Editorial by Desada Metaj
Edi Rama broke the silence of this Sunday's haunted morning, clearly to speak to the Constitutional Court and give them a strong signal about what decision they should make. "...But I said to share with you today what the Venice Commission and the European Court of Strasbourg say on this issue. Venice's position is actually very clear. The courts should NOT suspend members of the government..." - were Rama's firm words, as a final and indisputable verdict.
What made Rama’s “constitutional verdict” even more brutal was that he claimed to have studied the doctrine of the Venice Commission. He spoke confidently – without actually referring to any specific Venice document – claiming that they should not do this because: “First, they violate the balance of powers… Second, by doing this, the courts create the possibility of instrumentalizing justice… Third, ministers have political, not administrative functions…”.
As a zealous constitutionalist preacher, he also issued an “obiter dictum” for the specific case when he says: “The suspension measures apply to civil servants, not to members of the government, because the minister is not an ‘administrative official’, but a political authority… the judicial suspension of a minister is de facto pressure for his dismissal, given that when a minister is suspended, an individual is not suspended, but the entire decision-making process for one or more sectors that the minister can cover is paralyzed. And this is completely unconstitutional.”
Rama's excessive zeal and almost perfect accuracy in terminology clearly show that he, or people around him, have put aside any work and are looking through the large stack of Venice or Strasbourg papers, half-arguments to build the defensive narrative that he will sell to the public, as the cloak under which the pressure on the judiciary is hidden. However, he could not provide a number, date or reference to the document on which he is based. Without also questioning the interpretative twists that he usually makes to such texts. This was noticed even by the newest client of Rama's "Diella", Sali Berisha himself, who had received negative responses to the existence of these Venice documents.
However, in the passages of Rama's speech, it is clearly stated what he expects from the Constitutional Court: "...the minister either remains in office or leaves office: 1 - by resignation; 2 - by the Prime Minister; 3 - in extremis with a final sentence according to the law. There is no other option. The prosecutor's offices and the courts do not intervene in this at all and do not do this at all. Never."
In other words, Rama asks the CC to say, neither more nor less, that a minister can commit criminal offenses of any nature, extent, damage and effect while in office, and justice cannot suspend him from office! But according to this logic, then it follows that neither the measure of "house arrest" nor "prison arrest" can be given, because otherwise the minister would be automatically suspended from office due to physical isolation. These two measures are taken as an example, since they are components of the "immunity" of the deputy, and therefore also of the minister. So according to Rama, ministers have even stronger protection than the deputies themselves! Is this a small oversight that may have escaped the constitutionalist prime minister, or is it his hidden intention? This remains to be seen, but the logical paradox is more than obvious.
In the democracy of the Venice Commission, this is a matter of justice, especially of the GJK, SPAK and GJKKO, which must be left free from pressures, and not of political figures – especially the Prime Minister – who dare to broadcast lectures on justice and jurisprudence as an “era before the trial”. This is a pure and brutal intervention in a system from which they should stay away. These are also the basic lessons that Venice or Strasbourg teach: justice must be outside the interference and pressure of power, especially the political one. Rama, it seems, is removing the last brick from Venice to finally sink its lessons under the swamp of autocracy, despite the rule of law. And together with him, Berisha is also playing this dangerous game (for his troubles with the same justice), as the political constitutionalist in Rama’s opposition. Clearly, both are putting not only the Constitutional Court, the GJKKO and the SPAK, but the entire justice system into a political fan battle, camouflaged as judicial-legal. Now in public, the SPAK decision or even the expected one of the Constitutional Court, thanks to the diabolical game of Rama and Berisha, is starting to be seen as a political result. The risk of transforming justice – even if only in perception – into a part of politics is the most successful destruction that can be done to its credibility.
The Constitutional Court is already under strong public pressure from politics. There is no longer any doubt. Whether it will withstand it remains to be seen. However, it will not be a battle that can end with a single episode in the Criminal Court. It will be a long battle, apparently. SPAK has every opportunity, if it sees that they can put any obstacles in its way at the moment, to request other even more severe measures – such as those for MPs: prison arrest or house arrest. And there Rama will be forced to hand Balluk over to justice with his own hands, removing his immunity, along with his MPs (as he did with the municipal councilors in the Veliaj case). If, in this expected situation, he chooses not to lift the immunity of his ministers in cases of house arrest or prison, then this is another story that does not yet deserve to be analyzed, although it is not difficult to understand what it will mean for the Albanian political scene.
Well, in both of the above situations, the big loser will be Minister Balluku. She has left her political and legal fate in Rama's hands. If she does not understand this situation, it is her misfortune. If she does understand it, she must direct her legal position herself, with individual political and public acts. Rama and Berisha's political games have shown that the only thing they value is their own heads, for which they are willing to sell everything.
