IBERO-AMERICA: Toward a Common Parliament

By Tito Drago Reprint | | Print |

Tito Drago

MADRID, May 30 1997 (IPS) - A two-day Congress of presidents of Ibero- American Democratic Parliaments, which closed here Friday, agreed on the need for a common parliamentary mechanism among the countries of Latin America, Spain and Portugal.

That body should bolster an Ibero-American Community of Nations, made up of the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking sovereign states of the Americas and Europe, whose presidents have met annually since their first summit in Guadalajara, Mexico in 1981, the Congress concluded.

Various formulas for the creation of such a body were heard. The president of the Mexican Senate, Genovevo Figueroa, suggested an Ibero-American Parliament that would “establish a mechanism of permanent communication with the parliaments of the rest of Europe, North America and other regions,” and which could meet parallel to the Ibero-American summits.

The president of the European Parliament, Jose Maria Gil- Robles, said there were several possibilities, including “attendance at the Ibero-American summits by the presidents of parliament, prior meetings of the parliamentary delegations, or combining meetings of legislators with the summits.”

Federico Trillo, the president of the Congress of Deputies of Spain, said it was paradoxical that the meetings of Ibero-American parliaments, held for the first time in 1983, began to languish just when the summits of the Ibero-American heads of state and government got underway.

“This is an unsustainable paradox when we are experiencing a flourishing of representative democracy in all the countries of Ibero-America represented here.”

The only nation absent at the Congress was Cuba. The president of the Cuban parliament, Ricardo Alarcon, turned down an invitation to attend as observer rather than full participant, which he called discriminatory.

Trillo underlined that he convoked this week’s Congress with the aim of “reinforcing the parliamentary pillar of the Ibero- American Community of Nations.”

The president of the Uruguayan parliament and vice-president of that Southern Cone nation, Hugo Batalla, stressed “the need for equal and full participation by each one of the nations that comprise a multinational group…the only way to reconcile the age- old principle of national sovereignty with the need for joint action” imposed by today’s era of globalisation.

The president of the Central American Parliament, Ernesto Lima Mena, pointed out that common parliamentary mechanisms have been developed up to now in the framework of economic integration. He underscored that it was now “absolutely necessary to bolster the parliamentary presence in political and social integration.”

The Congress also warned of a crisis of public disenchantment and waning of citizen confidence in politicians suffered by the parliaments of Latin America, Spain and Portugal, and signalled the need for new forms of participation by civil society.

The president of the Portuguese parliament, Antonio de Almeida Santos, pointed to “an ever deepening divorce between the represented and their representatives, voters and the elected, the sovereign people and their organs of sovereignty.”

In the words of the president of the Venezuelan Chamber of Deputies, Ramon Guillermo Aveledo, “politics has been delegitimised in the eyes of many.”

The Congress heard a broad range of formulas by which to broaden participation among individual citizens and civil society in general.

The president of the Argentine Senate, Eduardo Menem, noted that his country’s new constitution established the right of popular legislative initiative and referendums as measures to facilitate citizen engagement. De Almeida Santos suggested that large groups of voters could propose parliamentary candidates and drafts of new laws.

European Parliament president Gil-Robles pointed out that the debates of that body were increasingly enriched by contributions from non-governmental organisations, which are heard at public hearings and meetings held at the Parliament’s own locales.

Venezuelan lawmaker Aveledo suggested “an interactive parliament,” conceived as a place of work and dialogue, that would contribute to democratic governability. “We could imagine legislatures with transparent walls. Those within could see what was happening outside, in society, and people outside could look in.”

This is possible today, he added, “thanks to new technologies which should be used to improve human life, at a personal and community level.”

Carlos Baraibar, president of the Uruguayan Chamber of Deputies, underlined that “interaction between parliament and society will give more force to the demands of society, and legitimate legislative decisions.”

But while he assigned “a capital importance to social organisations, unions, business associations, neighbourhood and community groups,” he stressed that these could not substitute political parties, and that when they do, “it is because the parties are failing to adequately fulfill their specific tasks.”

“Parliament is the only setting where different ideologies and political conceptions can confront each other in a civilised but full and frontal manner.”

In the words of the Mexican delegation, “we must advocate a broadening of direct popular participation in decision-making, while ensuring a state of law.”