Pro-life bench files urgent request for the Unborn Child Statute

The pro-life bench – made up of federal deputies and senators opposed to abortion – filed this Wednesday (27) the urgent request to discuss the Statute of the Unborn Child in the plenary of the Chamber of Deputies. In total, 300 signatures were recorded, 43 above the required number of 257.

“The number of signatures is quite significant, because it represents more than the absolute majority of the Chamber of Deputies”, said congresswoman Chris Tonietto (PL-RJ), president of the Parliamentary Front Against Abortion.

When presenting the urgent request, it is necessary for the President of the Chamber Arthur Lira (PP-AL) to place the project on the agenda of the plenary. If the urgency request is approved, the project will be voted on by federal deputies.

In a press conference, on Wednesday night (26), the deputies commented on the importance of defending life from conception and criticized the “judicial activism” of the Federal Supreme Court (STF) in the ADPF 442 trial, which attempts to decriminalize abortion up to the 12th week of pregnancy.

“We understand that life begins at conception and we celebrate the sacred right to live and the beauty that is life”, says deputy Eli Borges.

The PSOL party, author of ADPF 442, was also heavily criticized by parliamentarians. For deputy Coronel Fernanda (PL/MT), “PSOL works to take lives, defend drugs and criminals. And if today there is a demand in the STF, it is because they provoked it”. She also reinforced that with “the risk of innocent children losing their lives, Congress needs to pass “laws that protect with more strength and more efficiency”.

Project was stalled at the Women’s Commission

The unborn child project was presented in 2007, and has faced resistance for years to be approved in the Chamber of Deputies. Since June 2017, it has been stuck at the Women’s Rights Commission and is awaiting a vote on the new opinion presented on May 6 last year.

Representative Diego Garcia (Republicanos-PR), who was already one of the rapporteurs of the Statute of the Unborn Child in the Chamber of Deputies, celebrated the urgency given to the project. “The project is ready to be approved, it has already been approved in two thematic committees of the Chamber, and those who are against the proposal tried to prolong the discussion in the Women’s Committee. I even presented a technical and legal opinion with more than 50 pages on the right to life from conception,” he told Gazeta do Povo.

Garcia criticized the STF’s attempt to speed up the discussion on abortion, and denied any omission by parliament in relation to this issue. “The Supreme Court does not represent the public opinion of the vast majority of Brazilians, who are against abortion under any circumstances,” he explains.

The proposal explains and guarantees rights for embryos, as already provided for in the Constitution – the right to life – and in the Civil Code, which in its second article recognizes the protection of human life from conception.

Through the proposition, deputies want to encourage the creation of public policies that guarantee support for women with difficulties (economic, psychological, social, etc.) in carrying their pregnancy to term, a situation that receives little attention from the State.