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CCR: Law banning sentenced people to be Gov’t members – constitutional
The Constitutional Court of Romania (CCR) on Thursday rejected as inadmissible the Ombudsman's exception of unconstitutionality to Law 90/2001, which refers to the article prohibiting convicted people from being members of the Government
CCR specifies that it rejected as inadmissible the Ombudsman's notification regarding the article prohibiting convicted persons from being members of the Government, as the reasons invoked consist of both problems of enforcement and interpretation of the law, as well as regulatory issues.
"Following the deliberations, the Constitutional Court, by a majority of votes, dismissed as inadmissible the exception of unconstitutionality drawn up. In adopting this solution, the Court found that, in effect, the grounds referred to in the notification consist of both problems of enforcement and interpretation of the law by the competent public authorities, as well as the legislative issues that come within Parliament's competence, " reads a press release of CCR .
The plenary of the Constitutional Court debated on Thursday the exception of unconstitutionality of the provisions of Art. 2 of Law no. 90 / 2001 on the organisation and functioning of the Romanian Government and of the ministries, amended and completed, issued directly by the Ombudsman.
The criticized provisions have the following content: "Can be members of the Government people who have Romanian citizenship and domicile in the country, who benefit from the exercise of electoral rights, who have not suffered criminal convictions and are not found in one of the incompatibility cases provided for in Book I, Title IV of Law No. 161/2003 regarding certain measures for ensuring transparency in the exercise of public dignities, public positions and the business environment, the prevention and sanctioning of corruption, with subsequent amendments and completions."
The decision is final and generally binding and to be communicated to the Ombudsman.
The arguments retained in motivating the solutions ruled by the CCR plenary sitting will be presented in the decisions' content, which will be released in the Official Journal of Romania, Part I.
The Court’s decision bans PSD (social-democrat, ruling party) leader Liviu Dragnea to be part of the Government because of the final suspended sentence (on parole). The ruling comes after four postponements.
PSD chairman Liviu Dragnea said on Thursday, before the ruling on the Law 90, that the Court’s decision would not change his political actions, adding he will continue to support PM Sorin Grindeanu.