The debate that will make history in Peru: the legality of the dissolution of the Congress

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Congress of Peru (Credit: CRIS BOURONCLE / AFP via Getty Images)

(CNN Spanish) - On Tuesday, the plenary session of the Constitutional Court, the supreme interpreter of the Constitution of Peru, will begin a debate that should conclude with a vote on the dissolution of Congress and the legality of that decision taken by the President of Peru Martín Vizcarra .

On September 30, 2019, President Martín Vizcarra dissolved the Peruvian parliament under one of the articles of the Constitution. This happened after a series of confrontations between the Executive and the Congress, of an opposition majority, which began under the presidency of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski. The ex-president resigned amid accusations about his relationship with the Brazilian company Odebrecht. Vizcarra, vice president of Kuczynski, assumed power, but the relationship between the Executive and the Legislative did not improve.

After the dissolution of the Congress, the former president of the Parliament and president of the Permanent Commission, Pedro Olaechea, filed a lawsuit before the Constitutional Court seeking that this body declare void the decision taken by Martín Vizcarra. The president said that he dissolved the Parliament protected by the powers conferred on him by the Constitution, but a sector of the dissolved Congress indicated the opposite and described the decision adopted by the president as a "coup d'etat".

The presentation on the case will be held on Tuesday by Judge Carlos Ramos, one of the 7 members of the Constitutional Court. The document, which has already been made public, proposes to declare the demand of the Permanent Commission unfounded, that is, it validates the dissolution of parliament. After the presentation, the magistrates should vote and it will be the result of that vote that defines the last word of this body on the dissolution of Parliament.

While this happens, the elections to elect the Congress that will replace the dissolved one, and that will exercise its functions only for a year and a half, that is, until the general elections of 2021, will be held on Sunday, January 26.

In November 2019, the magistrate of the Constitutional Court Carlos Ramos told CNN that the elections took place beyond the decision that this institution will take on the lawsuit filed by Pedro Olaechea: “The elections are held; that is to say, I believe that in that sense there does not have to be concern in the citizenship ”.

CongressMartín Vizcarra