First modification:
This Monday, March 20, the Legislative Administration Council (CAL) gave the go-ahead for the motion of censure to which President Guillermo Lasso would be subjected for alleged crimes of corruption. Now, it is in the hands of the Constitutional Court, which must decide if the motion is in accordance with the guidelines of the Magna Carta.
The request for impeachment against the Ecuadorian president, Guillermo Lasso, made by the National Assembly, passed the verification of the Legislative Administration Council (CAL) of this institution and sent it to the Constitutional Court that will evaluate its legality.
Five Council legislators voted in favor and two abstained, so the motion was accepted by a majority. CAL accepted the impeachment request against Lasso, who was charged with racketeering and embezzlement in a case of alleged corruption of public companies.
Now it is the Constitutional Court that must decide if the request made by the National Assembly complies with the law and adheres to the Ecuadorian Magna Carta.
According to the opposition legislator, Darwin Pereira, the Court will have a period of six days to resolve the request and give it “admissibility” of the process sent by the CAL. If the response is favorable, the Assembly will continue with the impeachment process.
Pereira assured that this is only one step to follow, since, if the process is approved by the Court, the filter of the Oversight Commission of the Assembly is still missing so that the debate can be carried out in plenary.
For her part, the official assembly member, Nathalia Arias, affirmed that there were doubts regarding the processing of the motion presented. In addition, she ruled that she hoped that the Constitutional Court could account for due process.
Arias maintains that in the control of the Assembly “due process must be guaranteed from beginning to end.” Otherwise, he stressed, the process can be exposed “to nullity” at any time.
Lasso’s alleged links to the “Great Godfather” case
Several opposition groups, which are a majority in the Assembly, asked to send Lasso to trial based on a report from a legislative commission that was investigating the well-known “Encuentro” or “Gran Padrino” case.
The digital media ‘La Posta’ brought to light the controversial audios where the businessman Danilo Carrera, Lasso’s brother-in-law, appeared. In these, a plot of corruption in hiring and appointments in state companies could be glimpsed.
The same audios included another person close to the ruling party, businessman Rubén Cherres, who was linked in 2021 to an investigation for alleged links to drug trafficking.
The investigative commission recommended to the entire Assembly to demand explanations from Lasso for the alleged network of corruption.
The request for impeachment is covered by numerals 1 and 2 of article 129 of the Constitution, which considers censuring the president for crimes “against the security of the State” or for “concussion, bribery, embezzlement or illicit enrichment.”
Viviana Veloz, the assemblywoman who presented the request before the Assembly, had affirmed: “We have presented this impeachment trial because the factual facts, the circumstantial relationship and the conduct of the president are consistent with the crimes of extortion and embezzlement in the public companies Petroecuador, the Ecuadorian Oil Fleet (Flopec) and Coordinating Company of Public Companies (Emco)”.
The Lasso Administration criticized the report when it was published by the commission that is made up of the opposition majority and said it was a “tome” without “head or tail.”
The Lasso government is facing this trial at a complex time. He recently lost the local elections, which were left in the hands of Correísmo, and was defeated in a referendum promoted by the president himself.
In June 2022, Lasso had dodged an impeachment motion in the Assembly, because the number of votes was not enough. This event occurred in the midst of the indigenous protests that paralyzed the country for 18 days.
with EFE
