President Iohannis on CCR ruling regarding amnesty: No tragedy

President Klaus Iohannis has retorted to the recent Constitutional Court’s ruling that rejected initiatives to amend the Constitution through which amnesty and pardon for corruption deeds should be banned, arguing that the question asked at the referendum on May 26 has not been about banning amnesty and pardon through Constitution, but through the laws adopted in the Parliament.

Klaus Iohannis says that the CCR ruling is not changing at all the need to transpose the referendum’s results in concrete actions.

“Romanians expect the will they voiced at the referendum of May 26 to be transposed in concrete actions. We need the harm done in the past two years to be repaired. The road to implement the goals of this pact is not an easy one and it is still young.

A few days ago, the Constitutional Court has established that it’s no need to amend the Constitution to ban amnesty and pardon of the corrupt people.

At the referendum on May 26, I did not ask if this interdiction must be enforced in the Fundamental Law. To implement the results of the referendum a political will is needed first,” President Iohannis pointed out.

“It’s no tragedy that certain proposals in the drafts amending the Constitution have been invalidated by CCR, as certain voices have claimed in the public space. Parties will just have to come up now with other versions to amend the legislation, to lead to the same result: to transpose the will of the people in law as soon as possible”, the head of state added.

Iohannis has also slammed the ruling PSD-ALDE coalition once again.

“After the consultations in June, I launched the invitation to all political parties to be part of this project for the Romanians. The only parties that did not sign this pact are PSD and ALDE, which continue to move away from the citizens’ interests.

“Through its passivity, PSD-ALDE majority is against the Romanians’ will. When citizens have expressed their sovereign will in a certain sense, the immediate consequence for the decision maker is to act in tune with this will (…) PSD’s political will to protect exclusively the corrupt people, a will invalidated by the referendum, is the one that prompted the amputation of the criminal laws and of the justice laws (…) The will of the people, clearly expressed by 6.4 million Romanians by voting <yes> at the referendum of May 26 must be compulsorily observed. This is unquestionable“.

Chairman of the National Liberal Party (PNL), Ludovic Orban has announced on Monday that the draft law amending the Constitution would go on in Parliament without the provisions the Constitutional Court has declared unconstitutional.