Constitutional Court of BiH has not ruled on the amendments to the Election Law that have been discussed recently

(Patria) - The Constitutional Court of BiH appealed in today's statement to everyone, and primarily to politicians and "those who claim not to be politicians but speak publicly on behalf of politics" - to stop abusing its decisions and the institution itself.

"For a month and a half now, almost daily, in political confrontations among politicians, and even with the OSCE, one can hear how the OSCE has shown that it does not respect the position of the Constitutional Court of BiH, citing two specific decisions of the Constitutional Court of BiH, namely: U-3/17 and U-23/14.

It is not specified which positions of the Constitutional Court of BiH from these two decisions are not being respected by the OSCE, nor what the Constitutional Court of BiH ruled on through these two decisions.

The hope of the Constitutional Court of BiH that politicians would stop playing games with the decisions of the Constitutional Court was in vain, so the Constitutional Court did not react.

However, as the abuse of the Constitutional Court's decisions continues, the Constitutional Court of BiH must remind that in Decision U-3/17, at the request of Bariša Čolak, then Chairman of the House of Peoples of the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH, it ruled on his request to examine the regularity of the procedure, i.e., to determine the existence or non-existence of a constitutional basis for declaring the Proposal for the Law on Amendments to the Election Law of BiH of April 28, 2017, harmful to the vital interest of the Bosniak people.

The Constitutional Court found that the statement of the Club of Delegates of the Bosniak people in the House of Peoples of the PSBiH on the destructiveness to the vital interest of the Bosniak people in BiH in the said Proposal of the Law meets the conditions of procedural correctness from Article IV/3.f) of the Constitution of BiH.

It then found that the said Proposal of the Law did not violate the vital interest of the Bosniak people in BiH.

'In translation,' this means that in this specific case, the Constitutional Court did not rule on a matter within its jurisdiction prescribed by Article VI.3.a) of the Constitution of BiH, i.e., it did not assess the constitutionality of a law that was still in the adoption procedure, i.e., was not in legal force, so no one can claim that the Constitutional Court took a position on the constitutionality of the Proposal for Amendments to the Election Law of BiH from 2017.

Namely, with the said decision, the Constitutional Court ruled drawing its jurisdiction from Article IV/3.f) of the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which means it only examined the procedural correctness of the case, i.e., under which procedure the process of adopting the Law on Amendments to the Election Law of BiH should be conducted.

Therefore, those who 'read and interpret' the decisions of the Constitutional Court of BiH should read the decision from the first letter to the last period.

As for the second decision, i.e., Decision number U-23/14, the Constitutional Court did rule on a matter within its jurisdiction prescribed by Article VI/3.a) of the Constitution of BiH, i.e., it ruled on the constitutionality of certain provisions of the Election Law of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was in legal force, and only found that the provision of the law according to which 'each constituent people is given one seat in each canton' is unconstitutional, as well as the provisions of Chapter 20 - Transitional and Final Provisions of Article 20.16.A paragraph 2 points a-j. of the Election Law of BiH.

These provisions prescribed the number of delegates elected from each of the ten cantons.

And that is all that the Constitutional Court of BiH decided with the said two decisions. The Constitutional Court, therefore, has not ruled nor decided on any issue that has recently been discussed as a proposal for amendments to the Election Law of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Therefore, the Constitutional Court of BiH appeals to everyone, and primarily to politicians and those who claim not to be politicians but speak publicly on behalf of politics, to stop abusing the decisions of the Constitutional Court and the Constitutional Court of BiH itself.

If they consider a law unconstitutional, the Constitution of BiH prescribes the way in which a decision of the Constitutional Court of BiH on that issue can be obtained.

Let them request it, and the Constitutional Court will assess the constitutionality. But saying that the Constitutional Court has decided on something it has not even ruled on is becoming truly unserious and hinders the already difficult work of the Constitutional Court of BiH," states the statement signed by the President of the Constitutional Court of BiH, Seada Palavrić.