Adopted in plenary with a clear majority on 31 March new decree which “regulates the conditions under which medically assisted death is not an offense and amends the Penal Code” was ready this Wednesday, almost two weeks later, to be sent again from the Assembly of the Republic (AR) to the President of the Republic ( PR).
The Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Affairs carried out the so-called final drafting of the diploma, that is, it consolidated its final text. Once this has been done, the plea is sent to the chairman of the AR. And this brings him to Belém.
Marcelo does not say what he will do with the pleas. Formally, there are three scenarios: enactment, political veto (return of the decree to parliament) or constitutional veto (request to the TC for a preventive constitutionality review).
The options are these. However, those who know the relevant procedures can easily anticipate that the PR will simply repeat what it has already done twice: ask the Constitutional Court (TC) to analyze preventively whether or not the diploma is in conflict with the Constitution . On the other two occasions, the judges, albeit by a minimal majority, rejected the decree and therefore returned it to parliament for the unconstitutions to be removed.
“Medically assisted death can only occur through euthanasia when medically assisted suicide is impossible due to the patient’s physical incapacity.”
Essentially, the judges have argued that a law of this importance cannot allow any kind of uncertainty in interpreting the conditions under which the state can make a person eligible for medically assisted death. The TC has even said the plea can be constitutional, but with one condition: the situations in which it will be possible to request a medically assisted death must be “clear, predictable and manageable”.
The latest amendment of the law went further to state that the standard procedure will always be medical assisted suicide (see side column with definition of concepts). “Medical assistance in death can only be provided by euthanasia when medical assistance in suicide is impossible due to the patient’s physical disability,” reads the new article inserted in the diploma after the last designation in the TC.
The Constitutional Affairs Committee had even scheduled the final wording for April 5, but Chega asked for a postponement. “We didn’t have time to analyze the text,” the parliamentary leader justified. PS, IL, BE, PAN, Livre and six PSD deputies formed the majority to pass the law. The rest voted against.
Source: DN
