THE CONSTITUTIONAL Court will not decide over the controversial amendment to the State Citizenship Act, which forces Slovaks to forfeit their citizenship if they are granted citizenship of other country. The court’s senate led by Constitutional Court (CC) President Ivetta Macejková unanimously postponed the final verdict until further notice, the SITA newswire reported on January 30.
The senate however agreed at its January 22 session to set the date for the proceeding to February 26. Gábor Gál from Most-Híd party considers the decision outrageous, as reported by the TASR newswire.
Prime Minister Robert Fico’s government adopted the amendment in 2010 in response to Hungarian law on double citizenship. Together 44 MPs sitting in the opposition challenged the law and turned to the court in September 2011. They argued that the law is unconstitutional because it strips people of their citizenship against their will. Moreover, they criticise then MPs for passing it in the fast-tracked proceeding though there was no reason for doing so.
The motion also points to the amendment’s ambiguity, vagueness and unenforceability of the measures, especially the rule that person who fails to report having the citizenship of other
country be charged with a crime, SITA reported.
Source: SITA, TASR
Compiled by Radka Minarechová from press reports
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