(Trends Wide Spanish) — After more than four hours of session, this Monday the plenary session of the Colombian Senate was adjourned when the draft legislative act that seeks to regulate the recreational use of cannabis in adults in Colombia was being discussed in its eighth and final debate.
The session was adjourned due to lack of decision-making quorum, amid heated claims from legislators to the board of directors. It was called again for this Tuesday at 2 pm local time.
During the debate, more than 25 interventions by legislators for and against the initiative were heard, which this Tuesday will have its last chance to be approved or rejected.
File photo. A man prepares a marijuana cigarette during a 4/20 rally to commemorate World Cannabis Day in Bogotá on April 20, 2022. (Photo by Raul ARBOLEDA/AFP)
As it is a reform to the Constitution, the text must be approved in the ordinary session that ends this Tuesday, with a qualified majority, in this case 54 votes in favor, otherwise, it runs the risk of sinking and not fulfilling its Procedure.
If it is not approved, the initiative would have to be presented again in a new regular session and start its process from scratch.
The project under discussion intends to modify article 49 of the Colombian Constitution to eliminate the prohibition for the production, distribution, commercialization and sale of this substance through the granting of licenses by the competent authority.
Never in the history of Colombian legislation has an initiative to legalize the cannabis market gone so far.
