A bill to legalize medical marijuana in Ukraine that was supposed to be taken up for a final vote this week is being effectively blocked, with members of one party filing hundreds of so-called “spam” amendments to procedurally delay passage.
Ukraine’s unicameral legislature, the Verkhovna Rada, was scheduled to consider the reform measure on Wednesday. It advanced through committee last month, with the support of President Volodymyr Zelensky, and it was expected to easily pass in a final reading—but MP Olga Stefanyshina says opponents are using a time-consuming legislative tactic to keep it from enactment.
“The bill on medical cannabis is blocked in the Council,” she said in a Facebook post on Wednesday, according to a translation.
Despite “hours of negotiations” to pass and implement the reform so that “patients could get medication and pain relief as early as next year,” members of the Motherland party are forcing consideration of 226 new amendments that are meant to “exhaust” the process and “deprive the law of votes,” she wrote.
“It’s over 400 minutes of the Rada’s working time, and in fact, 2 days of a completely senseless spectacle: when amendments put on a vote just to prolong the time and prevent
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