The communication stopped being a public service in Ecuador

Ecuadornews:

The decision was surprising and in a single session the judges of the Constitutional Court declared unconstitutional the reforms to the Magna Carta that were approved by the Assembly in 2015.

Although the detail of the ruling is not known, the court reported that five of the nine members of the organization accepted three of the demands presented by several political and social sectors that were against these changes.

One of them was to consider communication as a public service. This concept was part of the Communication Law and is considered one of the axes that served the State could execute sanctions to guarantee the right to communication of citizens. This same measure was taken by the Collective Rights Commission of the Assembly that decided to eliminate the qualification of “public service” in the reform that prepares the Communication Law.

Before knowing the decision of the constitutional judges there was concern to know if they would not be attacking the Constitution. Now, with this ruling, that figure is totally excluded from the national regulations. The reform that limited the actions of the Comptroller’s Office, specifically on examining the achievement of the objectives of State institutions, was also declared unconstitutional.

The surrogate controller, Pablo Celi, welcomed the decision of the court, although he regretted that it took so long to repeal those amendments. “This resolution shows the unconstitutionality of the reforms introduced in 2015 and confirms the invalidity of the normative acts for which the power to conduct management audits was withdrawn to the Comptroller’s Office As Comptroller of the State, I have been claiming from the beginning of my management, the restitution of this faculty, because it is fundamental for the fulfillment of the control functions and whose absence favors its weakening by limiting the scope of the audits, “Celi said in an official gazette.

Another relevant issue after the Court’s ruling will be in the social security system. The judges decided to delete the paragraph that provided “the State guarantees the payment of the retirement pensions of the members of the Armed Forces and the National Police”.

The change of article 372 that changed the word provisional for social security to the IESS funds was also declared illegal. In the area of security, the mission that the Armed Forces had with the Montecristi Constitution will be returned. That is to say, the concept of “complementing” the integral security of the State was eliminated.

Another of the changes was that the sectional governments return to have the attribution to plan, build and maintain the infrastructure and health and education teams. The 2015 reform granted that power only to the Central Government.

Municipalities may also hold popular consultations in their jurisdictions on different topics, not only on those that have competencies. In addition, it was declared unconstitutional that the new workers of the public sector are under the Public Service Law (Losep).

It also returned to the powers of Montecristi over the Ombudsman and the age to be a candidate for the presidency of over 35 years. The rest of the reforms approved in 2015 were not analyzed by the Court, because they were changed in the consultation of last January, for example on the re-election of authorities.

The full text of the ruling will be informed in the coming days to the parties. There is no stage that can modify the criteria of constitutional judges

The amendments

The communication

The amendment approved in this chapter gave way to the reform of article 384 of the Constitution which establishes that the communication must be a public service and that it will be provided through public, private and community media.

15 amendments to the Political Charter were approved by a majority of the National Assembly.

The contents

Other aspects of the amendments are the role of the Armed Forces, Public Service Law, Social Security, Comptroller, etc. (I)

Sourc: https://www.eltelegrafo.com.ec/noticias/politica/3/enmiendas-corte-constitucional