Legal Opinions and Comments

Amendments to the Electoral Code have been made necessary by the 4 March 2016 decision of the Constitutional Court. This decision declared unconstitutional the procedure of election of the President of Moldova by 3/5 of the Members of Parliament, as well as the related rules and laws. It also revived the constitutional provisions on the direct election of the President of the Republic, to be found in Articles 78 (1, 3, 4), 85 and 89 of the Constitution, in force until the adoption of the Law no. 1115—XIV of 5 July 2000, and the corresponding Electoral Code provisions for the election of the President by direct, secret and free vote of the citizens that were repealed by the above law. This decision was consulted in English, directly on the Constitutional Court’s website. All references to the original complaint (48b/2015) and the ruling by the Constitutional Court (Judgment No. 7 of 04.03.2016) are based on the translated documents. On 1 April 2016, the parliament of Moldova voted to hold the presidential election on 30 October 2016.

Overall, the Opinion welcomes the Draft Amendments to the Law on Civil Service of Ukraine, which aim to ensure the autonomy of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights to recruit his/her staff members. At the same time, the Draft Amendments would benefit from some changes to protect the institutional independence of the Commissioner from any interference from external bodies and ensure a pluralist staff composition at all levels.

From 15 to 18 February 2016, a delegation made up of Venice Commission and OSCE/ODIHR experts participated in a working visit to Tbilisi. The delegation met with the Speaker of the Parliament, representatives from parliamentary and non-parliamentary parties, the Central Election Commission (CEC), the presidential administration, and civil society as well as international organisations working in the electoral field in Georgia. The scope of this joint opinion covers only the amendments submitted for review and analyses them against relevant international obligations and standards, in particular those of the Council of Europe, and OSCE commitments, as well as good practice from other OSCE participating States and Council of Europe member states. It also refers to the relevant recommendations made in previous OSCE/ODIHR and Venice Commission joint opinions and previous OSCE/ODIHR and Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly reports from observation missions to Georgia.