Az Alkotmánybíróság döntései

Absztrakt

The Constitutional Court (CC) made 83 decisions between 1 September and 25 November 2016, most of them (70) in 5-member chambers. There were 6 decisions that found a body of law or a regular court’s decision unconstitutional. The decisions reached in plenary session were rarely unanimous: out of 13 cases only 3 were reached without any concurring or dissenting opinions and these 3 unanimous decisions dismissed the cases in quiestion.

Many decisions reflected some of the legal aspects of the referendum held in October on refugee quota. The CC dismissed the constitutional complaint on voting from abroad. The current law on referendum does not allow to vote from abroad for those who have a residence in Hungary but are abroad on the day of the referendum. The complainant stated it is unconstitutional that the law on referendum discriminates between those citizens who have residence in Hungary and are at home or are abroad on the day of the referendum. According to the CC the complainant had no standing because the law in question was not applied by the regular court and also because the CC has already decided a similar case – but in connection with the law on parlamentary elections.

In two other decisions the CC found two decisions of the Curia unconstitutional. In both cases two television chanels broadcasted an advertistment of the Government that urged the citizents to vote. According to the two chanels it wasn’t a political advertistment, therefore strict rules on political advertisments are not to be applied to it. According to the National Electoral Committee the two chanels were correct: simply because the referendum was initiated by the Government it doesn’t make an advertisment on the importance to go to vote political. The Curia disagreed: it pointed out, that during th campainge the opposing parties focused on to urge the citizens to take part in or to refrain from voting. Therefore the nature of the advertistment (whether it is political or not) must be examined in a larger context. The Curia decided the Government’s ad was political because of the direction of the campaign, therefore the two chanels broke the law on political advertistments. The CC ruled the advertisments were not political, because according to the law to apply int he case does not require an examination of the „larger context”, for example of what is happening int he campaign. According to the CC any advertistment that urges the citizens to vote or to refrain from voting cannot be taken as political advertistment.