OVP asked the CNE to guarantee the right to vote of the prison population

Article 63 of the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela establishes that suffrage is a right and a duty of citizens, free, universal, direct and secret. This constitutional precept does not exclude persons deprived of liberty, which is also supported by Article 19, which establishes that the State must guarantee all persons the exercise of human rights, such as political participation, without discrimination, in an inalienable, indivisible and interdependent manner.

It is for this reason that the Venezuelan Prison Observatory (OVP) requested through a communication to the National Electoral Council (CNE) the guarantee of the right to vote of the prison population in Venezuela, on the eve of the presidential elections scheduled for July 28 of this year.

Since civil interdiction and political disqualification are conditions for a person to exercise the right to vote, it should be noted that both are accessory penalties, defined in article 11 of the Venezuelan Penal Code (CPV), as those “which the law brings as adherents to the main one, necessarily or accidentally.” However, prison is a main and corporal penalty, which in accordance with article 16, may be accompanied by political disqualification, as an accessory penalty, for the duration of the sentence.

Therefore, in accordance with Article 64 of the Constitution, which establishes the requirements for a person to be an elector, and in accordance with the Penal Code, we have that only through a court ruling issued in a civil interdiction process, and in the cases of a criminal judicial conviction, which establishes political disqualification as an accessory penalty, Venezuelans cannot exercise their right to vote.

In this sense, article 24 of the Penal Code is more decisive, since it expressly stipulates that political disqualification cannot be imposed as a principal penalty but as an accessory penalty to prison (and imprisonment), producing as an effect the deprivation of the public or political positions held by the convicted person, as well as the inability during the sentence to obtain others, “(…) and to enjoy the active and passive right to vote.”

Likewise, the document submitted by OVP to the CNE emphasizes that the right to vote of the population deprived of liberty is a human right, established in article 272 of the Constitution, by providing that the Venezuelan State must guarantee a penitentiary system that ensures “the rehabilitation of the inmate and respect for his or her human rights”; and “in accordance with the principle of progressiveness and without any discrimination, the enjoyment and exercise of human rights that cannot be waived, is indivisible and is interdependent,” according to article 19 of the CRBV.

It is important to note that political rights oblige States to implement measures that guarantee that all their citizens can fully enjoy them on equal terms.

The Venezuelan State must guarantee the inmate population the enjoyment of their rights, and therefore its duty is to implement measures to guarantee the right to vote. Otherwise, it would be going once morest the principles of equality, non-discrimination and justice that sustain Venezuela as a democratic and social country of Law and Justice.

We request that respect for the rights of persons deprived of liberty be guaranteed, taking into account that their inclusion contributes to promoting and fulfilling the purpose established in our legal system, ensuring the participation and role of all sectors of society, including the most vulnerable.

There are no human rights without democracy, and there is no democracy without human rights.