Dear friends :

We are pleased to submit the first newsletter of 2005. Once again it is a thematic bulletin, this time dealing with parliamentary monitoring carried out by several members of the Lima Agreement in their respective countries. This bulletin contains information on Argentina, Mexico and Peru.

With warm greetings,

Asociación Civil Transparencia
Executive Secretariat
 

PODER CIUDADANO
 

EL CONGRESO BAJO LA LUPA

Argentina  | Poder Ciudadano

On December 2nd 2004, Poder Ciudadano and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation submitted the report “El Congreso bajo la lupa” (The Congress under scrutiny), the output of a civic monitoring effort of both legislative houses conducted during 2004, which highlights their strengths and weaknesses, and includes a series of recommendations to enhance and make them more transparent.

This work underscores the progress made at the Senate and recommends following the same direction taken so far, while for the Chamber of Deputies the report is much more critical and suggests an “urgent” reform of the Internal Regulations, as well as the dissemination of more information that should be provided by deputies to the citizens regarding the work they carry out.

The presentation was conducted by Laura Alonso, coordinator of the Action with Politicians department of Poder Ciudadano. Other attendees were the Vice president of Poder Ciudadano, Carlos Facal; the representative of Konrad Adenauer in Argentina, Hans Blomeier; Senators Jorge Capitanich (PJ), Mario Losada (UCR), Marita Perceval (PJ) and Marcela Lezcano (UCR); Deputy Nilda Garre (Frepaso); journalist Pablo Mendelevich and political scientist Ana María Mustapic, professor at the University Torcuato Di Tella.

Among the advances achieved at the Senate level, the report details the implementation of the electronic vote; broadcasting of “Senado TV”; the increasing volume of information posted at the web site of the Senate; the administrative decrees of the Upper House’s Chairmanship posted on the internet; information about scholarships and subsidies that Senators grant, as well as some sworn statements. Of a total of 71 senators (given that the third senator for Corrientes, Raul Romero Feris, has not sworn in yet), currently 16 - which accounts for 22.5 percent- publish their financial disclosure reports (declaraciones juradas) on the internet, even though they are under no obligation to do so. At the beginning of the year, only 3 did.

For further information: pablo@poderciudadano.org
 

ADOPT YOUR DEPUTY

México  | Alianza Cívica

Based on the “Adopt an officer” project - promoted by Alianza Cívica in 1995- and on the interest on contributing to the citizenship awareness process through the promotion of citizen participation in public affairs, while taking advantage of the 2003 federal electoral process to renew members of the Chamber of Deputies, Alianza Cívica boosted the following projects: “¡Para saber quién es quién!-Banco de Datos de las y los Candidatos a Diputados Federales” (To know who’s who– Database of Candidates to Federal Deputies”, “Adopt your deputy”).

Through these projects, the following goals were expected to be achieved:

• To contribute to the citizenship awareness process by promoting citizen participation in public affairs.
• To encourage a rapprochement between deputies and citizens.
• To promote transparency and accountability in legislation.

Projects were carried out in the following order:

1. Elaboration of a databank of candidates for federal deputy, called “¡Para saber quien es quién!”.
2. Follow-up of legislators’ performance during the LIX Legislature through the “Adopt your Deputy” project.

This project was aimed at facilitating access to the following information:

• Candidate’s general information, education and professional background, parties and organizations he/she has been involved in, as well as campaign promises stated in a curricular record.
• Information regarding the deputy’s legislative work: Commissions he/she participates in, position at the Chamber of Deputies and information about his/her citizen service module.
• Agenda or work plan of the commissions where the adopted deputy participates.
• Attendance and participation in work commissions.
• Law initiatives or reforms put forward by the deputy.
• Attendance at and participation in Plenary Meetings.
• Initiatives developed in connection with the transparency and accountability of his/her legislative work.
• Mechanisms of citizen participation incorporated or promoted as part of his/her legislative work.

The required information was collected through:

• Web pages on the Internet: The Chamber of Deputies, the Parliamentary Gazette and Web pages of deputies from different political parties.
• Direct interviews with “adopted” deputies.
• Print media such as newspapers and weekly magazines.

In order to promote transparency in legislative work and encourage a closer relationship between deputies and citizens with a view to strengthening democratic institutions, particularly the Congress, Alianza Cívica designed the “Adopt your Deputy” instrument. Additionally it summoned, trained and advised civil and social organizations from 11 states of the Mexican Republic to adopt at least two deputies of different political parties from their state in order to monitor their performance during the LIX Legislature.

Monitoring was carried out from September 1, 2003 to March 31, 2004. Local groups decided to adopt 20 deputies of relative majority and 12 regional deputies (plurinominales), from which 10 were women while 22 were men.

For further information, please contact: badrycamacho@alianzacivica.org.mx
 

CONGRESS DATA

Perú  | Transparencia

The Civil Association Transparencia conducts a monthly monitoring of the Congress, which results are published in the Congress’ newsletter “Datos”. Throughout 2004, this work has had a significant impact on topics subject to public opinion and topics related to the internal reform of the Legislative Branch in Peru.

Among the advances made and disseminated through Datos and many other media, we find, in first place, some incipient progress made in Congressmen’s salaries and expenses aimed at bringing about a real reform in the Peruvian public administration. This required a constitutional reform that was finally achieved and served as a starting point for the amendment of the regulations related to State officers’ salaries, a topic which is undoubtedly of concern to the Congress of the Republic.

Secondly, as a result of the dissemination campaign which once again was covered by the media, an encouraging advance was made in terms of parliamentary transparency through the Congress’ web page. This is a topic that has been openly ignored by the former 2003-2004 Chairmanship and which finally brought about a real change in the image of the Congress and the “redemocratizating attitude” it must always adopt. This new attitude included the disclosure of information related to the election of congressmen and their attendance at plenary sessions - topics that were not openly available to the public before. In third place, ‘Datos’ promoted, in August last year, the organization of a technical commission which drew up the preliminary 2004-2005 legislative agenda. The proposal was submitted to the Chairmanship of the Congress, and all topics were included in the agenda that was finally approved.

Finally, it is important to point out that there are still many topics that require urgent reforms and in respect of which efforts must be made in order to raise public awareness. These efforts are related to the Reform of the Internal Regulations in topics such as attendance control, cuts of Congressmen’s salaries due to absence, the Ethics Commission, Congressmen’s salaries and operating expenses, the internal labor regime of Congress officers, the procedures for constitutional prosecution and lifting immunity, access to public information, the work of parliamentary commissions, the management and submission of bills, parliamentary groups and their formation, among other issues in which, unfortunately, and regardless of the work carried out, impact on the media and scandal play a critical role in promoting reforms and making advances.

For further information, please contact: rgonzalez@transparencia.org.pe
 

Dirija sus consultas a Claudia Solari
 

Contacts