Photo: Chepa Beltran/LongVisual via ZUMA Press Wire/picture alliance / Deutsche Welle
The plenary session of the Colombian Senate rejected, in its eighth and last debate, the legalization of the recreational use of marijuana, a debate that has brought controversy in recent days and although it seemed to have a green light, in the end it did not gather the necessary votes.
Although he has had 47 votes in favor and 43 againstthe bill that sought to modify the Constitution to allow the use of recreational cannabis could not be approved as it did not gather the necessary 54 (half plus one) in the Senate vote that took place barely an hour before it ended the legislature.
The senator of the Liberal Party Juan Carlos Losada, who presented the project, said after knowing the result of the vote, that despite the fact that the bill today “dies here”, they will present it again in the next legislature because it is the first time that the decriminalization of cannabis has gone this far on the legislative path.
“Continuing to leave a substance that is legal in the hands of traquetos (mafiosos) and jíbaros (narcos) is detrimental to the children of Colombia, and is detrimental to the country’s democracy and that a new approach is the only way”, concluded Losada.
It benefits the mafias
For her part, the author of the project, the official senator of the Historical Pact María José Pizarro, argued: “it is sad because a substance that is legal to consume, that is legal to carry and that is legal to sow, is still illegal for sale, which only benefits mafias and illegality. Today with this decision illegality wins, a failed prohibitionist policy wins”.
Cannabis for medicinal use is allowed in Colombia, but for recreational use, governments of different parties have opted, legislature after legislature, for a prohibitionist policy under the eternal promise of ending drugs.
The last blow was given by the former president alvaro uribewho explicitly included this prohibition in the Constitution and for this reason now its decriminalization needs eight debates -instead of the normal four- in Congress.
self-cultivation allowed
In addition, in Colombia you can carry up to 20 grams of marijuana and the planting of 20 self-cultivation plants for personal consumption has been allowed since 1986, but now the speakers wanted to promote the regularization of the market for its sale.
“Today we have lost a huge opportunity”lamented Pizarro, who was “sure” that this project will be carried out in the next legislative year, since they count on amending the law so that some politicians with conservative political overtones are in favor.
Keep reading:
– Why it has not been so profitable to grow marijuana in Latin America.
– The “secret” effects of smoking marijuana every day.