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| PHÎÒÎ: FROM PRIVATE ARCHIVE |
KW: How do you assess the amendments to the laws on the judicial system and the status of judges passed by the VR in the first reading, which, by the way, were to be presented to the Venice Commission for evaluation? There is serious concern that the judicial power has not become more independent after these amendments, but instead became more dependent on the president, who at the moment has the determining influence on the Supreme Council of Justice?
T.M.: At the moment, we cannot agree or discard these concerns, since we simply did not see the text of the bill. We expect to receive this document and a formal request from Ukraine to comment on its provisions.
KW: Serhiy Kivalov says that the commission approved the bill. What is really happening?
T.M.: Mr Kivalov presented the general outline of the bill. That, however, is not enough for us to draw conclusions about such complex text. This is why we expect an official request any time soon.
KW: Do you know the exact date when it will happen?
T.M.: No, we don’t know the exact date, but we hope it will be very soon.
KW: Does this mean that the bill was not discussed at the latest meeting of the commission?
T.M.: No, we did not discuss it.
KW: How would you evaluate the proposed amendments in general?
T.M.: We did not see the amendments, so it would be premature to evaluate them.
KW: The bill on a nationwide referendum in Ukraine was approved in the first reading. In the opinion of many experts, this bill will allow the president to bypass the legislature in organizing the holding of referendums and thus introducing amendments to the Constitution and passing amendments to laws and adopting new bills. How do you assess these actions of the government?
T.M.: Since the times of President Kuchma, we expressed our opinion that one cannot introduce changes to the constitution without having consent of two thirds of the parliament. Otherwise, an additional referendum is required.
KW: Our current administration is proposing to change legislation on local elections. The talk is about a majoritarian system of elections to village, town and city councils and a mixed system for elections to county and oblast councils. At the same time, prior to that there was talk about introducing open election lists. What are your recommendations to changing the election law?
T.M.: We heard a lot of criticism against using the proportional system in local and regional elections. The proportional system works quite well in many countries. However, it seems to me that there is a prevailing opinion in Ukraine that political parties are not so well developed on the local level and a majoritarian or mixed system on this level would make more sense. We have nothing against transition to a majoritarian system. However, a system with open lists is also acceptable.
KW: Coming back to judicial reform, aren’t changes happening too fast? The first reading of the bill took place only two weeks after comparatively lackluster discussions…
T.M.: We expect there will be much more discussion before the second reading. As far as I can judge, the second reading of the bill in Ukraine will have substantial changes, which means that the first reading is far from the final decision on the text of the bill.
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