Congressmen Ruth Luque, Carlos Zevallos and Jaime Quito; and the political analyst, Fernando Tuesta, consider that the Ethics Commission Far from fulfilling a sanctioning and oversight role, it is used as an instrument to attack legislators opposed to the Executive or Parliament. For this reason, they propose that the working group should no longer be made up of congressmen and be made up of autonomous people.
Executive Director of Proética, José Luis Gargurevich: “Express mechanisms are needed for flagrant conduct”
The Ethics Commission has not proven to be a fast and effective space when investigating and sanctioning unethical conduct by congressmen. They need to evaluate its permanence as a self-control mechanism in the next Congressional Regulations. For those cases where the misconduct is flagrant and explicit, ad hoc and express mechanisms are needed, where the Board of Directors entrusts 3 parliamentarians from different benches (not involved) with an analysis, deliberation and immediate sanction. The Ethics Commission has lent its procedures and lethargy to negotiations outside the microphones, where misconduct is forgiven for votes and adhesions. The best way to make a control mechanism work is to demonstrate that every action has consequences: impunity cannot be the indicator that reigns in the institution that represents citizens.
Congresswoman Ruth Luque: “It is a commission to encourage anti-ethics”
The Ethics Commission It has not served to sanction or generate measures to prevent. In the face of flagrantly unethical behavior, shielding has taken precedence. On the other hand, it is questionable that their procedures have been used to sanction acts that were not appropriate to do so, I am referring to, for example, Sigrid Bazán, Susel Paredes and in my case. I am referring to political actions that the three of us had to express our political positions. Congressmen who did violate essential norms of ethical behavior that a congressman must have have been left safe. I was a member for the first two years, and my experience has been of being an absolute minority, so I can attest that in practice it was a Commission to encourage anti-ethics and in the bicameral debate they did not want to give a debate to improve the functioning of this commission, so it seems that they chose to follow the same dynamic in the future.
In the debate of the Constitution Commission and when I was head of the Ethics Commission, I proposed that there were two possible solutions: a Commission composed of a mixed form (independent people and a minimum percentage of congressmen) or a commission made up of autonomous people and no parliamentarian in office and its decisions are automatically binding and the Plenary only enters into the appeal instance.
One of the problems that requires express regulation is that it must necessarily enter the Plenary as a priority as soon as the sanction is issued in the commission and be definitively resolved in no more than 10 days.
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Congressman Jaime Quito: “The commission should not be made up of congressmen”
The commission should be made up not of congressmen but of other sectors that really investigate and sanction those parliamentarians who commit ethical misconduct or offenses that must be punished. We have seen that the Ethics Commission does not do that. They would have to be autonomous people, selected with certain criteria, otherwise there will be no form of sanction or position against those congressmen who break rules or fall into ethical breaches.
The weight of the votes is also decisive. He who does not have votes is obviously totally unprotected, but I do not consider it to be a question of being protected or not but rather of sanctioning what is wrong and not persecuting or using it as a control tool to subordinate those who are not with the line of the right-wing majorities.
You go to Congress to do politics, but for the majorities, not for certain power groups or for certain benches or parties. There is an instrumentalization not only in the Commission, but also in various instances of the spaces of power.
In the discussion of the regulations, no proposal to improve the functioning of the commission in the new bicameral congress has been discussed. They want all this to continue having a Congress in the same situation as the one we have today. Everything should be changed, not just Ethics. A Congress that serves the population is needed.
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Fernando Tuesta: “When it was sanctioned it was due to media pressure”
I consider that the Ethics Commission has not achieved the effect or objectives that were expected, neither in this nor the previous ones. Instead of being a real space for evaluation and sanction, it has ended up archiving many cases despite obvious ethical failures, and when it has sanctioned, it has almost always been due to pressure from the media or public opinion.
Furthermore, the congressional majority controls these commissions and that generates exchanges of favors that prevent sanctioning those who correspond. That’s why I wonder who really controls those who should control. I believe that there are very few cases in which the Ethics Commission has acted correctly and, therefore, I doubt that Congress will approve a truly autonomous external body, especially when it would touch on sensitive issues for many parliamentarians.
In reality, what happens is that support and favors are often exchanged because, of course, there are people and parties that avoid sanctions in exchange for support for a bill. And that, I repeat, has worsened from Congress to Congress. There are very few cases that have been sanctioned. At a time where the quality of representation is very low and where many have incurred a lack of all kinds. Now, is Congress going to approve and allow an outside commission to exist? I think it is unlikely.
Congressman Carlos Zevallos: “The commission should be made up of former congressmen”
From my perspective, I recognize that some cases have been addressed by the Ethics Commission, but the most relevant ones, those that would really allow us to demonstrate a firm commitment against the lack of ethics in Congress, have not received the corresponding sanction. Many cases have been resolved with minimal sanctions or have simply been archived, despite the fact that there was clear evidence, even known to the media. This has generated a climate of shielding and has increased the discredit of Congress in the eyes of citizens.
In my case, I was reported for the dismissal of a pregnant worker, but I demonstrated that neither I nor Human Resources had knowledge that she was pregnant, and that is why the case was archived. However, I have also seen how the Ethics Commission is used politically to attack congressmen, and I consider that in my situation this happened, without anyone later offering an apology.
One of the proposals to improve the functioning of the Ethics Commission would be to apply immediate sanctions for repeated offenses, organize cases by severity and age, and avoid political manipulation in the prioritization of files. In addition, an advisory committee could be convened or the Ethics Commission could be replaced by a body made up of former congressmen with impeccable track records, who have not been denounced during their period of legislation and who are the ones who defend the institution and its ethics.
