Court to rule on freezing polls July 14

Fuente: 
Kuwait Times
Fecha de publicación: 
08 Jul 2013

The administrative court yesterday set July 14 as the date to issue its ruling on a petition demanding that the July 27 election should be suspended because the current Cabinet is illegal. Lawyer Adel Abdulhadi, who filed the petition last week, argued in the court yesterday that the government’s composition is not in line with the constitution which requires that at least one of its members must be an elected MP. He said that after the June 16 historical ruling of the constitutional court which nullified the election process and dissolved the National Assembly which was elected in December last year, the only elected MP in the Cabinet, Minister of Social Affairs and Labour Thekra Al-Rasheedi, is no longer a member of the Assembly.

Accordingly, none of the Cabinet members is an elected MP which violates article 56 of the constitution which renders it “illegitimate” and as a result any actions taken by the Cabinet will be illegal and unconstitutional. One of those actions was approving an Amiri decree inviting voters to elect a new Assembly issued last month. According to Abdulhadi, this decree is illegal and the whole election process will also be illegal. Abdulhadi demanded that the court should halt the election scheduled for July 27 in order for the government to rectify the constitutional errors.

The lawyer also told the court that even if the government claims State Minister for Assembly Affairs and Planning Rola Dashti is the elected MP in the Cabinet, this would mean that the dissolved 2009 Assembly must be reinstated. Dashti was a member of parliament elected in 2009 but this Assembly was dissolved on two occasions, the first time in December 2011 after which it was reinstated by the constitutional court, but was dissolved again in October last year. Abdulhadi said that in both cases, the Cabinet is either illegal or the 2009 Assembly should be revived in order for it to become legal. The court yesterday received a similar petition and set tomorrow to start reviewing it.

In another development, Al-Jarida newspaper claimed yesterday that a group of influential people, including members of the ruling family, have established a KD 13.5-million fund to influence the outcome of the election. The daily said that the fund will pay KD 350,000 to candidates who will be supported by the fund and running in the first and third constituencies, KD 250,000 in the second and as much as KD 500,000 for certain candidates in the fourth and fifth electoral districts. The paper said the fund aims at electing at least 25 MPs in the 50-seat Assembly to have a formidable bloc that can influence the Cabinet’s composition. The fund also plans to spend as much as KD 13 million to influence the election of the new Assembly speaker.

By B Izzak, Staff Writer

http://news.kuwaittimes.net/court-to-rule-on-freezing-polls-july-14/