Key Benefits:
LAW 472
(August 5)
Official Journal No. 43,357 of 6 August 1998
86 of this Act states: " This law governs a year after its enactment ... ">
By which article 88 of the Colombian Political Constitution is developed in relation to the exercise of popular and group actions and other provisions are dictated.
COLOMBIA CONGRESS
DECRETA:
OBJECT, DEFINITIONS, GENERAL PRINCIPLES, AND PURPOSES
OBJECT
ARTICLE 1o. LAW OF THE LAW. This law is intended to regulate popular actions and group actions in accordance with article 88 of the Colombian Political Constitution. These actions are aimed at ensuring the protection and protection of collective rights and interests, as well as those of a group or a plural number of personnel.
DEFINITIONS
ARTICLE 2o. POPULAR ACTIONS. They are the procedural means for the protection of collective rights and interests.
Popular actions are exercised to avoid contingent damage, to cease the danger, threat, violation or tort of collective rights and interests, or to restore things to their previous state when possible.
ARTICLE 3o. GROUP ACTIONS. These are actions that are brought by a plural number or a set of people that meet uniform conditions for the same cause that caused individual damages for those people. Uniform conditions must also have place with respect to all elements that configure the responsibility.
The group action will be exercised exclusively to obtain the recognition and payment of damages.
ARTICLE 4. COLLECTIVE RIGHTS AND INTERESTS. They are collective rights and interests, among others, related to:
(a) The enjoyment of a healthy environment, in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution, the law and the regulatory provisions;
b) Administrative morality;
c) The existence of ecological balance and the rational management and use of natural resources to ensure their sustainable development, conservation, restoration or replacement. The conservation of animal and plant species, the protection of areas of special ecological importance, the ecosystems located in the border areas, as well as the other community interests related to conservation and restoration of the environment;
d) The enjoyment of public space and the use and defense of public goods;
e) The defence of public heritage;
f) The defense of the nation's cultural heritage;
g) Public safety and health;
h) Access to a service infrastructure that ensures public health;
i) Free economic competition;
j) Access to public services and their delivery is efficient and timely;
k) Prohibition of the manufacture, import, possession, use of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, as well as the introduction into the national territory of nuclear or toxic waste;
l) The right to technically predictable disaster security and prevention;
m) The construction, construction and urban developments respecting the legal provisions, in an orderly manner, and giving prevalence to the benefit of the quality of life of the inhabitants;
n) The rights of consumers and users.
Likewise, collective rights and interests are defined as such in the Constitution, the ordinary laws, and the treaties of international law concluded by Colombia.
PARAGRAFO. The rights and interests set forth in this article shall be defined and regulated by the rules currently in force or those that are issued after the current law.
PRINCIPLES
ARTICLE 5o. processing of the actions regulated in this law will be based on the constitutional principles and especially on the prevalence of the substantial right, publicity, economy, speed and effectiveness. The general principles of the Code of Civil Procedure shall also apply where they do not conflict with the nature of such actions.
The judge will ensure due process, procedural guarantees and balance between the parties.
Promoted the action, it is the duty of the judge to promote it officiously and to produce a decision of merit on the penalty of incurring a disciplinary lack, sanctionable with dismissal. To this end, the knowledge officer shall take the necessary measures to bring the request into line with the appropriate action.
ARTICLE 6o. PREFERENTIAL PROCESSING. The popular preventive actions will be processed with preference to the others known by the competent judge, except the Habeas Corpus, the Action of Tutela and the Action of Compliance.
ARTICLE 7o. INTERPRETATION OF PROTECTED RIGHTS. The rights and interests protected by the Popular and Group Actions, in accordance with Article 4or. of this law will be observed and applied according to how they are defined and regulated in the Constitution, the laws and international treaties that link Colombia.
ARTICLE 8o. STATES OF EXCEPTION. Popular actions can be initiated and processed at all times.
POPULAR ACTIONS
PROVENANCE AND EXPIRATION
ARTICLE 9o. popular actions come against any action or omission by public authorities or individuals, who have violated or threatened to violate collective rights and interests.
