THREE years after a group of then-opposition MPs, led by the current justice minister, Daniel Lipšic of the Christian Democratic Movement (KDH), filed a complaint with the Constitutional Court seeking review of Slovakia’s so-called expropriation law, the court has still not delivered a decision.
The case was postponed again on November 24 due to the absence of Lipšic, who is the representative of the group of MPs before the court. He was not at the court hearing because his attendance was required at a meeting of the government’s Security Council. The court decided to continue the case on January 26, 2011, the SITA newswire reported.
In January 2008, the group of opposition MPs asked the Constitutional Court to examine the expropriation law and issue a preliminary injunction to halt the use of the law on one-off extraordinary measures in acquiring land for state highway and dual-carriageway projects. The MPs said that allowing the state to build highways on private land without restriction was an unacceptable violation of ownership rights. Lipšic at the time called the law an unconstitutional, flagrant violation of ownership rights, one of the basic human rights.
The Constitutional Court refused a year ago to suspend the effectiveness of the contested provisions of the law but agreed to hear further arguments on its legality.
