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NPP Sen: Commission “Mocked Minorities” in Complaint Dismissal Against Mari Tere González

By on October 1, 2016

SAN JUAN – New Progressive Party (NPP) Sen. Itzamar Peña Ramírez affirmed the Senate Ethics Committee “didn’t comply with the procedure required by law” by suspending the process against Popular Democratic Party (PDP) Sen. Mari Tere González.

The NPP legislator said she attended a Commission executive meeting on Thursday in representation of her party’s minority, and assured they didn’t discuss the Justice Department’s investigation against González due to possible criminal acts from her alleged involvement in the government fraud scheme orchestrated by former PDP fundraiser Anaudi Hernández Pérez.

Sen. Mari Tere González

Sen. Mari Tere González is under investigation by the Justice Department for possible criminal acts associated to the public corruption scheme headed by convicted businessman Anaudi Hernández Pérez / File

“However, surprisingly, during [Friday] evening I saw a news report that stated the Senate Ethics Committee ‘suspended the process’ against Sen. González, when this public server, as member of the Commission, had not been officially summoned to attend any other issue after the one on Thursday morning,” she expressed.

Regarding this situation, Peña Ramírez sent a letter to the Commission’s president, Sen. Miguel Pereira, emphasizing that “the act described above is completely irregular and distorts the most elemental principles of minority representation in legislative processes, in this case, before a Commission.”

She added minority representatives have every right to participate in legislative processes, and scrutinized the Ethics Committee for “disrespecting said right.”

Peña Ramírez criticized that “the fact that the [Popular Democratic Party] is in majority and has the votes to make the determinations they want, isn’t an excuse to dismiss the right of minority representation.”

She called her exclusion of the voting process and the determination “a mockery to minorities’ rights and disrespect toward the Puerto Rican people.”

In her letter, the NPP senator told Pereira that any procedure held after the Commission’s meeting on Thursday at 9:30 a.m. is null, for omitting to officially summon Commission members to attend a different issue.

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