On Tuesday, September 3, Deputy Bequer Neftalí Chocooj, a member of the Cabal bench, filed an appeal in the Constitutional Court (CC) against the plenary session of the Congress of the Republic to stop the budget increase of Q14,151 million, approved on August 27 by the Legislature.
Chocooj said that he filed the appeal because the budget allocation treated the indigenous population of Sololá and Totonicapán in a discriminatory manner.
The parliamentarian points out that Decree 17-2024, which contemplates the budget expansion, violates several constitutional articles, which he describes as discriminatory with respect to the allocation of funds for the Departmental Development Councils (Codedes), since Sololá is allocated fewer funds than other departments.
“The action is brought against the approval of decree 17-2024 of the Congress of the Republic of Guatemala, which provides for the Extension of the State Income and Expenditure Budget for Fiscal Year 2024, by the Plenary of the Congress of the Republic of Guatemala, during the thirty-first ordinary session of the Congress of the Republic of Guatemala (…) whose call was signed by the President of the Board of Directors of the Congress of the Republic,” states a part of the protection filed by Chocooj.
The parliamentarian points out in the appeal that the approval of the budget increase violated several rights, including the rights to justice, security, peace, development and equality.
On August 27, with 113 votes in favor, the Congress approved an amendment to discuss a new budget expansion initiative in a session, on a day in which the pro-government deputies repeated the strategy with which they had already achieved a budget expansion once, but which was the subject of several legal challenges.
However, on that occasion there was no interpellation involved, as this was the reason why the previous extension was suspended by order of the Constitutional Court (CC).
The plenary decided by 114 votes to urgently consider, without opinion, a new initiative for budget expansion that, according to the records, was presented by the pro-government deputies Andrea Villagrán and Román Castellanos, which increases the budget by Q14 thousand 151 million 700 thousand 391.
At least 17 deputies voted against the bill and 29 legislators did not attend the session in the Legislative Assembly.
The initiative did not have any amendments, only the review fund which was to revise the wording of the law.
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