Will the Government introduce a new Criminal Code soon, as requested by the President of the Constitutional Court, Darko Kostadinovski, due to the controversial amendments adopted two years ago? The Constitutional Court in February opened a procedure for assessing the constitutionality of the law and gave the Parliament a 6-month deadline to correct the provisions. Although this deadline has passed, there is still no information in the Parliament about the progress of the procedure.
Speaker Afrim Gashi recently stated that "the door for the new Criminal Code is open," but that there is still no proposal from the Government. SDSM MP Slavjanka Petrovska also has no information on when the law will be submitted to MPs.
"It is very difficult to answer this question from the opposition's position, especially when the government is quite closed when it comes to essential laws - closed in the sense that the Government either does not submit them at all, or submits them through a shortened procedure through a group of MPs, and this has also been noted in the European Commission Report," said Slavjanka Petrovska.
The new Criminal Code is expected to correct the changes through which officials involved in corruption and abuse of public office were amnestied, due to which some cases against former officials have already become obsolete. This was also noted in the European Commission Report. The law is also part of the obligations taken with the reform agenda, with a deadline for adoption by December of this year. Minister of Justice Igor Filkov said in an interview with the MIA agency that the law is in the final stage. This was also confirmed by Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski, who this week announced that the changes will be made by the end of the year.
"For the Criminal Code, we are doing this under the pressure of the Constitutional Court's decision and we will complete this by the New Year. Those changes will be introduced in parliament, so that it does not happen that we make a general collective amnesty in society and all the criminals who are in prison are released. Everyone must be responsible before making any decision," declared Hristijan Micksoki.
The latest amendments to the Criminal Code were approved in September 2023 by the previous Government, with an expedited procedure through the European flag, in which case a large number of former officials were saved from criminal prosecution. According to the Criminal Court's analysis, at the time of the approval of the amendments, proceedings were underway against 197 persons accused of abuse of official duty. /tv21
