A draft invoice to legalize and regulate marijuana gross sales in Mexico is being circulated amongst senators, and a prime lawmaker says the plan is to vote on the proposal earlier than December 15.
Whereas the laws hasn’t been formally launched but, the draft measure largely displays an earlier model the Senate handed late final yr, with some revisions.
Senate Majority Chief Ricardo Monreal Avila of the ruling MORENA get together has been pushing for the reform and not too long ago mentioned that there’s settlement amongst main lawmakers to prioritize laws to manage hashish.
▶️ La elección de ministra o ministro de la @SCJN y de magistrados del Tribunal Electoral en 17 estados, así como la regulación del hashish; son algunos de los temas que el presidente de la Junta de Coordinación Política, @RicardoMonrealA, espera se aprueben pronto en el Senado. pic.twitter.com/YIzgA5wcLn
— Senado de México (@senadomexicano) November 22, 2021
The Mexican Supreme Court docket declared practically three years in the past that the nation’s prohibition on the personal possession and cultivation of cannabis was unconstitutional. Lawmakers have been then obligated to enact the coverage change however have since been unable to achieve a consensus on laws to place in place laws for a marijuana program.
On the request of legislators, the courtroom agreed to increase its deadline for Congress to formally finish prohibition on a number of events. However due to the repeated failed attempts to meet those deadlines, justices ultimately voted to end criminalization on their own in June.
Monreal beforehand mentioned that the stage is about for lawmakers to actually pass a marijuana legalization bill throughout the brand new session after a number of makes an attempt in recent times fell wanting getting over the end line.
Below the draft invoice that’s at present being circulated, adults 18 and older can be allowed to buy and possess as much as 28 grams of marijuana and domesticate as much as six crops for private use.
Members of the Senate Well being and Justice Committees have been tapped to formulate the draft of a hashish invoice.
Es importante recordar que el anteproyecto de regulación de #cannabis que fue circulado no ha sido presentado oficialmente. Aún falta unos pasos. Diría que es una ley digna de aprobarse con algunos ajustes menores (eliminar posesión easy y restricciones a clubes). #UrgeRegular
— Zara Snapp (@zarasnapp) November 24, 2021
The textual content of the measure states that the aim of the reform is to advertise “public well being, human rights and sustainable growth” and to “enhance the residing situations of the individuals who reside within the United Mexican States.”
It will additional “stop and fight the implications of problematic consumption of psychoactive hashish and contribute to the discount of the crime incidence linked to drug trafficking, selling peace, safety and particular person and group well-being.”
Regulators can be tasked with growing separate guidelines to manage hashish for adult-use, analysis and industrial manufacturing.
The invoice would set up a Mexican Institute for the Regulation and Management of Hashish, which might be a decentralized physique underneath the Ministry of Well being. It will even be chargeable for issuing licenses, overseeing this system and selling public schooling campaigns round marijuana.
Retail licenses would should be issued inside 18 months of the enactment of the legislation.
As a way to “compensate the damages generated by the prohibition,” the invoice states that no less than 40 % of marijuana cultivation licenses would wish to go to communities most impacted by hashish criminalization for no less than the primary 5 years of implementation. After that time, no less than 20 % of licenses would should be reserved for fairness candidates.
After the Supreme Court docket independently invalidated prohibition earlier this yr, advocates pressured that the choice underscores the necessity for legislators to expeditiously cross a measure to implement a complete system of authorized and controlled gross sales. They wish to make sure that a market is established that’s equitable, addresses the harms of criminalization on sure communities and promotes private freedom.
Advocates are happy to see Senate management take significantly the necessity to set up laws and supply entry to hashish for adults, however they’ve recognized some provisions as problematic.
For instance, possessing greater than 200 grams of marijuana might nonetheless lead to jail time.
❌ Se sigue penalizando la posesión easy, es decir, la posesión para fines de consumo private (no suministro ni comercio). Esto quiere decir que, si posees más de 200 gramos, puedes ser condenado de 10 meses a 3 años de prisión.
— México Unido (@MUCD) November 23, 2021
Senate President Olga Sánchez Cordero, who beforehand served at a cabinet-level place in President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s administration, not too long ago mentioned that “there’s no longer room for the prohibitionist policy.” And he or she additionally says the affect of the U.S. is to blame for failed marijuana criminalization laws in her nation.
The Senate authorized a legalization invoice late final yr, after which the Chamber of Deputies made revisions and passed it in March, sending it again to the originating chamber. A few Senate committees then took up and cleared the amended measure, however leaders shortly began signaling that certain revisions made the proposal unworkable.
After the Chamber of Deputies beforehand authorized the Senate-passed legalization invoice, senators mentioned that the revised proposal was critically internally conflicted—on provisions regarding authorized possession limits, the definition of hemp and different points—and lawmakers themselves might be topic to prison legal responsibility if it went into impact as drafted.
However Monreal mentioned in April that if the courtroom have been to make a declaration of unconstitutionality earlier than a measure to manage hashish was authorized, it could lead to “chaos.”
The highest senator additionally talked in regards to the significance of lawmakers taking their time to craft good coverage and never rush amidst lobbying from tobacco and pharmaceutical trade pursuits.
“We should not enable ourselves to be pressured by pursuits,” he mentioned on the time. “The Senate should act with nice prudence on this matter.”
Sen. Eduardo Ramírez Aguilar of the MORENA get together mentioned in April that “presently, it is important to legislate in the terms that are presented to us” after which think about extra revisions to hashish legal guidelines by subsequent payments.
That’s the place many legalization advocates took as nicely, urging lawmakers to cross an imperfect invoice instantly after which work on fixing it later.
Mexico’s president mentioned in December {that a} vote on legalization laws was delayed due to minor “mistakes” in the proposal.
The legalization invoice cleared a joint group of Senate committees previous to the complete flooring vote in that chamber final yr, with some amendments being made after members informally considered and debated the proposal throughout a digital listening to.
Members of the Senate’s Justice, Well being, and Legislative Research Committees had approved a prior version of legal cannabis legislation final yr as nicely, however the pandemic delayed consideration of the problem. Sen. Julio Ramón Menchaca Salazar of the MORENA get together mentioned in April that legalizing hashish might fill treasury coffers at a time when the economy is recovering from the health crisis.
As lawmakers work to advance the reform laws, there’s been a extra lighthearted push to focus consideration on the problem by sure members and activists. That push has principally concerned planting and gifting marijuana.
Late final yr, Sánchez Cordero, then a prime administration official, was gifted a cannabis plant by senator on the Senate flooring, and she or he mentioned she’d be making it part of her private backyard.
A distinct lawmaker gave Sánchez Cordero, a marijuana joint on the ground of the Chamber of Deputies in 2019. That joint is now framed and hangs in her workplace.
Hashish made one other look within the legislature final yr, when Sen. Jesusa Rodríguez of the MORENA get together decorated her desk with a marijuana plant.
Drug coverage reform advocates have additionally been cultivating lots of of marijuana crops in entrance of the Senate, placing strain on legislators to make good on their pledge to advance legalization.
Learn the draft marijuana legalization bill that’s being circulated in Mexico’s Senate beneath:
Taliban Announces Deal To Grow Cannabis In Afghanistan Amid Questions Over Company’s Involvement
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