“We are going to start the process of censorship of the commissions of the Chamber of Deputies. We have reached an agreement between the PDG, the Republican Party, the National Renewal, the UDI and Evópoli. We have the votes to censor thirteen commissions.” This is how the head of the Evópoli bench, Francisco Undurraga, confirmed the opposition agreement to try to take control of the parliamentary instances that are currently —mostly— in the hands of the ruling party.
“We believe that the political forces have changed and from that point of view we are going to exercise democracy and we are going to hand over the command of the commissions to this new political force that went against President Mirosevic in the previous elections,” added Deputy Undurraga , along with his peers Andrés Longton (RN), Jorge Alessandri (UDI), José Miguel Castro (RN) and José Carlos Meza (REP). And it is that the opposition —together with the PDG— is still wounded after losing the presidency of the Lower House.
In fact, the deputy Alessandri remarked that there is even the option of censuring the President of the House himself, Vlado Mirosevic (PL). “The day he loses the circumstantial majority in the room, he will be censored, because that is how internal democracy operates,” he said.
Deputy Longton detailed some of the commissions in which they will seek censorship, assuring that their objective is to set out “the priorities that this Congress should have to make up for the government’s ‘lack of agenda’.”
These would be the Emergency, Disaster and Fire Commissions; of Water Resources and Desertification; of the Elderly and Disability; Future, Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation; of National Defense; Citizen Security; of Social Development; of Mining; Sports and Recreation; Agriculture, Forestry and Rural Development; of Economy, Promotion; Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises; Consumer Protection and Tourism; of Extreme Zones and the Chilean Antarctic; of Culture, Arts and Communications.
For his part, the deputy of the Socialist Party (PS), Marcos Ilabaca, expressed the concern that exists within the bench of the PS, regarding the call made by Francisco Muñoz —alias Pancho Malo— and the deputy Gonzalo De La Carrera to be able to carry out precisely the motion of censure towards the Economy Commission. “Here the question to the right is whether they are willing to continue playing at the pace set by Pancho Malo and De La Carrera, or are they going to make a decision regarding what different organizations in the world of the economy are requesting,” he questioned. .
Deputy Ilabaca called for this type of issue of administrative governance of the Chamber, in all its dimensions, “to be serious and have a republican and responsible outlook.”
It is worth mentioning that the Government harshly criticized the motion of censure against the president of the Chamber’s Economy Committee, the socialist deputy Daniel Manouchehri. This is the motion presented by deputy De la Carrera, after accusing his pro-government colleague of processing bills of “private interest.” Let’s remember that De la Carrera attacked Manouchehri a few months agofor which he was sanctioned by the Ethics Commission.
In this regard, the Minister of the Segpres, Ana Lya Uriarte, stressed that “it has been our purpose as a Government to strengthen a healthy, democratic, friendly and kind coexistence within the National Congress. It seems to us that this is what the citizens, tired of of small fights”. And she added: “The censorship of the deputy does not contribute either to that democratic dialogue or to solving people’s lives, but rather falls within the area of the political fight where we would not want to be.”
Likewise, Minister Uriarte highlighted the work that Manouchehri has carried out at the head of the Economic Commission. “He has had an absolutely impeccable performance, according to the information we have requested. Censorship has no other justification than to make a political majority prevail over the performance of the task.”