ARTICLE 10. OPTIONAL EXHAUSTION OF THE GUBERNATIVE PATH. Where the collective right or interest is threatened or violated by the activity of the administration, it will not be necessary to institute the administrative resources in advance as a requirement to try the popular action.
ARTICLE 11. EXPIRY. The People's Action may be promoted for as long as the threat or danger to the collective right and interest. When that action is directed to return things to its previous state, the term to interlay it will be five (5) years, counted from the action or omission that produced the alteration.
LEGITIMIZATION
ARTICLE 12. SHARE HEADLINES. You can exercise popular actions:
1. Any natural or legal person.
2. Non-governmental organizations, Popular, Civic or similar organizations.
3. Public entities that fulfil functions of control, intervention or surveillance, provided that the threat or violation of collective rights and interests has not originated in their action or omission.
4. The Attorney General of the Nation, the Ombudsman and the District and Municipal Persons, regarding their competence.
5. Mayors and other public servants who, by reason of their duties, must promote the protection and protection of these rights and interests.
ARTICLE 13. EXERCISE OF POPULAR ACTION. Legitimized to exercise popular actions can do it for themselves or for whoever acts on their behalf.
When a popular action is brought without the intermediary of a judicial proxy, the Ombudsman's Office may intervene, for which the judge must notify him of the order's self-order.
ARTICLE 14. PERSONS AGAINST WHOM THE ACTION IS DIRECTED. The People's Action shall be directed against the individual, natural or legal person, or the public authority whose action or omission is deemed to threaten, violate or violate the collective right or interest. In the event of an infringement or threat and the persons responsible are unknown, it will be for the judge to determine them.
OF JURISDICTION AND JURISDICTION
ARTICLE 15. JURISDICTION. The jurisdiction of the Administrative Contentious shall be known to the processes that arise during the exercise of the Popular Actions originated in acts, actions or omissions of public entities and private persons to carry out administrative tasks in accordance with the provisions of the relevant provisions.
In other cases, you will know the ordinary civil jurisdiction.
ARTICLE 16. COMPETITION. Of the Popular Actions, the administrative judges and civil circuit judges will be heard in the first instance. In the second instance, the jurisdiction shall be the first section of the Administrative Court or the Civil Chamber of the Judicial District Court to which the Judge of the first instance belongs.
The judge of the place of occurrence of the facts or that of the domicile of the defendant at the choice of the popular actor shall be competent. Where the facts are several of the competent judges, the judge before whom the application has been brought shall be aware of the case.
PARAGRAFO. Until they become operational, the administrative courts, the popular actions brought before the Administrative Jurisdiction Jurisdiction will know in the first instance the Courts Administrative and administrative disputes and in the second instance the State Council.
FILING OR REQUESTING
ARTICLE 17. FACILITIES TO PROMOTE POPULAR ACTIONS. The person concerned may go to the District or Municipal Person, or to the Ombudsman's Office to assist him in the elaboration of his or her request or request, as well as in the events of urgency or when the applicant does not know how to write.
Where there is no judge of the circuit or the Administrative Contentious, the suit may be filed with any Municipal Civil Judge or Promiscuo, who within two (2) days of following shall refer the case to the competent official. In the event of serious and permanent commitment to one or more of the rights covered by this law, the Municipal Civil Judge or Promiscuo shall immediately and by the most effective means send the proceedings to the competent judge.
In the development of the principle of the prevalence of the substantial right to the proceedings, the competent judge who receives the popular action will have the power to take the necessary precautionary measures to prevent irreparable and irreparable damage. or suspend the operative events of the threat to collective rights and interests.
ARTICLE 18. DEMAND OR REQUEST REQUIREMENTS. To promote a popular action a demand or request will be filed with the following requirements:
(a) The indication of the collective right or interest threatened or violated;
b) The indication of the facts, acts, actions or omissions that motivate your request;
c) The enunciation of the pretenses;
(d) the indication of natural or legal persons, or the public authority allegedly responsible for the threat or tort, if possible;
e) The tests that you intend to enforce;
f) The addresses for notifications;
g) Name and identification of who exercises the action.
