Participants in the National Dialogue continues their discussions on Sunday on consensus on a number of political issues to reach an outcome that serves the interests of the country and establishes a solid foundation for political reform that supports the democratic process, for which His Majesty the King laid the foundations. The participants in the political theme are scheduled to discuss the sub-theme of the powers of the Shura and Representatives Councils. The participants will discuss expanding or limiting the legislative and supervisory powers of the House of Representatives, the expansion of the powers of the parliamentary inquiry committees, the legislative powers of the members of both Houses, mechanisms of legislative tools, and the relationship between the Shura Council and House of Representatives, as discussions of visions relating to the economic, social, rights themes were concluded in last week’s meetings.
It is noteworthy that participants in the political theme had discussed last week the sub-theme of the powers of Shura Council, where it was agreed that a mechanism needs to be developed with the aim of ensuring speedy promulgation of the legislation, the transfer of the chairmanship of the National Council to the President of the House of Representatives, the preservation of a bicameral system, with the development of criteria for selecting members of the Shura Council and that members of the parliament must not hold dual nationalities and should be citizen for at least five years.
While participants did not agree on the visions relating to special parliamentary powers to assess the government agenda, the abolition of the Shura Council and the adoption of the unicameral, the indirect election of the members of the Shura Council from civil society institutions, increasing the number of members of the House of Representatives, and limiting the number of terms for a member of the Shura Council to a maximum of two. They also rejected the allocation of a quota for women in the parliament and the reduction of the powers of the Shura Council.