Cabinet endorses constitutional amendments

AMMAN — The Cabinet on Sunday endorsed the 2014 constitutional amendments to be sent to the Lower House for deliberations during its current extraordinary session.

According to the Jordan News Agency, Petra, the Cabinet expanded the jurisdiction of the Independent Elections Commission (IEC), stipulated in Paragraph B of Article 67 to include the municipal elections or any other general polls in addition to managing parliamentary elections.

Under the Cabinet's amendments, the said paragraph will stipulate the establishment of an independent commission to manage parliamentary and municipal elections or any other general polls according to the provisions of the law, Petra said.  

The Cabinet also reworded Article 127 of the Constitution, including the General Intelligence Department (GID) personnel under the provisions applied to the army and other security bodies.

As amended by the Cabinet, Petra reported, the said article will be divided into two paragraphs: “A- The duties of the Army shall be confined to the defence of the Kingdom and its safety. B- Recruitment to the Army, GID, the police and Gendarmerie, their organisations and the rights and duties of their personnel shall be defined by law.”

The new amendments stipulate that the King will appoint army and GID chiefs without a recommendation by the prime minister or the concerned minister. 

During a press meeting last week, Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour said the move is intended to protect these agencies from politics, especially as the Kingdom is bracing for a stage of parliamentary government.

His Majesty King Abdullah on Wednesday directed the government to activate the Ministry of Defence and expand the jurisdiction of the IEC to encompass all electoral processes.

In a letter to Ensour, the King issued directives to activate the Defence Ministry to assume the political, economic, legal and logistic functions related to national defence.

The Lower House will begin Tuesday looking into the amended provisions.