Early elections suspended: what will happen to this initiative now that the legislature is over?

Although Congress on Friday approved the possibility that a early elections can be reanalyzed by the Constitutional Commissionthe current legislature had to be extended – until 28th February next – for this decision to take effect.

However, the leader of Parliament, José Williams, adjourned the session without responding to the request of the deputy Flor Pablo (not grouped), who asked “as a matter of urgency” for the extension of the legislature and the suspension of the week of representation , as well as Jaime Quito (Free Peru). “The majority does not want to leave”, denounced the legislator after her invocation did not succeed.

With this scenario, the debate on the early elections it would resume on March 1, after the President of the Constitutional Commission, Hernando Guerra (Popular Force), summoned the members of his working group to analyze other initiatives after the rejection of four others.

If the green light is obtained, the opinion issued by the Constitution would not be confirmed until the next legislature, starting in August, with which the chances of approving the elections for this year are nil. Furthermore, an electoral process takes at least seven months to take place, according to the law.

“The only possibility for elections to be held this year was for Congress to approve the plan in March with 66 votes, plus a referendum in June and a first round in December,” the research portal reported. Epicenter.

He early elections It is one of the main demands of the anti-government protests that began in various parts of the country two months ago and in which 70 people died.

However, the legislature did not agree to approve any of the legislative initiatives that included this advancement of general elections to 2023 or 2024, two of them proposed by the executive and two others by parliamentary benches, including Fujimori.

“If the plenary session of Congress accepts it, the drafts that come to the Constitution Committee will be considered in due course,” said Williams, noting that this working group must find sufficient arguments to propose one of the proposals. in the plenary session. .past projects or a new one.

The current legislature ended last Friday, but on the same day Williams announced that would run until February 17.

Guerra accused this Friday the “radical right” of hindering the possibility of debating the electoral advance again and recalled that, although the legislator has concluded, the commission he chairs “could still meet”. However, he says he received the copy of the request for reconsideration signed by Jorge Montoya (People’s Renewal), which prevents them from “touching on this subject”.

“It will prevent us from being able to call (a meeting) for tomorrow… it’s one thing to have different opinions and another thing to be obstructive,” he said.

He said that now the members of his committee “the only thing” they can do “is to hope that it can be voted on again” in plenary, on a date which has not yet been fixed.

Montoya submitted his request for reconsideration shortly after the plenary session of Congress approved that an early election could be reconsidered by the Constitution Committee for possible consideration in the current legislature by the plenary session of the legislature.

“This issue has caused us to lose seven plenary sessions unnecessarily,” the lawmaker said. Popular Action and Popular Renewal They are the ones who voted the most against the reopening of the debate on the early elections that day: respectively 10 and 9 of their legislators opted for this decision.

Popular Force and Free Peru, instead, they won the majority of votes in favor of reopening the debate, with 17 and 14 members of Congress respectively.

As, Alianza Para El Progreso, the Magistral Bloc and the Ungrouped Legislators obtained 6 votes in favour, while Avanza País recorded the majority of abstentions (3).