El Salvador’s Supreme Court of Justice authorized immediate presidential re-election

The Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ) of El Salvador rendered this Friday a decision that allows the outgoing president to compete for immediate re-election, with which Nayib Bukele could run for a second term in 2024.

In the decision, the magistrates order the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) to authorize “that a person who exercises the Presidency of the Republic and has not been president in the immediately preceding period to participate in the electoral race for the second time ”.

That is to say, If Bukele had held the Presidency during the period 2014-2019, he could not seek re-election for the five-year term 2024-2029.

The judges, appointed on May 1 after the Congress’s dismissal of constitutional magistrates in a widely criticized process, They overturned a 2014 decision that banned presidential re-election for the next 10 years after leaving office.

The Salvadoran Constitution stipulates that No one can be a candidate for the Presidency if he has exercised his functions “for more than six months, consecutive or not, during the immediately preceding period”.

The judges considered that the interpretation of 2014 is “wrong” and stressed that in their opinion, the Constitution allows a citizen to be president for a maximum of 10 years.

“It is the same article 152 ordinal 1 which allows a maximum of one person to exercise the Presidency for 10 years and in fact, the 1983 Constituent Assembly demands that these 10 years be exercised, if the people so decide, consecutively ”, we read in the sentence.

Add: “Illegitimate would be to promote the continuity of the president or a re-election beyond 10 years, that is to say beyond two terms.”

The magistrates also recall a qualification for immediate re-election and recall that “The president who ran as a presidential candidate for a second term must be required to apply for a license within the last six months” at the start of the next period.

That is to say, if Bukele signs up to run for president in 2024, he must request leave in December 2023 to respect “the ban on taking advantage of the position to make electoral propaganda”.

This change of judgment of the judges this is part of a judgment that deals with a request for withdrawal of citizens’ rights to a Salvadoran woman promoting Bukele’s re-election.

The previous bedroom admitted the request under the criterion that article 75 of the Constitution he recalls that “those who support the” re-election or maintenance of the President of the Republic, or use direct means aimed at this end, lose the rights of citizens “.

The magistrates, whose legitimacy is questioned by social organizations and the opposition because of their method of election, recalled that This article refers to citizens who support a presidential re-election beyond two consecutive terms.

Among the magistrates is a former advisor to the Bukele Executive, a lawyer for the current police chief and a former commissioner of the Institute for Access to Public Information, who was chosen by Bukele in a questioned process.

The agent, 40 years, won the 2019 presidential election in the first round and with a large advantage.

Besides, its popularity prompted the New Ideas (NI) party, led by one of his cousins, to obtain 56 of the 84 deputies of Congress.

To concern did not speak on social media, But some of his officials and NI deputies applauded the decision and encouraged his re-election.

The president declared on June 1, when he finished 2 years of government, that he will not allow the country to regress to the system that “has plunged us into crime, corruption, inequality and poverty” while “God gives me strength”.

(With information from EFE)

KEEP READING: