The Citizenship Initiative, supported by USR, "Without Penalties in Public Functions," endorsed by the Constitutional Court

Romania's Constitutional Court (CCR) on Tuesday established that the citizens' initiative to modify the fundamental law, in the sense that the persons who were convicted by a final verdict to no longer be allowed to hold public offices, meets the constitutional provisions, officials of the CCR said.

Following the CCR decision on Tuesday, the initiative will enter the parliamentary procedures and consequently will be subject to referendum to review the Constitution, ziare.com reports.

Union Save Romania (USR - opposition) filed to Parliament, on September 21, 2019, the second lot of signatures for the initiative, over 780,000, meeting thus the conditions set to launch a referendum, i.e. 500,000 signatures from 21 counties.

The initiative “No criminal convicted people in public offices” proposes the amendment of article 37 of the Constitution regulating the right to be elected. The new paragraph reads: “The citizens with final jail sentences, for intentional offenses cannot be elected in local public administration, in the Chamber of Deputies, in the Senate and as President of Romania, until a situation repealing the sentence’s consequences appears.”

USR wrote on Facebook after the CCR decision: “Victory! The initiative ‘No convicted people in public offices’ is constitutional! The CCR decision today proves once more that the initiative deserves being included in the Constitution. It is the wish of a million Romanians who want Romania to be heading towards development and the first step is that the country is no longer led by people criminally convicted for corruption. We express confidence that it will be voted and supported by the MPs from all political parties, in the same way the citizens supported the initiative.”

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