Bulgaria’s President mounts new Constitutional Court challenge to 2023 constitutional amendments
Bulgarian head of state President Roumen Radev has approached the Constitutional Court for a second time seeking the annulment of various amendments to the constitution approved in 2023, his office said on November 20.
Radev is challenging the abolition of the ban on dual citizenship for candidate MPs, the “thoughtlessly introduced” principle of continuity of the term of office of MPs and Parliament, as well as the provisions on the formation of a caretaker government.
The amendments approved last year provide for a National Assembly to remain in existence until the members of the next National Assembly are sworn in. Previously, the constitution provided for a National Assembly to be dissolved when a parliamentary election date is decreed.
The amendments also restricted the head of state to a limited choice of public office-bearers from which to choose a caretaker Prime Minister. These include, among others, the Speaker of Parliament, the Ombudsman and the head of the Audit Office. Previously, the president had a free hand.
The Constitutional Court, in its previous ruling on challenges to the amendments, left these new provisions in place. The statement by Radev’s office said that the new challenge was justified by “the emergence of a number of new circumstances that emerged during the application of the contested texts”.
The amendments to the constitution that Radev is challenging “cancel the mechanisms for bearing political responsibility in the formation and functioning of state government bodies,” he said in his motives sent to the court.
Radev said that the new challenge would “provide an opportunity to clarify a number of controversial points that have already marked the procedures for forming a caretaker government under the new order and which continue to hinder the functioning of constitutionally established bodies, including Parliament itself”.
He cited the current difficulties in the 51st National Assembly in electing a Speaker. In the continuing impasse in electing Parliament’s principal presiding officer, several politicians and observers have said that the National Assembly is not just electing a Speaker, but also a potential candidate caretaker PM.
(Photo: president.bg)
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