Venice Commission Unveils Opinion on Constitutional Amendments

Political reasons are not sufficient to justify the prolongation of the mandate of a sitting parliament, the Venice Commission said in an evaluation of a constitutional amendment draft that the Georgian Parliament has already passed with its first reading.

As the Venice Commission, the Council of Europe?s advisory body on constitutional issues, put it, politically the ?most important and most disputed amendment? in the draft is the proposal for simultaneous presidential and parliamentary elections sometime between October 1 and December 31, 2008. It will be up to the President to announce the exact date of elections. The proposal will lead to the prolongation of the current Parliament?s term in office by about eight months.

?A convincing constitutional justification for such an amendment would be to provide in the Constitution that presidential and parliamentary elections are to be held jointly as a general rule and not only on this one occasion. The draft Constitutional Law does not however contain such a rule,? the Venice Commission said.

The draft of constitutional amendments says that this rule will be applicable only once, in 2008. 

The Venice Commission also called the three-month period within which the President would be free to schedule elections ?is clearly excessive.?

?The fixing of the date of elections is not a neutral procedural act but can have important political consequences. The discretion of the President should therefore be limited to a short time period not exceeding two or three weeks,? the Commission said.

But recommendations by the Venice Commission have little influence in practice. The ruling National Movement party made it clear even before the recommendations were unveiled, that the proposed amendments will go in force regardless of the Venice Commission?s opinion.

The ruling majority in the Parliament claims that the simultaneous elections in 2008 are justified by foreign factors, particularly Russia?s pressure on Georgia.

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