The Judicial Appointments Council is expected to send to the presidency the names of two candidates for the sixth seat of the Constitutional Court.

According to the decision of the KED meeting on Tuesday, December 22, Aleksandër Toma and Përparim Kalo are in the running for the seat. Toma and Kalo were interviewed on Tuesday by KED, where they also presented their platform regarding the candidacy for the role.

KED is expected to decide today on the approval of the final ranking list, which will then be sent to the President.

KED’s decision to compile a list of only two candidates is a violation of the Constitution and the law on the Constitutional Court.

Initially,  Article 125 of the Constitution provides that the members of the Constitutional Court are selected from the candidates ranked in the first three places, from the list of KED.

“Members are selected from among the candidates ranked in the top three on the list by the Judicial Appointments Council, in accordance with the law.”

This is reinforced in the  Law on the Constitutional Court, where Article 7 / c provides for the procedure for electing members of the CC by the President of the Republic.

“The President, within 30 days of receiving the list from the Judicial Appointments Council, appoints the judge of the Constitutional Court from the candidates listed in the first three places of the list.”

Also, point 5 of this article provides that the Law Commission organizes hearings with candidates and then compiles a list of three names which it sends to the plenary session to be voted with 3/5 of the votes.

Thus KED had to compile a list of three names for the competition to be considered valid, otherwise, it had to notify the Assembly to reopen the competition.

On the 17th the Parliament approved  Altin Binaj as the fifth member of the Constitutional Court. Again Exit argued in an article that this action of KED is in violation of the law, as KED sent to the Assembly only the candidacy of Binaj.

But the election of the fifth member of the Constitutional Court was hailed by foreign ambassadors in the country and was seen as a step towards the functioning of the Constitutional Court.

US Ambassador Yuri Kim welcomed the news of Binaj’s accession and did not address the fact it appears to be unconstitutional and in violation of the law.