President of the Servel warns “uncertainty” by Celis Law: “I do not know if we will have time to implement it” in case it is approved

The president of the board of directors of the Electoral Service (Servel), Andrés Tagle, warned of “uncertainty” in case the Celis Law is approved in Congress. Tagle expressed concern about the publication deadlines, indicating that he does not know if they will have “time to implement it.”
The bill – which was approved on October 13, in express processing, by the Senate and sent to the Lower House – aims to “save” candidacies challenged by the Servel for errors in the accreditation of administrative documents.
In this sense, it establishes, for a single time, a new deadline to comply with the obligation to accompany the authorization to the director of the Servel to open the bank account referred to in article 19 of Law No. 19,884.
If approved, the rule would apply only to the November 21 elections and would benefit eight candidates for Congress, including PPD deputy Ricardo Celis, hence the project’s nickname.
“The problem with this law is that, approved by parliament, it has to go to the Constitutional Court, because it modifies an organic law and there is an automatic control of constitutionality. Therefore, how long it takes the TC and then the President of the Republic to promulgate it, is uncertain,” tagle said.
“If approved, there is an uncertainty of when it will be published. And between the deadline for publication and the election, I don’t know if we’re going to have time to implement it and I don’t know the magnitude,” he said.
“The candidates who could be accepted, we do not know if they will do it or not. It’s not just one MP, there are several candidates. So it depends on the number of candidates that apply because the volume that changes is significant,” he added.
“Basically, if the election with the new candidates cannot be done, because the material is not there, obviously there will have to be a postponement in those districts,” he explained in conversation with CNN Chile.
“We will always make the best efforts, but if in the time it is enacted – and I am talking from when it is published in the Official Gazette until the election – there is enough time to implement it, it will be done, and if not, it will not be done,” Tagle added.

Original source in Spanish