR. (OR)