Mexico: Bill to Support People With Disabilities and Older Persons
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- 17 Feb 2023
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Guarantee Everyone’s Right to Make Their Own Decisions
A proposal to eliminate legal guardianship for people with disabilities and older people in Mexico City will be presented to Mexico City Congress on February 16, 2023, in what could be a landmark move for human rights, Human Rights Watch and other rights groups said today.
Marisela Zúñiga, chairperson of the Human Rights Commission of the Mexico City Congress, will present the bill to reform the city’s Civil Code and Notary Public Act so that it aligns with international human rights law. It would end imposed legal guardianship and give every adult the right to make their own decisions.
“Society thinks we [people with disabilities] are incapable of deciding the most relevant issues about our lives: for instance, where to live and with whom, the type of job we want to have, things we want to buy, or if we want to marry,” said Fernanda Castro Maya, a woman with an intellectual disability who works at CONFE, an organization supporting the proposal. “But if we are provided with the legal right to do so and appropriate access to support, we would be able to participate on an equal basis with others in all issues that concern us.”
Deciding is My Right – a coalition of organizations of people with disabilities, human rights organizations, and academics – proposed the language for the bill, which would eliminate the legal guardianship system. The Mexican Supreme Court ruled legal guardianship unconstitutional in 2021 on the basis that it disproportionately discriminated against people with disabilities. If passed into law, the bill would instead ensure that every adult in Mexico City is granted full legal capacity and benefits, from access to support to make decisions. Support could include someone to help them understand legal transactions, communicate decisions to authorities and third parties, or express their will and preferences.
Since 1928, the Civil Code in Mexico City, as well as other legislation governing legal capacity in all of Mexico, has deprived many people with disabilities of their right to make decisions, wrongly assuming they are not sufficiently mentally capable to make choices. Under this law, people who are deaf, deaf-blind, or have intellectual disabilities or mental health conditions can be placed under legal guardianship, meaning that someone else makes decisions on their behalf. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), which has applied in Mexico since 2008, shifted from the medical model of disability to a social model, which considers people with disabilities to be rights-holders and not objects of care or rehabilitation. Read More…
