The debate on the reform of the Electoral Code was again postponed by the Congress of the Republic

The speakers of this reform argued that the most controversial points of the reform to the Electoral Code have already been withdrawn.

The Government of Gustavo Petro has proposed reforms on several fronts since he assumed the Presidency of Colombia, one of them, which different political sectors of the country consider necessary, is the reform of the Electoral Code.

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The discussions on this reform in the Congress of the Republic have been postponed on several occasions since the Government proposed it in 2022, and now, when it is going through a final instance, it suffered a new postponement.

The argument of the proponents of this reform, among them, the national registrar, Alexander Vega, is that this policy has not been modified since 1986. In addition, they point out that this reform is necessary due to the changes that Colombia needs in the way of doing politics, especially in view of the 2023 regional elections.

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“The benefit that the Electoral Code brings is enormous because, not only does it integrate multiple regulations that have been dispersed over decades into a single regulation, but it also modernizes the electoral legislation,” said the Minister of the Interior, Alfonso Prada, at the time it was presented. the reform proposal.

However, some sectors, including those close to President Gustavo Petro, have not supported this proposal because there could be an impact from the Vega registrar, or pressure from some sectors for this modification to be made, which would imply that there is ” politicking” behind this purpose.

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“The Electoral Code proposal is a shame, promoted by the questioned registrar Alexander Vega. There are complaints of handing over positions and jam to congressman, “said Ariel Ávila, who together with Jota Pe Hernández made it clear that the bench of the Alianza Verde and Centro Esperanza coalition will not support this initiative. This is the same line of several political parties.

The First Committee of the Senate, in the first instance, exhausted the discussion, which was postponed until March 2023. The argument that they delivered from the Legislature is that they did not want to “desk” the initiative.

Now, in this session, an attempt was made to vote for the 218 articles contained in this proposition, however, the congressmen decided to postpone the discussion for one more day. This decision was known on the afternoon of March 22, 2023.

Senator Alfredo Deluque, who is the rapporteur for the reform, stated that Congress has once again postponed this discussion because they have “no desire.”

“We discussed the presentation report, we made the presentation of what the reform contains, and we even have some meeting points with some members of the opposition to this reform in the past, but we decided to postpone the discussion until tomorrow due to the accumulation of proposals” Deluque specified.

The senator, who represents the U party, affirmed that this is a vote that must be carried out with patience, since it requires a detailed study of each one of the points.

“We have no desire. We will study the proposals calmly so that tomorrow we can begin the serious debate on the articles of said reform; There are around one hundred proposals filed today and what this indicates is that there is a desire to reach agreements and consensus on proposals that are presented by the people who are part of the First Commission”, he added.

On the other hand, the speakers of the reform warned that the most controversial articles, such as the one related to the identification of Colombians, have already been removed from the document that is being studied in the Congress of the Republic. In addition, the proposal of Senator Paloma Valencia, who asked to archive the reform to the Electoral Code, was denied.

This reform had already been approved by the Congress of the Republic in 2020 during the government of former President Iván Duque, however, it was rejected by the Constitutional Court because a Statutory Law could not be approved during extraordinary sessions and virtually, since In that year, due to the covid-19 pandemic, the sessions were held that way.

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