Roy Barreras, senator-elect from the Partido de la U, plans on pursuing a political reform project while in office to create a Senate seat for future ex-presidents and those who come in second in presidential elections.
“If this bill is approved in a year, it would give President Alvaro Uribe the right [to be a senator], and how great the quality and the stature of the Senate debates would be,” insisted Barreras, who currently has a seat in the House of Representatives.
The bill would give the president who is stepping down, as well the runner-up in the current election, a seat in the Senate that would allow each to have a voice in debates, but without a salary or vote on legislation.
Barreras said that the bill would cover ex-governors and ex-mayors so that they too could have a seat on municipal boards and assemblies in the period after they leave office.
The incoming senator denied that he was attempting to create a “lifetime seat” for Uribe in the Senate.
Barreras was previously in the news last year when the Cambio Radical political party expelled the congressman from its ranks for his support of Uribe’s presidential re-election effort.
