The Chilean Human Rights Commission (CChDH) announced Monday that it has filed a complaint with the UN Human Rights chief, Volter Turk, about the so-called ‘Agreement for Chile’, a pact agreed by political parties to carry out a new constituent process.
The president of the CChDH, Carlos Margotta, has pointed out that the agreement «seriously violates articles 1 and 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights».
The complaint considers that, «from a human rights perspective, it is not compatible with the right of self-determination of the Chilean people that 24 persons not elected by popular vote draft a constitutional project».
Likewise, Margotta has criticized that «another designated organism authorizes, supervises and decides the admissibility of the proposals declaring their compatibility or not with respect to the constitutional framework predetermined by the draft», according to the CChDH communiqué.
«All this turns the Committee of Experts together with the Technical Committee on Admissibility into the guardians or custodians of the process without the sovereignty of the citizenry having given them that power and authority, thus seriously violating popular sovereignty, restricting democracy and ignoring the original constituent power held exclusively by the people of Chile,» reads the letter.
Chilean political parties announced in mid-December that they had reached an agreement on a new constituent process, months after negotiations following the rejection by the Chilean population in the referendum held on September 4.
As the Senate explained in a communiqué at the time, the signatories agreed to create a body to draft the proposal made up of popularly elected members and «experts» appointed by Congress.
The Constitutional Council will be composed of 50 persons elected by direct popular vote, under universal and mandatory suffrage, under the principle of parity. This body will discuss and approve the proposed text and will be dissolved after completing the indicated task.
The Expert Commission will be made up of 24 academics, half elected by the Parliament and half by the Chilean Senate. This body will draft a preliminary draft that will serve as the basis for the drafting.
In addition, there will be a Technical Committee on Admissibility, of 14 jurists, elected by the Senate, which will review the approved norms in order to determine the «eventual inadmissibility» of the measures when they are contrary to the institutional bases.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
