NewsWhore
01-27-2010, 05:10 PM
President Leonel Fernandez Reyna has called the new constitutional text, proclaimed by the National Assembly yesterday, "the Constitution of the XXI Century". During the ceremony, he said the new constitution would be the guarantee of peace, democracy, freedom, social justice, welfare and prosperity of the Dominican family.
"Today we have this new Constitution. Here it is. It is a new text of which we can be deeply proud, because in the end it is the product of the collective intelligence of the Dominican people", he said in his keynote speech at the event. He announced that the 2010 Constitution would now be dated 26 January 2010.
The President stressed that the new bill of rights represents a quantitative leap because it introduces elements that relate to a direct or participative democracy.
He defined the changes in the area of the Judicial Branch as profound and radical with the creation of the Council of the Judicial Branch as well as the Higher Council of Public Prosecutors (a division of the Attorney General's office). Moreover, Fernandez said he believed that the creation of the Constitutional Tribunal was a great innovation.
President Fernandez cited these advances in constitutional law as a way of challenging some public concerns that the current Constitutional reform was done with the aim of extending the Executive Branch prerogatives. "On the contrary, since besides not adding any new powers in its favor, what has really happened with the entry into effect of the new constitution, is a reduction of some of the powers traditionally granted to the Executive Branch," he argued.
The President added that in the new law of laws, the appointment of the Chamber of Accounts is no longer in the hands of the President of the Republic, but in the hands of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. Likewise, President Leonel Fernandez said that from now on the Chief Executive would not have the prerogative of authorizing the presence of foreign troops in military exercises within the national territory, nor of approving the dispatch of Dominican troops overseas on peacekeeping missions. The power to annul municipal taxes, among other dispositions, was also taken from the Executive. The new Constitution consists of 254 articles, up from 122 articles in the 2002 Constitution. The first Dominican Constitution dating back to 6 November 1844 had 211 articles. The legislature now needs to work to modify numerous laws that are now outdated.
For President Leonel Fernandez's speech upon proclaiming the Constitution, see: www.presidencia.gob.do/app/article.aspx?id=11919 (http://www.presidencia.gob.do/app/article.aspx?id=11919)
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#1)
"Today we have this new Constitution. Here it is. It is a new text of which we can be deeply proud, because in the end it is the product of the collective intelligence of the Dominican people", he said in his keynote speech at the event. He announced that the 2010 Constitution would now be dated 26 January 2010.
The President stressed that the new bill of rights represents a quantitative leap because it introduces elements that relate to a direct or participative democracy.
He defined the changes in the area of the Judicial Branch as profound and radical with the creation of the Council of the Judicial Branch as well as the Higher Council of Public Prosecutors (a division of the Attorney General's office). Moreover, Fernandez said he believed that the creation of the Constitutional Tribunal was a great innovation.
President Fernandez cited these advances in constitutional law as a way of challenging some public concerns that the current Constitutional reform was done with the aim of extending the Executive Branch prerogatives. "On the contrary, since besides not adding any new powers in its favor, what has really happened with the entry into effect of the new constitution, is a reduction of some of the powers traditionally granted to the Executive Branch," he argued.
The President added that in the new law of laws, the appointment of the Chamber of Accounts is no longer in the hands of the President of the Republic, but in the hands of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. Likewise, President Leonel Fernandez said that from now on the Chief Executive would not have the prerogative of authorizing the presence of foreign troops in military exercises within the national territory, nor of approving the dispatch of Dominican troops overseas on peacekeeping missions. The power to annul municipal taxes, among other dispositions, was also taken from the Executive. The new Constitution consists of 254 articles, up from 122 articles in the 2002 Constitution. The first Dominican Constitution dating back to 6 November 1844 had 211 articles. The legislature now needs to work to modify numerous laws that are now outdated.
For President Leonel Fernandez's speech upon proclaiming the Constitution, see: www.presidencia.gob.do/app/article.aspx?id=11919 (http://www.presidencia.gob.do/app/article.aspx?id=11919)
More... (http://www.dr1.com/index.html#1)