The Constitutional Court of Moldova ruled today that the country's parliament cannot dissolve itself.
Point reports this, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
The Constitutional Court clarified that there are only two constitutional reasons for dissolving parliament - failure to approve the government within 45 days and failure to pass laws within 90 days.
The issue was considered at the request of deputies of the PAS party of the new President of Moldova, Maia Sandu. Early parliamentary elections were one of her main election promises.
Sandu’s opponents from the Socialist Party of former President Igor Dodon did not fail to take advantage of Sandu’s failure. They declared their intention to find out in the same constitutional court the exact period during which President Sandu is obliged to nominate a candidate for the post of prime minister. The second notice from the Socialists will concern the sanctions that Maia Sandu faces if she refuses to nominate a candidate.
Dodon himself demanded that his opponent nominate a candidate for prime minister by February 1.
“Go ahead, Madam President. We require the nomination of a candidate by February 1st. Why until 1st? Because the parliament session is opening. You have 2 weeks,” Dodon said today.
Earlier, Justice Minister Fadej Nagacevski said that Sandu could face impeachment if she refuses to propose a prime minister to parliament.
“The populist theory that parliament can be punished by dissolution even if the president does not nominate a candidate for prime minister has also failed. I wonder what else they will come up with to avoid fulfilling their constitutional obligation to nominate a candidate for the post of Prime Minister,” the minister wrote on his Facebook.
Sandu understands perfectly well that she does not have and is not expected to have a majority in parliament. Therefore, deputies can approve the candidacy proposed by the president simply “out of spite,” and then, for the same reason, declare a vote of no confidence in the government.
A way out of the hopeless situation was offered to Sandu by the scandalous politician, the mayor of Balti, Renato Usatii. In the last elections, he betrayed his pro-Russian electorate by calling for a pro-Western candidate to vote. Now he invited her to submit her own candidacy for the post of prime minister. They say that the socialists will not vote for Usatii under any circumstances, which means that the path to the dissolution of parliament will be open.
But Sandu did not accept the generous offer. Either because he is ashamed of the alliance with Usatii, who has a trail of criminal cases behind him (in Russia, a criminal case has been opened against him for complicity in the so-called “Moldavian Laundromat”), or because he does not really want the dissolution of parliament.