On Wednesday, the Presidency's press office distributed to the media the "legal defense" of the head of state as an "interested party" in the case with complainant Erion Veliaj, who opposes his dismissal as mayor by the Council of Ministers.
In this document drafted for the Constitutional Court, the President undertakes to oppose as 'unconstitutional' the court's decision to suspend a controversial decree of his, which scheduled the holding of partial elections in Tirana, despite the fact that Mayor Veliaj had filed a lawsuit with the Constitutional Court.
Veliaj's lawsuit was based on Article 115 of the Constitution, which clearly states that the dismissal decision is suspended upon appeal. However, Begaj put the Presidency on a collision course with the Constitutional Court, as he asks it to declare its “incompetence” to review his decree and lift the suspension of the decree.
The president also undertakes to ask the Constitutional Court to reject Veliaj's request as unfounded in Article 115 of the Constitution and to announce an early election date in Tirana.
"In our assessment as an interested party, only such a proceeding can restore the constitutionality of this appeal process, arbitrarily violated by the Constitutional Court itself," the Presidency's arguments state.
Throughout the preamble prepared for the court session on October 31, where the legality of Veliaj's dismissal from the government will be decided, the President uses language that aims to intimidate the Constitutional Court in its decision-making.
In a subsection of the document titled "The Constitutional Court has the obligation to respect its jurisprudence," the President suggests that this court maintain its decision-making practice, alluding to the fact that it is violating it.
"The Constitutional Court cannot read the Constitution 'case by case' and throw away its previous decisions whenever the findings, reasoning, definitions and references presented therein do not apply to the artificial construct it seeks to give to the latest case at hand," the document states.
The President also undertakes to analyze not only the decision-making, but also the behavior of the Constitutional Court, accusing it of "self-isolation" towards the arguments of interested parties.
Begaj also claims that the Constitutional Court does not have the legal competence to review Veliaj's appeal and calls her decision unilateral.
"This decision of the Judges' meeting is unconstitutional and must be corrected immediately. The Constitutional Court must reopen the discussion on legitimation and reconsider it after hearing the arguments of the interested parties before proceeding with any further steps," the President writes.
The document, which appears more like a public 'attack' on the Constitutional Court, was published just hours after the opposition took an official step, demanding his dismissal from office for serious constitutional violations, including accepting payments from a private hospital and concluding insurance contracts with the company where his son worked./Reporter.al
