Venezuelan Legislature Approves 30 Articles for Constitutional Reform

[GeminiProgressive]

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/news/2750

Aside from the change to the presidential term (article 230), the AN also approved of changes that would provide communal councils with 5% of the nation's budget (art. 167). Also, the change to article 184 more clearly defines the functioning of communal councils.

Articles that had already been approved earlier last week include the prohibition against discrimination based on health or sexual orientation (art. 21), the lowering of the voting age from 18 to 16 (art. 64), a requirement for gender parity in candidatures for public office (art. 67), the toughening of requirements for initiating popular referenda (art. 71-74), the right to not having one's primary residency expropriated (art. 82), the creation of a social security fund for the self-employed (art. 87), the reduction of the workweek from 44 to 36 hours per week (art. 90), the protection of Afro-Venezuelan culture, in addition to indigenous and European culture (art. 100), stronger self-management rights for university students (art. 109), and new forms of social and collective property (art. 115).

The AN plans to continue its article-by-article discussion of the constitutional reform until the end of October, at which point a national referendum will be organized to vote on the reform.

Other articles to be discussed and voted upon in the course of this week include an expansion of the president's powers (art. 236), to allow him to revise political boundaries of municipalities and to name second vice-presidents, among other things. Other changes would include a prohibition against privatizing subsidiaries of the country's state oil company PDVSA (art. 303), the removal of central bank independence (art. 318), the transformation of the country's military reserve force into a "popular militia" (art. 320) and the strengthening of the president's state of emergency powers (art. 347).