National Assembly under warning enters to define the term for the interruption of pregnancy due to rape

The National Assembly without certainty of votes and under the warning of the Constitutional Court will try, this February 17, to define the maximum term for the voluntary interruption of pregnancy in case of rape. There will be no debate, only a vote on the text.

To this is added the pressure of activist groups that will try to surround the Legislative Palace in search of a response based on positions of defense of the right to life and the right to decide on their bodies.

The 137 legislators will have to decide between two reports: the majority that proposes the interruption of pregnancy up to 18 weeks of gestation for girls, adolescents and women from rural areas, towns and nationalities; and the minority report, which proposes termination for girls, adolescents under 18 years of age, rural women and women with disabilities up to 12 weeks of gestation.

Without an assured vote, the National Assembly will meet to define the term for the interruption of pregnancy due to rape

The Constitutional Court in a clarification order to judgment no. 34-19-IN/21, warned the National Assembly that “it must pass a law that regulates the voluntary interruption of pregnancy in cases of rape within the period set by the Court, without the legislator being able to evade its responsibility to legislate and approve a law”.

If the National Assembly does not comply with the sentence, article 86, number 4 of the Constitution states that the judge will order his dismissal.

Also article 22 of the Organic Law of Jurisdictional Guarantees and Constitutional Control in its numeral 4 determines: “In the event that public servants fail to comply with a judgment or reparation agreement, the judge will order the initiation of the procedure for their possible dismissal ” .

However, for the constitutionalist Stalin Raza, the Court could not execute the dismissal of the 137 assembly members, what would occur is a breach of sentence, and in that case, the Constitutional Court itself could set new deadlines or issue provisional regulations.

In this case, adds Raza, there is no room for the removal of legislators because they are elected officials and the judges of the Constitutional Court do not have democratic legitimacy; Thus, the constitutional judges, despite ordering the Assembly to pass a law, since they do not have democratic legitimacy, cannot dismiss them because the balance of powers would be broken.

What article 86 of the Constitution determines refers to civil servants in general, maintains Raza, who insists that in the event of non-compliance with the ruling, the Court can set new conditions, deadlines and even issue a provisional law to regulate what it resolved through sentence in April 2021, until the Assembly issues the final law.

political positions

A few hours after the vote is taken on the articles of the project that guarantees the voluntary interruption of pregnancy to girls, adolescents and women in case of rape, the political positions have not changed, although the political approaches continue to try to obtain the 70 votes .

Spokespersons for the Union for Hope (UNES), the Christian Social Party (PSC), the National Accord Caucus (BAN-CREO), and the Pachakutik movement (PK), which together exceed one hundred votes, ratified that this time they will not vote organically and will have full freedom to decide according to their beliefs and convictions.

For the legislator Sofía Espín (UNES), the majority report of the Justice Commission fell into a kind of haggling trying to get, for political rather than technical reasons, the deadlines for the termination of the pregnancy. In that sense, she added, the new deadlines do not listen to the recommendations of the technicians and gynecologists, who point out that at twelve weeks the unborn feels pain.

Espín said that he hopes that the plenary session of the National Assembly at the meeting on February 17 will accept the minority report, which in his opinion includes the recommendations and the ruling of the Constitutional Court.

On the other hand, the president of the Justice Commission, Alejandro Jaramillo (ID), affirmed that there is a good atmosphere and predisposition in the assembly members to approve the commission’s report, where he sets two deadlines. That he spoke with the majority of assembly members to whom he gave a broad explanation of the text, therefore, he hopes that there will be more than 70 votes.

However, he announced that once this law is approved, he will present a reform project regarding temporality, since in his opinion there should be no deadline for all girls, adolescents and women to access any of the procedures for the interruption of rape pregnancy.

Johanna Moreira (ID), assembly member speaker, maintained that the bill will have to be voted on in its entirety and not in parts, therefore, she will have to withdraw the previous motion that she presented a week ago so that the entire text is separated from the Article 19, which refers to the time limits for interruption.

Juan Fernando Flores, from the ruling BAN bloc, considered that because it has to do with a moral, ethical and individual conception of each one of the legislators, freedom to vote has been given, so that each member studies, interprets the report both majority and minority, and based on that you can have freedom in making the decision.

Each colleague has had meetings with those who support the majority and minority report, what is certain is that the plenary session of the Assembly will have to make a decision whatever it may be to comply with the Constitutional Court’s ruling, Flores said.

Jorge Abedrabbo ratified that the assembly members of the PSC bench are free to vote on the issue, that there will be freedom of conscience to be able to act. But that he, in a particular way, will support the majority report, since he considers that consensus has been reached in relation to rape victims in the country. (I)