{"id":128562,"date":"2019-07-15T14:08:42","date_gmt":"2019-07-15T14:08:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dr1.do\/?p=128562"},"modified":"2019-07-16T12:01:08","modified_gmt":"2019-07-16T12:01:08","slug":"constitutional-reform-not-presented-on-wednesday-or-friday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/2019\/07\/15\/constitutional-reform-not-presented-on-wednesday-or-friday\/","title":{"rendered":"Constitutional reform not presented on Wednesday or Friday"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Despite the rising speculation that the National Assembly for Constitutional Revision would be convened last week, nothing happened and tensions are expected to remain high when regular work sessions resume on Tuesday, 16 July 2019, at the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. Time is running out. The regular sessions of the National Congress close on 26 July. The President could call for an extension, keeping the legislators at work through 14 August. The ruling PLD party needs to present its pre-candidates to the Central Electoral Board by 22 August. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is at stake is the amendment that would remove the clauses that impede President Medina from running for President again. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There had been speculation on Wednesday, 10 July, that the bill would be presented to the Senate and approved. Followers of President Medina are a majority in the Senate. Then, it would be presented to the Chamber of Deputies on Friday, 12 July. But contrary to speculation, the bill was not submitted to the Senate on Wednesday. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The president of the Chamber of Deputies, Radham\u00e9s Camacho, did convene the extraordinary session. Deputies usually meet in session on Tuesday and Wednesday. 153 legislators were present and there was much expectation Friday would be their turn to pass the bill starting the constitutional amendment process. But after the Senate was not convened on Wednesday afternoon, on Friday morning, nothing about the Constitution was on the agenda. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the legislators met inside the Chamber of Deputies, outside the Congress building a large protest took place. It had been called by opposition party presidential pre-candidate Luis Abinader, who has rejected any constitutional amendment. Legislators that back Abinader left the Friday session to join their leader and the protest outside. The rally did not have the support of former President Hip\u00f3lito Mej\u00eda, who has said he rejects the constitutional amendment but stated he would not get involved in internal affairs of other political parties. Legislators that back former President Leonel Fern\u00e1ndez did not join the protestors outside the Congress building. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Political analysts say that Medina has not been able to secure the minimum 148 votes needed to make the changes so that he can seek a third term in office. This is two-thirds of the 190 deputies and 32 senators. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is speculation that Medina followers add up to 72 deputies and 23 senators, for 95, plus the 13 deputies of the PRD that has been their ally since 2015. Even if the support of the PRSC and other minority parties is ensured, without the backing of more PRM and other so far dissident PLD members that favor former President Leonel Fern\u00e1ndez, the numbers are not enough to ensure the passage of the constitutional amendment bill. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Opposition leader, Guillermo Moreno speculates the followers of Medina would “need to buy more than 30 legislators to complete the majority” needed to pass the constitutional amendment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more in Spanish:
El Dia<\/a>
Listin Diario<\/a>
Z101 Digital<\/a>
El Dia<\/a>
N Digital<\/a>
El Dia<\/a>
Diario Libre<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

15 July 2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Despite the rising speculation that the National Assembly for Constitutional Revision would be convened last week, nothing happened and tensions are expected to remain high when regular work sessions resume on Tuesday, 16 July 2019, at the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. Time is running out. The regular sessions of the National Congress close … <\/p>\n

Read more\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[154,3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128562"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128562"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128562\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":128609,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128562\/revisions\/128609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}