The claim will be directed against the alleged person responsible for the fact or omission that motivates it, if known. However, when in the course of the proceedings it is established that there are other possible persons responsible, the judge of first instance of trade will order his summons in the terms in which here is prescribed for the defendant.
ARTICLE 19. POVERTY PROTECTION. The judge may grant the protection of poverty where appropriate, in accordance with the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, or when the Ombudsman or his delegates expressly request it.
PARAGRAFO. The cost of the expertise, in cases of poverty, will be borne by the Fund for the Defense of Collective Rights and Interests, based on its creation. These costs will be reimbursed to the Fund by the defendant, at the time of satisfying the liquidation of the costs, as long as it is condemned.
ADMISSION, NOTIFICATION, AND MOVE
ARTICLE 20. ADMISSION OF THE CLAIM. Within three (3) business days following the filing of the initial application or request, the competent judge shall decide on his admission.
You will admit the claim that does not meet the requirements set forth in this law, specifying the defects that you have for the plaintiff to subsane in the term of three (3) days. If he does not do so, the judge will reject it.
ARTICLE 21. NOTICE OF THE ORDER ADMISORY OF THE CLAIM. In the car that admits the lawsuit the judge will order his personal notification to the defendant. Members of the community may be informed by means of a mass media or of any effective mechanism, taking into account any beneficiaries.
For this purpose, the judge may simultaneously use various means of communication.
In the case of public entities, the self-order of the application must be notified personally to its legal representative or to whom the latter has delegated the power to receive notifications, all in accordance with the provisions of the Code. Administrative Dispute.
When the defendant is a private person, the personal notification of the self-order shall be made in accordance with the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure.
In any case, if the person to whom the notification is to be made, or his or her delegate, shall not be found or not, for any reason, receive the notification, it shall be carried out by means of delivery which the notifier makes to the employee who is there find an authentic copy of the claim and the self-order and the notice to be sent, by the same conduit, to the notified person.
If the lawsuit has not been promoted by the Public Ministry, the public will be notified of the order's self-defense, in order to intervene as a public part in defense of the collective rights and interests, in those processes that Consider appropriate.
In addition, you will be notified to the administrative entity in charge of protecting the right or the affected collective interest.
ARTICLE 22. TRANSFER AND DEFENCE OF THE CLAIM. In the order of the application the judge will order his transfer to the defendant for the term of ten (10) days to answer it. You will also be able to inform you that the decision will be made within thirty (30) days following the expiration of the transfer term and that you have the right to request the practice of proof with the defence of the claim.
If there are multiple defendants, they may designate a common representative.
ARTICLE 23. EXCEPTIONS. In the defence of the application only the exceptions of merit and the previous ones of lack of jurisdiction and res judicata, which will be resolved by the judge in the judgment, can be proposed.
Accordingly, the relevant evidence shall be carried out within the same time limit for the evidence requested in the application and in the defence thereof.
CO-ADJUVANT AND PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES
ARTICLE 24. INTERVENANCE. Any natural or legal person may contribute to these actions before the first instance is proposed. The intervenance will operate towards future action. Such actions may also be supported by popular, civic and similar organisations, as well as the Ombudsman or his delegates, the District or Municipal Persons and other authorities who, by reason of their duties, must protect or to defend collective rights and interests.
ARTICLE 25. PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES. Before the application is notified and in any state of the process, the judge may, on his own initiative or at the request of a party, decree, duly substantiated, the previous measures which he considers relevant to prevent imminent harm or to stop the one that was caused. In particular, you can decree the following:
a) Order the immediate cessation of activities that may cause or continue to cause the damage;
b) Order that the necessary acts be executed, where the potentially harmful or harmful conduct is a consequence of the defendant's omission;
(c) obliging the defendant to provide caution to ensure compliance with any of the previous measures;
d) Order the studies necessary to establish the nature of the damage and the urgent means to be taken to mitigate it from the Fund for the Defense of the Rights and Collective Interests.
