Moldovan top court rules on dissolution of parliament in last six months of president's mandate

Chisinau, 24 November /MOLDPRES/- The Constitutional Court (CC) today issued a decision for explaining the Article 85 of the Constitution and found that the parliament can be dissolved within three months, even if this period coincided with the last six months of the president’s mandate.

The CC plenum today considered a notification submitted by MPs of the Party of Socialists (PSRM) and ruled that impossibility to form the government within three months led to the parliament’s dissolution, even if the period coincided with the last six months of the Moldovan president’s mandate.

According to magistrates, after the expiration of the three-month period, the president is obliged to dissolve the parliament, if the government’s creation fails. At the same time, a possible postponement of the parliament's dissolution till the end of the president’s mandate, in the circumstances when the dissolution becomes already certain after the three-month term expires, has no reason and is not likely to help solve and unlock institutional crisis and can lead to maintaining an interim government with a limited capacity of work for a longer period.

“Postponement of parliament’s dissolution, in conditions when it has no longer right to form a plenipotentiary government, leads to irrational extension and worsening of the institutional crisis”, the court’s decision said.

Additionally, the court noted that the ban on parliament’s dissolution in the last six months of president’s mandate was a reminiscence of the period in which the president had been elected through universal, direct and freely expressed suffrage. Thus, the reason of the restriction comes from the need to keep continuity of state structures during the electoral campaign, as well as the necessity to avoid overlaying of electoral campaigns for electing parliament and the one for electing the president.

The court’s ruling is final, cannot be subject to any appeal, and enters into force upon  publication in the Official Journal (Monitorul Oficial) of Moldova.

(Reporter A. Zara, editor M. Jantovan)