Chile: the first draft of the new constitution is ready

The text, which is a draft with 499 articles, must now be reviewed by the Harmonisation Commission, which will make improvements to the wording and detect possible contradictions, eliminating content that is repeated, in order to have the final document ready on 4 July, that is, two months before the Plebiscite.

The Constitutional Convention published the first draft of the new Chilean Constitution afterwards the voting in the Plenary. The text will be put to a plebiscite for approval on 4 September, in a mandatory election.

The document, of 499 articles and 160 pages, incorporates the consolidated text of the norms approved in the Convention, ordered by commission. The same text stresses that the list of article numbers is not definitive, as this will be determined by the Harmonisation Commission.

The first article of the draft begins with “Parity democracy”, which defines that “the State recognises and promotes a society in which women, men, gender diversity and gender-based dissidence participate in conditions of substantive equality, recognising that their effective representation in the democratic process as a whole is a principle and a minimum condition for the full and substantive exercise of democracy and citizenship”.

The Harmonisation Commission, made up of 40 constituents who are responsible for proposing improvements to the grammatical wording and legal coherence, detecting possible contradictions and eliminating content that is repeated, will begin its work on Monday.

This Commission will have less than a month to present its observations to the Plenary, which will have to carry out the final votes, presenting a definitive text on 4 July, which the citizens will have to approve in the so-called Plebiscite of exit.

The Preamble Commission, in charge of drafting the text that opens the Constitution, and the Transitory Norms Commission, in charge of the transitory articles necessary to pass from one Constitution to the other, will also work in parallel.

The first draft of the new constitution can be downloaded here.