PARAGRAFO 1o. The decree and practice of the previous measures will not suspend the course of the process.
PARAGRAFO 2o. When dealing with a threat by reason of an omission attributed to a particular authority or person, the judge shall order immediate compliance with the action that is necessary, for which it shall grant a term. If the danger is imminent, it may order that the act, the work or the action be executed by the threatened actor or community, at the expense of the defendant.
ARTICLE 26. OPPOSITION TO THE PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES. The order that decrees the previous measures shall be notified to the defendant simultaneously with the admission of the application and may be the subject of the replenishment and appeal resources; the resources shall be granted in the The effect of this is to be resolved within five days. Opposition to the previous measures can only be based on the following cases:
a) Avoid further damage to the collective right or interest that is intended to be protected;
b) Avoid certain and imminent damages to the public interest;
c) Avoid the defendant whose gravity is such that it makes it practically impossible for him to comply with an unfavourable ruling.
It is up to whoever claims these causes to show them.
COMPLIANCE PACT
ARTICLE 27. COMPLIANCE PACT. The judge, within three (3) days following the expiration of the term of the transfer of the claim, will cite the parties and the Public Ministry to a special hearing in which the judge will hear the various positions. on the action instituted, and natural or legal persons who have registered written comments on the project may also be involved. The intervention of the Public Ministry and the entity responsible for ensuring the collective right or interest will be mandatory.
The inattendance of this hearing by the competent officials will cause them to incur a cause of misconduct, punishable by removal from office.
If, before the time indicated for the hearing, some of the parties have evidence of a fair cause for failure to appear, the judge shall indicate a new date for the hearing, not before the fifth day after the tenth day, by car that will not have resources, without there being any other postponement.
A compliance pact may be established at that hearing at the initiative of the judge determining the form of protection of collective rights and interests and the restoration of things to their previous state, if possible.
The compliance pact thus concluded will be reviewed by the judge within five (5) days, counted from its conclusion. If there are no irregularities in any of the contents of the draft pact, they will be corrected by the judge with the consent of the interested parties.
The hearing will be considered failed at the following events:
(a) When the totality of the interested parties is not compared;
b) When no compliance pact project is formulated;
c) When the parties do not consent to the corrections the judge proposes to the draft compliance pact.
In these events the judge will order the practice of evidence, without prejudice to the actions that proceed against the public officials absent in the event contemplated in the literal a).
The approval of the compliance pact will be implemented by means of a judgment, the resolutive part of which will be published in a newspaper with a broad national circulation at the expense of the parties involved.
The judge shall retain jurisdiction for enforcement and may appoint a natural or legal person as auditor to monitor and ensure compliance with the dispute settlement formula.
PROBATIVE PERIOD
ARTICLE 28. TESTS. Realized the summons to establish the draft compliance pact, without reaching agreement, or cited is and not effected by the absence of the parties, the judge will decree, prior analysis of conduct, relevance and effectiveness, the tests requested and those of its own motion, indicating day and time for its practice, within the term of twenty (20) days extendable for twenty (20) days longer if the complexity of the process requires it.
The judge may order or practice any conductive evidence, including the presentation of statistics from sources that offer credibility.
The judge may also order public entities and their employees to render concepts in the manner of experts, or to provide documents or other reports that may have probative value. It may also require individual certifications, information, examinations or concepts. In one case or another the orders must be fulfilled in the strict term defined by the judge.
The judge will personally practice the evidence; but if this is impossible, he may commission in the interests of the procedural economy.
In the processes referred to in this law, the judge may order the practice of testing within or outside the national territory.
ARTICLE 29. CLASSES AND MEANS OF PROOF. For these actions, the means of proof established in the Code of Civil Procedure are obtained, without prejudice to what is available in this law.
