The project to decriminalize assisted death will even be voted on in plenary tomorrow, after passing through the Constitutional Affairs Committee yesterday, the same day the President of the Assembly of the Republic decided to launch the PSD initiative for a referendum on euthanasia for “there are no changes in circumstances” in relation to the previous initiative, which has already been presented on the same issue [do Chega]🇧🇷
The General Secretary of the PSD and former Social Democratic parliamentary leader, Hugo Soares, announced that the PSD will appeal to the plenary of this decision by Augusto Santos Silva, accusing the PS of “conspiracy” and ” go hand in hand with Chega”. . This is because André Ventura was the first to speak out against the PSD referendum proposal, claiming it was “unconstitutional”.
“What are the criteria of the President of the Assembly of the Republic, who has already decided otherwise in this legislature?” asked Hugo Soares. When asked whether the PSD will appeal to the Constitutional Court against the decision of inadmissibility of the draft resolution of the referendum on the decriminalization of euthanasia, the Social Democratic leader only pointed to the appeal in plenary. “The picture will be perfect when the PSD source is voted on, who will be next to each other will be Chega and PS,” underlined Hugo Soares.
Augusto Santos Silva’s decision was announced at an extraordinary conference of leaders precisely to discuss the PSD’s request for admission and the planning of its referendum proposal.
Earlier, in the Committee on Constitutional Affairs, Rights, Freedoms and Guarantees – in which the new project to decriminalize assisted death was approved with votes for PS, IL and BE – Social Democratic deputy Paula Cardoso called on the deputies present to to postpone the vote for a week due to the fact that an extraordinary conference of leaders was scheduled for yesterday afternoon to discuss the draft resolution of the PSD, but this call was opposed by the PS, BE and the Liberal Initiative.
Bowl waves with reversal
After the leadership conference, Chega’s president announced that, should the decriminalization of euthanasia come into effect, “the first project” the party will present to the Assembly of the Republic in the next term will be to try to overturn this law to make. . And he promised to do everything to try to stop the vote in plenary tomorrow, also calling on the president of the republic not to “let this law come into force”.
BE and PAN argued that the PSD initiative for a referendum should have been accepted even if they opposed its content, but PS, Chega, IL and Livre agreed with its rejection.
The parliamentary leader of the PS, Eurico Brilhante Dias, welcomed the decision of the parliament speaker and endorsed his legal-constitutional analysis. Asked about Chega’s intentions, he added that he sees no reason why the replacement text based on initiatives by socialists, BE, IL and PAN should not be voted on in plenary tomorrow. “As we expected, the draft resolution presented at the last minute ran serious risks of being unconstitutional,” he said.
Moments
2016 petition
The parliamentary debate on death by medical aid began three terms of office after the delivery of a petition with 8,400 signatures to the Assembly of the Republic calling for the decriminalization of euthanasia. Submitted in April 2016, the petition was followed by a manifesto from the civil movement “Right to die with dignity” and, once in parliament, triggered the first round of hearings involving entities such as the Orders of Doctors and Nurses, or the National Ethics Council for the Life Sciences. At that time, the deputies also heard from different personalities mainly associated with the jurisdiction, such as Jorge Reis Novais, Teresa Beleza, Mafalda Miranda Barbosa, Manuel Costa Andrade or Luísa Neto.
projects of 2017
The petition was due to go to plenary on January 1, 2017, but the decriminalization of medically assisted death would not be voted on until more than a year later – on May 29, 2018 – through bills introduced by PS, Bloco de Esquerda, PAN and PEV . They would all fail, but the socialist project was stopped by just five votes. PS and BE immediately pointed to the next legislature.
2021 approval and vetoes
In 2021, five bills will be submitted on this subject. After a hearing of almost a year, they arrived at a joint proposal that was approved in plenary. The diploma went to Belém and from there to the Constitutional Court, where it would appear with a declaration of unconstitutionality. Returned to the deputies, it was reformulated and finally approved shortly before the dissolution of parliament, but was to receive a political veto from the President of the Republic.
Return in 2022
Already in the current legislature, four parties – PS, BE, Liberaal Initiatief and PAN – have resubmitted bills, which have been central to the work in the specialty. Along the way there were two bills proposing a referendum on euthanasia (the first submitted by PSD deputies, the second, already in the current legislature, by Chega).
Source: DN
