Interior Minister Juan Carlos Videguin handed the proposal to Legislative President Ernesto Castro on Tuesday. On Wednesday morning, electoral reform had already been approved by waivers of paperwork and 66 votes from Nuevas Ideas and his allies. / Legislative Assembly.
The Legislative Assembly on Tuesday amended the electoral law to reduce the number of members of the Legislative Assembly from 84 to 60, change the seat allocation system and eliminate the possibility of electing members “with surplus money”.
The reform bill was submitted on Tuesday afternoon and, after lengthy debate, was approved at 12:13 am this Wednesday with a waiver and will apply from the 2024 elections. Win a seat in the FMLN.
“They wanted to include their friends. Corrupt friends needed jurisdiction, so they added them,” said Giovanni Zardagna of Nuevas Ideas.
When it comes to allocating seats in parliament, the “hair” system will be replaced by the “dont” system, which is known to favor major parties slightly over other systems.
Lawmakers also cut back on the number of lawmakers. San Salvador will have 16 members. Liberty, 7; Santa Ana, San Miguel, Sonsonate, 5 each; Usulutan, 4; Ahuachapan and La Paz, 3 each. And the remaining departments will have 3 to 2 members.
Who else will we lose? With new ideas, the number of MPs will be even smaller, and the theory of wanting to cover everything will collapse. ”
Sucy Callejas, Lieutenant for New Ideas.
They know they will lose their municipality, so they decide to get rid of the mayor. The solution is to get rid of them, as no number will be given to them and they will lose their legislators. ”
Claudia Ortiz, representing Vamos.
Equality or Electoral Calculation?
Nuevas Ideas representatives argued that the reforms would make voting “equal” and meet the demands of the people, but opponents of Nuevas Ideas said the reforms would solidify a parliamentary majority in legislative elections. It claims it was due to Ideas’ electoral interests. Electronic voting begins on January 6th and ends on February 4th.
“This is a concentration of power. This happened in Venezuela in 2012,” said Arena’s Rosa Romero. Claudia Ortiz, from Vamos, said Nuevas Ideas aims to “tailor the election rules to suit themselves”.
change formula
According to Eduardo Escobar of the Voting and Civic Action Initiative, D’Hondt “would benefit the Nuevas Idea Party” in the face of “eventual decline in votes”. He explained that Dont’s formula is “always proportional” but that he is one, although “less proportional because it uses the quotient rather than the larger remainder (voting remainder).”
In March 2023, the AC calculated that the D’Hondt method would reduce the Legislative Assembly to five parties: Nueva Ideas, Gana, Arena, FMLN and PDC. Excludes Nuestro Tiempo, PCN and Vamos.
One election expert said that since the Constitutional Council’s September 2006 ruling approved in 2008 “a minimum of three deputies to optimize the mission of pluralism,” there have been six lawmakers who have distorted the system. He pointed out that the division had been reduced from three seats to two. At least two members of parliament were approved for this reform.
DEMs
data
According to Axión Ciudadana, the number of electoral forces will be “further reduced” as the Dhonto system and 60 MPs will bring the number of parties to just five.
What were the electoral reforms for the 2024 elections?
Lawmakers approved the reforms to Articles 10, 13 and 217-3 of the Election Law without change. The reforms will “make or break the elections for the Legislative Assembly” in 2024.
1.- Article 10 of the Election Law
The subparagraph detailing that voters assigned to polling places will be assigned in alphabetical order is deleted.
2.- At least two people in each constituency
It is established that the legislature will have 60 members and each constituency will be consolidated with at least two members.
3.- New assignment of parliamentarians
Decreased in each department. Sixteen deputies are allocated to San Salvador, seven to La Libertad, and five to Santa Ana and San Miguel.
4.- New formula
Seats are now distributed by quotient and seats are padded with larger residuals. Here we use another form based on the quotient.
Source: Diario Elmundo
