ZAGREB, August 12, 2019 – A member of parliament from the opposition MOST party, Robert Podolnjak, on Monday accused Constitutional Court President Miroslav Šeparović of having sided with the parliamentary majority and the government by not stating the court’s position on an opposition motion for a special parliamentary debate on a vote of no confidence in the health minister, thus making it possible for the constitutional deadline of 30 days within which the parliament must discuss such motions, to expire.
Podolnjak said this in a letter which he sent Šeparović because he believes that the Constitution was violated when a conclusion was adopted that the parliament speaker does not have to call an extraordinary parliament session when one-fifth of its members file a motion to discuss a vote of no confidence in a government member at the time when the parliament is in recess.
Podolnjak, a constitutional law professor and member of the parliamentary Committee on the Constitution, Standing Orders and Political System, said that the motions submitted to the Constitutional Court regarding the parliament’s conclusion not to discuss the opposition’s motion described the conclusion as “a significant breach of the Constitution on which the parliamentary system is based”.
“The most important element is the government’s political responsibility towards the parliament, both collective and individual, and it cannot be partial or random. In every moment of their work, the government, the prime minister and individual ministers answer to the parliament and the ultimate test of their political responsibility is the vote of no confidence,” Podolnjak said.
Procedures regarding such a motion, envisaged by the Constitution, must be interpreted in line with that, including Article 116, Paragraph 4, which says that a debate on and a vote of no confidence must take place within 30 days at the latest from the day a motion to that effect is submitted to the parliament, claims Podolnjak.
Despite the importance of the topic in question and the 30-day deadline, the Constitutional Court did not state its position nor did the President of the Republic act on MPs’ request to call an extraordinary session of the parliament, in line with her constitutional powers, Podolnjak says in the letter.
As for Šeparović’s statement in which he said that the Constitutional Court acts exclusively on its own initiative and when and if it deems it necessary and would act the same way in the case of the latest motion, Podolnjak said that the motion in question was not an ordinary motion by a group of MPs but a motion by more than one-fifth of members of almost all opposition parties and all opposition members of the Constitution Committee.
Podolnjak also noted that Šeparović’s response and failure to act sent wrong messages to the public – that the motion is not an important matter concerning constitutional law and that motions by opposition MPs and parties are irrelevant.
Podolnjak also said that the Constitutional Court should urgently hold a session on the Opposition’s motion for an extraordinary parliamentary debate on a vote of no confidence in the health minister.
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