The Government of Georgia has been “forced” to ask the country’s Constitutional Court to confirm whether the President of Georgia violated the Constitution in her international visits, the Political Council of the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party said on Tuesday.
The statement follows Monday’s address by President Salome Zourabichvili to the Parliament, in which she detailed her visits to a number of European states for holding meetings.
GD’s Political Council said the Constitution stipulated the visits could only have been made through the “consent of the Government”, while the President’s meetings had not complied with the provision “as she herself admitted at yesterday's sitting [in the legislative body]”.
“[The visits] were planned by the President without any prior consultation with the Government, and the Government was informed of the visits only after [the fact], confirming that the President had intentionally violated the Constitution,” the ruling party statement said.
In its reaction, Georgian Dream reminded the President “that the rules of the state system are not determined by the President but by the Constitution, and no one can allow the President to change the Constitution”.
The statement also includes references to “a number of cases over the past year in which the President refused to appoint an ambassador or a diplomatic representative nominated by the Government,” with the refusals referred to as being “grossly” contrary to the Constitution of Georgia.
The Political Council has also called on the President “to carefully study the Constitution of Georgia and to understand well the essence of a parliamentary republic”.
