“Return pacification to society, national reconciliation and unity” were the arguments on which 99 legislators were based to grant amnesties to 268 people, among whom are political and social leaders who participated in the October 2019 protests, and cases of indigenous justice, defense of nature and territories.
The motion to grant the amnesties was presented by the Pachakutik assemblyman Mario Ruiz Jácome and the vote was recorded at dawn on March 10; The report presented by the Constitutional Guarantees Commission was accepted and the criticisms that arose from the legislators themselves regarding the legality of the document for having submitted the signatures after the deadline were left aside.
National Assembly grants amnesty to 268 people for cases of protests in October 2019, indigenous justice, defenders of nature and territory
“The purpose of the amnesty is to bring peace back to our society and for national reconciliation. We go in unity, with only one shungowith a single mind and with a single fist to walk as a united Ecuador, but with this instrument that is amnesty”, said the legislator Ruiz, somewhat excited.
Six hours lasted the reading of the report. Then the debate was opened and the legislator Ruiz insisted on three occasions that amnesties be granted to pacify, so that calm returns, so that the country continues walking as one fist, one heart and one mind. “It is the forgetting of the commission of a crime, but a political crime or in a political context,” she stressed.
That the amnesty report has been divided into four themes: the defenders of nature, life and water; the defenders of the territories; those who have carried out a social protest and have exercised the sacred right of peoples to just rebellion; and, those who have exercised their right to administer indigenous justice.
He also clarified that of all the amnesty requests, only 20% correspond to the group of those who demonstrated and protested in October 2019, and more than half of them were not in Quito, but in the different provinces of the country. He said that there are 268 people who cannot rest easy because they have legal proceedings.
Pedro Velasco (BAN) intervened to warn that 48 people included in the amnesty petition had no reason to be included in the report, because their processes had already been archived. through court orders. That is, how amnesty is going to be granted to 48 people whose cases have already been resolved in jurisdictional matters, he asked.
He also requested an explanation and basis for the provision of article 99 of the Organic Law of the Legislative Function, regarding the processing of amnesties in political crimes, related and derived crimes, not in kidnappings or crimes of private action, but if it is reviewed in the report there are cases of non-compliance with legitimate decisions of the competent authority, there are a number of people involved, there are issues of rebellion, instigation and kidnapping. However, at the end of the session, the BAN representative ended up adding his vote for the motion.
Legislator Mario Ruiz clarified that amnesties are granted to all those who have been prosecuted and those who have already been prosecuted, and that there are only two cases in which they are not granted, because the case has already been filed in the judicial sphere.
Fernando Villavicencio (CN-PSE) said that with the decision the National Assembly loses its memory. “Hopefully we can raise and deliver to the country a Moncloa micro-pact, so that it is understood that this pardon means cleaning politics of all the ballast,” he added.
He added that this is the time for forgiveness, but also the time for recognizing errors, as he recalled that he withdrew the complaint related to the legality of the report due to the late presentation of the signatures that approved the report in the Guarantees Commission, as he said that the content and the right of dozens of citizens, fighters, defenders of nature and human rights cannot be sacrificed, an error cannot sacrifice that right.
Before the press, he pointed out that the three decisions taken in session 767: reviewing the tax law, preventing the formation of a commission to evaluate President Guadalupe Llori and granting amnesties, the three facts are part of a special behavior in the that several legislators They should have acted. Guadalupe Llori was one vote away from being removed from office and generating an atmosphere of instability.
“Some legislators cornered us, I was cornered, because I could not discriminate my vote, I was never going to vote for the conspirators, because those who committed the crime of kidnapping, but we were cornered by the commission itself that did not allow the Assembly itself to discriminate the cases ”, affirmed Villavicencio.
Victoria Desintonio (UNES) stated that in October 2019 there was a general rejection of the rise in fuel prices, the social claim was not addressed and the Government’s response was repression.
He said that the government of Lenín Moreno accused the members of the Citizen Revolution of being responsible for destabilizing actions and that those statements sought to build a social imaginary to influence the opinion of the people, and it turns out that some of those influenced people also had power. in the administration of justice.
It is so much so that the Prosecutor’s Office immediately initiated actions that received media attention in the raids and arrests of the leaders of the party it represents, that on October 14, 2019, Virgilio Hernández, Paola Pabón and Christian González were accused of the crime of rebellion and the three were granted preventive detention.
He explained that the crime of rebellion, according to the COIP, is one that takes up arms to overthrow the Government or hinder the exercise of its powers. Where are the weapons wielded by the three: Hernández, Pabón and González, asked the Guayas representative.
The legislator of the National Agreement Bank (BAN) Guido Chiriboga said that they put more than 200 cases in a single basket, cases as diverse as some that claim to be accused and sentenced politicians, when what others did in October 2019 was burn QuitoIt was to commit excesses, to burn public institutions in Cuenca, it was to keep the country on edge.
He insisted that people who caused crimes against property and people cannot be put in a single basket, therefore, the approach to these amnesties must be reviewed, he added.
Only five of the 125 present legislators participated in the debate on this issue.
Vote
The 99 votes in favor of the amnesties determine that the UNES and Pachakutik benches voted organically, since each group contributed with 48 and 25 votes. The motion raised by legislator Mario Ruiz (PK) was joined by part of the Democratic Left bloc and the ruling party, represented by the National Agreement Bank.
Thirteen legislators consigned for the National Agreement Bank (BAN): Virgilio Saquicela, Pedro Velasco, Washington Varela, Marco Troya, Eduardo Mendoza, Augusto Guamán, Mariano Curicama, Elías Jachero, María del Carmen Aquino, Diana Pesántez, Francisco León, Vanessa Freire and Lidia Macías, alternate for Gruber Zambrano.
From the Democratic Left bloc, seven legislators voted in favor of amnesties: Alejandro Jaramillo, Johanna Moreira, Amparo Guanoluisa, Marcos Molina, Ramiro Narváez, Lucía Placencia and Xavier Santos.
The independents who voted for amnesties were six: Fernando Villavicencio (CN-PSE), John Vinueza (EU), Diego Esparza (AH), Amada Ortiz (before ID), Daniel Noboa (EU) and Bruno Segovia (before PK).
In the vote against, it was recorded that nine official BAN legislators did not support the motion of legislator Mario Ruiz. Also from the PSC, seven assembly members voted against, there were also twelve absentees, of which five are from the government caucus and seven from the PSC. (I).
Source: Eluniverso
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