the spirit of this figure, according to the law
In a recall process, according to the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court, the elements of representative democracy and participatory democracy come together, insofar as it is the citizenry that has a direct impact, not to appoint their rulers but to remove them from office. their positions when they consider that they have not fully exercised the representation that they have conferred. The figure was instituted as a participation mechanism in article 103 of the Political Constitution and was regulated through Law 1757 of 2015, which contemplates a political trial, initiated by the same citizens, in the event of non-compliance with the proposed government plan. by the ruler. For this reason, the legislator established a period of 12 months counted from the possession in office as a prudent term to evaluate his management, since he considered that this judgment is valid from the verification non-compliance with the government program.
In short, the mandate revocation mechanism is designed to defend the programmatic vote.
For this reason, the inhabitants of a certain municipality or a department can request that their mayors or governors be removed from their positions when there is one of two things: either general dissatisfaction of the citizens with the work of the president, or when there is non-compliance of the government program.
However, in order to guarantee the continuity and execution of the chosen government program, and avoid an unlimited electoral contest, the legislator considered it prudent to limit this right. In the first place, this procedure can only be initiated until the moment in which there is less than a year left before the expiration of the respective institutional period, that is, only during the second and third years of government. Secondly, the possibility of initiating a new process to revoke the mandate is restricted when the first one fails.
If the necessary threshold is achieved (at least 40% of all the votes that were cast in the 2019 vote must vote), the minimum vote (half plus one of the votes) and prior report of the result of the scrutiny, the registrar of the Civil Status must notify the President of the Republic or the respective governor so that they can proceed, as the case may be, to remove the respective governor or revoked mayor from office.
Then, within 30 days following the date on which the Registrar certifies the results of the vote, elections will be called to choose the successor and the ruler whose mandate was revoked may not register as a candidate.
fishing in the choppy river of elections
The intervention of candidates for the Presidency and the Congress of the Republic in the recall process once morest Mayor Daniel Quintero adds an additional ingredient of polarization that, as a source consulted by this newspaper stated, blurs the right that citizens have to express his feelings regarding the management of the Medellin government, beyond the electoral contest and the clashes between politicians.
In that coming and going of declarations, and in their passage through the city, the candidates to occupy the House of Nariño have already expressed themselves for and once morest the recall. Recently, Juan Manuel Galán, of the New Liberalism, did it, assuring that “this is going to go wrong for everyone. Whoever wins wins, in a possible revocation, the city is the one that is going to lose”, and added that the process “became a trophy for politicians (…) that is of no use to the people”. And a cascade of reactions came over him, including that of former mayor Alonso Salazar, who saw in Galán’s words support for Quintero “who has the most corrupt of the Antioquia political class on his team.”
Along the same lines, the candidate Alejandro Gaviria also questioned Quintero’s management, of whom he said “he is a bad ruler and what is happening in some of the city’s emblematic programs and institutions worries him.” And although he said that the recall is also a legitimate form of citizen participation, “and behind it is not only Uribe”, he did express some doubts regarding the mechanism.
For his part, former mayor Federico Gutiérrez, a candidate in the Equipo Colombia coalition, has intensified his criticism once morest Quintero, whom he assures “is a sea of lies, he dedicated himself to dividing, generating hatred” and became the “chief of Petro debate.
Precisely, the senator and candidate for the Historic Pact for the Presidency is one of the staunchest defenders of the mayor’s management and who has insisted on strengthening the discourse according to which “it is the corrupt who want to remove the mayor. I propose to citizens not to support the corrupt. Rather, let us revoke all the corrupt in national history.”
And just as the presidential ones pull and pull the whistle of the recall as a workhorse to obtain citizen support in Medellín for their aspirations, the candidates for the Senate and the Chamber also mediate in the debate.
The most active in favor of the recall are the members of the Democratic Center, including Paola Holguín, Margarita Restrepo and Juan Espinal. In contrast, León Fredy Muñoz, from the Green Alliance; the liberal Iván Agudelo, and the members of the Historical Pact lead the defense of the president.
cases of peñalosa and petro, two antecedents
The National Electoral Council has been crucial in other recalls in the country, especially those processed during the periods of Gustavo Petro and Enrique Peñalosa as mayors of Bogotá.
