PDP women in wait-and-see mode on abortion bill, Senate president’s statements
By The Star Staff
The president of the Popular Democratic Party (PDP) women’s group Mujeres Populares, Ada Álvarez Conde, said Wednesday that group members met a day earlier and decided not to make a decision on Senate President José Luis Dalmau Santiago and the abortion bill under consideration in the upper chamber.
“It’s good that they met because it was urgent,” Álvarez Conde said in a radio interview. “Women are a priority. The women’s organization has to be there and we are going to see what mechanisms they are going to talk about so that they consult the people of the Popular [Democratic] Party.”
“In yesterday’s meeting it was not established that, as of yesterday, some statements came out of the press announcing that today they are going to make another announcement about how the mechanisms [of the abortion bill] are going to work,” she added. “They want to wait before calling for or doing something that is going to be dealt with and in that wing of the party the vote is still pending. We are paying close attention; the organization will return to vote.”
The measure in question, Senate Bill 693, would tighten restrictions on abortion after 22 weeks of pregnancy. Dalmau Santiago, who is also the president of the PDP, said last week that he considers that a person involved in an abortion process involving a “viable” fetus is committing a “murder.”