The State Council knocked out the election of congressmen Jhon Jairo Roldán and Alirio Barrera as the first and second vice president of the Senate of the Republic, for the period 2024 – 2025.
The decision of the Quinta section detailed in the ruling: “Declare the nullity of the act 1 of the session of July 20, 2024, with regard to the election of John Jairo Roldán Avendaño and Josué Alirio Barrera Rodríguez as the first and second vice president of the Senate of the Republic (2024-2025), respectively.”
The ruling resolved a demand for electoral nullity that was filed against the election of the two congressmen on July 20, 2024claiming lack of right to participate political minorities and gender alternation in the dignities of the Senate.
The State Council explained that, despite the fact that Senator Roldán claimed impossible to comply with the norm because, as certified by the Secretariat of that corporation, the only postulates were from the liberal, but the Mira and Ada matches also expressed their desire to represent minorities.
On gender alternation, the high court explained that the law imposes on political organizations declared in opposition, alternate representation in successive periods between men and women. This to fulfill the principle of gender equity.
However, the Quinta section warned: “The Gazette 1643 of October 3, 2024, at the point of the dignity of the second vice presidency of the Senate of the Republic, is that the only postulate by the spokesmen of the parties and movements with representation in the public corporation referred to was the demanded senator Josué Alirio Barrera Rodríguez.”
What allowed us to infer that this rule was breached is that in the previous legislatures that position at the Senate’s Board of Directors has been occupied exclusively by senators of the male gender, understood by Honorio Enriquez Pinedo and Didier Lobo Chinchilthe. Now the Senate ran out of his first and second vice president.