The most recent was the case of Peñalosa (2016-2019). At the end of the second year of government, on October 26, 2017, the National Registry endorsed 473,700 signatures of the 706,708 it received and gave life to the process that sought to remove the president from the Liévano palace. Five months later, in February 2018, the CNE killed the process following finding possible irregularities in the accounts of the committee that collected the signatures. The movement might not justify $70 million given by Sintratelefonos, the ETB union. The times were more or less like this: in June 2017, the National Fund for Political Financing, an arm of the CNE, delivered a report on the committee’s accounts in which it found the alleged irregularities. Then eight months passed, between defense resources of the committee, rotations of the file and challenges of the magistrates, so that the February 2018 decision was finally known, approved with six votes in favor and two once morest.
The case of Gustavo Petro as mayor (2012-2015) had other nuances, although it was also plagued with resources and demands that bogged down the terms. On June 7, 2013, the District Registrar’s Office issued a resolution that certified the valid signatures to request the revocation of the mandate, however, Petro filed a tutelage before the Administrative Court of Cundinamarca in which he requested the verification of the signatures by graphologists. The Court agreed with the mayor in a ruling dated June 25 of that year. The Registrar’s Office complied with that mandate but, following review by the graphologists who incorporated the guardianship ruling into the process, the electoral body maintained that the signatures were valid.
Then followed a fight without quarter with appeals and impugnations of the defense of the mayor once morest the decisions of the Registrar’s Office.
The process was left up in the air for several months because a leg was born in history: in December 2013, the attorney Alejandro Ordóñez dismissed Petro and disqualified him for 15 years from holding public office. Meanwhile, the recall process met the requirements before the CNE and the committee was certified, even the Registrar managed to twice cite the recall vote. However, on March 20, the Attorney General’s Office terminated the process, considering that the recall had no purpose because Petro was no longer mayor.
Gustavo Petro was restored to office in April 2014 by President Santos, but the terms were no longer sufficient for the process to be reactivated.
what is the role of the cne in this process?
Any campaign to collect support to endorse citizen participation mechanisms, including recall, requires logistics that demand resources.
That is why the regulations consider it necessary to safeguard the principles of transparency, equality, citizen participation and political pluralism. Law 1757 of 2015 establishes for the promoter of any proposal on citizen participation mechanisms the obligation to present to the Civil Status Registry the accounting statements of the support collection campaign.
These financial statements must include the contributions, in money or in kind, that each natural or legal person makes during the respective campaign.
The Constitutional Court has considered in its jurisprudence that transparency in the financing of electoral contests and, in general, in debates that involve the direct participation of citizens, constitutes an “unavoidable condition of democracy that can ensure, in a good extent, with due diligence and preservation of accounting records.
That is why the rule is clear: the registrar will not be able to certify compliance with the legal requirements when the promoter has not delivered the financial statements within the term contemplated by law or when they reflect that the campaign exceeded the individual and general limits of financing allowed. by the NEC. The Plenary Chamber of the Council, following analyzing the accounts and other documents it deems pertinent, will issue the certification regarding compliance or not with the accounting and electoral regulations. Without that endorsement, the recall falls. In the well-known order that suspended the certification of the process once morest Quintero, the rapporteur magistrate asked the revoking committee to provide four details regarding his finances: 1) clarify what happened with the entry of a bank loan, evidenced in form 14, but of which no support attached; 2) clarify why several pages of the accounting book of expenses were canceled and some appear without the signatures of the respective accountant; 3) explain where the money contributed by Corporados Primero Antioquia came from, an entity with a verified net worth of $0; and 4) specify the value contributed for the collection of signatures by this legal entity.
The CNE’s questions will be addressed in the hearing that will be held next Wednesday, January 26, a meeting that will be the basis for the decisions made on the future of the certification. A final clarity: until the CNE issues its verdict on the financial statements, the recall process will not be able to advance in the Registry, which is waiting for that green light so that the final vote can be scheduled.
