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The Constitutional Court of Romania (CCR) will be considering on June 29 a constitutionality objection filed by the opposition Social Democratic Party (PSD) over Decision 36/2021 of the Romanian Parliament for the removal from office of Renate Weber as the ombudswoman, CCR officials said on Friday.
Parliament Decision 36/2021 for the removal from office of Ombudswoman Renate Weber is unconstitutional as it violates the provisions regarding the principle of legality and the five-year office tenure, reads a constitutionality objection filed by the opposition Social Democratic Party (PSD) with the Constitutional Court (CCR).
According to the document, the decision of Parliament would violate the provisions of Article 1(5) regarding the principle of legality and Article 5 (1) in the Constitution regarding the ombudsman's 5-year term of office.
"Contrary to the guarantees of independence for the Ombudsman as underlined by the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court and provided by European standards, the Romanian Parliament passed a decision to remove the ombudswoman from office in violation of the Constitution, the independence standards in Article 9 (2) of Law 35/1997 on the organisation and operation of the Ombudsman's Office, as explained in the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court, because removal from office was used as a discretionary, political check mechanism, and not as a legality check on the ombudsman," reads the objection.
The objectors say that they do not question the right of Parliament to assess the activity of the ombudsman, but "the constitutionality of this assessment in the sense that the assessment was not an objective one, did not follow the constitutional and legal framework and was not based on demonstrable cumulative violations of the Constitution or other laws."