ARTICLE 30. LOAD OF THE TEST. The burden of proof will be on the claimant. However, if for reasons of economic or technical order, if such a charge cannot be fulfilled, the judge shall impose the necessary orders to supply the deficiency and obtain the necessary evidence to prove a failure of merit, requesting such evidence from the public body for which the subject matter of the debate and the subject matter of the matter is referred to.
In the event of not being able to close the respective test, pursuant to the provisions of the foregoing paragraph, the judge may order his/her practice from the Fund for the Defense of Collective Rights and Interests.
ARTICLE 31. EARLY EVIDENCE. According to legal provisions, the necessary evidence may be requested and practiced prior to the process in order to prevent them from being distorted or lost, or that their practice is rendered impossible and to preserve the things and the circumstances in which they must subsequently be tested in the process.
PARAGRAFO. The judges of the republic will give preferential processing to the applications and practices of advance tests for the processes in which the popular actions are brought forward.
ARTICLE 32. PROFOR PERIPERO. In the order in which the expert is ordered, the date of delivery of the report shall be fixed to the court and from this date it shall be at the disposal of the parties for five (5) working days. The expert report shall be submitted in original and three copies.
The technical reports will be valued in conjunction with the existing evidentiary acquis, in accordance with the rules of sound criticism and may be taken as sufficient to verify the facts to which they relate.
The second opinion is unobjectionable and the judge will be able to welcome him in his sentence.
PARAGRAFO 1o. The impediments must manifest in the three (3) days following the appointment knowledge. The omission in this matter will make the expert in the sanctions that determines this law.
PARAGRAFO 2o. The judge may impose the following penalties on the expert, when these provisions are violated:
-Order your withdrawal from the public register of experts for popular and group actions.
-Decline your inability to contract with the State for five (5) years.
-Order the appropriate disciplinary and/or criminal investigation.
STATEMENT
ARTICLE 33. PLEADINGS. Overdue the term to practice tests, the judge will transfer the parties to plead for the common term of five (5) days.
Due to the termination of the transfer to allege, the secretary will immediately pass the file to the office for sentencing, without any incidents, except for the recusal, or any subsequent action other than that of the issue of copies, breakdowns or certificates, which shall not interrupt the term to be proposed, or the turn corresponding to the process.
The secretary shall refrain from passing to the office the writings that contravene this provision.
ARTICLE 34. STATEMENT. Due to the term to be invoked, the judge will have twenty (20) days to give judgment. The sentence that takes the form of the applicant for a popular action may contain an order to do or not to make, to condemn the payment of damages when damage has been caused to a collective right or interest in favor of the non-guilty public entity that is in charge of them, and to require the conduct of necessary conduct to return the things to the state prior to the violation of the right or collective interest, where it is physically possible. The order to do or not to do so accurately defines the conduct to be carried out in order to protect the right or the collective interest threatened or violated and to prevent the recurrence of the actions or omissions that gave merit to the access to the applicant's claims. You will also set the incentive amount for the popular actor.
The conviction of the payment of the damages will be done "in generating" and will be settled in the incident foreseen in the article 307 of the C.P.C.; as long as the orders and other convictions will be fulfilled. At the end of the incident, the sentence shall be added with the determination of the corresponding sentence, including that of the additional incentive in favour of the actor.
In case of damage to the natural resources, the judge will seek to ensure the restoration of the affected area by allocating part of the compensation.
In the judgment the judge will point out a reasonable period of time, according to the scope of his determinations, within which the fulfillment of the providence must be initiated and subsequently to complete its execution. In that term, the judge will retain the jurisdiction to take the necessary measures for the execution of the judgment in accordance with the rules contained in the Code of Civil Procedure and may form a committee for the verification of the compliance with the judgment in which the judge, the parties, the public entity responsible for ensuring the collective right or interest, the Public Ministry and a non-governmental organization with activities in the object of the judgment will participate.
You will also communicate to the administrative authorities or authorities so that, as far as your competence is concerned, they will collaborate in order to obtain compliance with the ruling.
ARTICLE 35. EFFECTS OF THE JUDGMENT. The judgment shall have the effect of res judicata on the parties and the general public.
RESOURCES AND COASTS
