Santo Domingo. The senator for the province Saint John, Felix Baptist, presented today before the Senate of the Republic a bill that seeks to eliminate the D’Hondt Method, for the selection of deputies to congress, councilors and members of district boards.
The legislator for San Juan expressed that the article 77 of the Constitution establishes that the election of deputies and senators will be done by direct universal suffrage, in the terms established by law and 208 indicates that the vote is personal, free, direct and secret.
Bautista qualifies in one of the recitals of the bill “the D’Hont method as unfair and disproportionate, since it does not correlate the number of votes obtained individually with the obtaining of seats, which implicitly alters the popular will, reduces balanced participation and transgresses constitutional precepts, as far as “regarding the right of minorities, stated in article 209, paragraph 2 and the principle of equality of article 39, paragraph 3, of the Constitution, among others.”
Article 5 of the proposal proposes a modification to article 295 of Organic Law No. 20-23 of the Electoral Regime, providing that the voter will choose the “candidate of his preference, regardless of the position he has on the list proposed by the applicant political party, movement or organization”, in the cases of “deputies in the established electoral constituencies, the councilors and their substitutes in the municipalities, as well as the members of the municipal districts.”
The initiative excludes overseas deputies, Parlacen and national deputies.
If this initiative is approved, the deputies in the national territory, the councilors and members, will be elected by simple majority, that is, those who obtain the greatest number of valid votes cast.
The legislator’s initiative for San Juan, repeals Law 157-13, whichthat establishes the D’Hondt method and partially modifies Organic Law no. 20-23, on the Electoral Regime.
