What did Ukraine's early June 2019 legal rulings change?
A look back at the Verkhovna Rada's impeachment-procedure law and a Constitutional Court ruling, both of 6 June 2019, as seen from 11 June 2019.
What was the state of Ukraine's institutional balance on 11 June 2019? Two decisions taken on 6 June 2019 framed the debate that day.
The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted a law on temporary investigative commissions and temporary special commissions of the Verkhovna Rada. The law regulates the procedure for impeaching the President of Ukraine, which gave parliament a defined legal route for a process that had lacked detailed rules.
On the same day, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine declared unconstitutional certain provisions of legislation on electronic asset declarations for civic activists. It also struck down, in a case brought by a plant owned by Kolomoisky, the right of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) to seek to have corrupt deals declared invalid.
Taken together, the two decisions touched on the powers of parliament over the presidency and on the tools available to anti-corruption bodies and civil society. The court's ruling narrowed the scope of NABU's authority in one specific respect and altered the declaration obligations placed on activists.
As of 11 June 2019, these were the legal developments of the preceding week that shaped the discussion of accountability in Ukraine. An opinion reading them together would stress that procedure, not just political will, determines how far oversight can reach: one decision set out a mechanism, the other removed one.
