The Constitutional Court did not intervene against the SPD, Tricolor and PRO campaign before the regional elections, it did not find a procedural way to do so. He rejected the first of a series of complaints coordinated by lawyer Pavla Krejčí at the turn of August and September. Now he also rejected the complaint from the South Bohemian Region, where the procedural situation was slightly different, so there was a chance for a different outcome.
Brno
9:45 20. 9. 2024 (Updated: 11:37 9/20/2024)
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Okamura said the criminal charges confirm that the SPD “hit the nail on the head” with its posters | Photo: René Volfík | Source: iROZHLAS.cz
“If they wanted to, they would have had the opportunity to discuss it, the Constitutional Court Act allows them to do so,” said lawyer Pavla Krejčí on the X network.
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Krejci and other people she represented sued the courts in various states to protect the integrity of the campaign and ban the use of the poster with the text “Imported surgeons will not solve health care problems.”
The poster shows a picture of a dark-skinned man with a knife in his hand. They also pointed to a poster with a picture of two Roma boys with a cigarette. The image was created by artificial intelligence and is accompanied by the inscription “They say let us go to school, but ours have it on the hook…”.
The regional courts did not comply with the proposals, nor did the Constitutional Court intervene. Already in the first rejection resolution, he wrote that the critics of the SPD campaign should have turned to the Supreme Administrative Court. Regarding the current resolution, Krejčí criticizes the insufficient justification and also the fact that the court did not provide guidance on how to effectively defend against similar motives in election campaigns.
“The complainant had the opportunity and obligation to exhaust the cassation complaint before filing the constitutional complaint, because the cassation complaint was admissible. Due to the incorrect instruction of the regional court on the inadmissibility of the cassation complaint, it can do so within an extended period of three months,” says the new resolution, which was provided to ČTK by Natálie Nechvátalová from the Department of External Relations of the ÚS.
Today, the Constitutional Court also rejected a complaint against the SPD campaign in the South Bohemian Region. As one of the petitioners wrote to me, in this state, I am ashamed of what the Constitutional Court sent me. I guess there is nothing to add to that. If they wanted to, they had the opportunity to discuss it, the Constitutional Court Act allows them to do so.
— Pavla Krejci (@pavla_krejci) September 19, 2024
“Procedurally, the Constitutional Court could not have decided otherwise. He had no other choice. If we want to define the rules of the election campaign in a different way, we have to change the legislation,” constitutional judge David Uhlíř responded on the X network.
Dear colleague, I understand you very well. I will not comment on the SPD election campaign here. From a procedural point of view, the Constitutional Court could not decide otherwise. He had no other choice. If we want to define the rules of the election campaign differently, we have to change the legislation.
— Uhlíř David (@UhlDavid1) September 19, 2024
The Romeo organization, the Central Bohemian regional coordinator for minorities, Cyril Koky, and others filed criminal charges against the SPD movement, its chairman Tomio Okamura, the Trikolora and PRO parties, and their marketers in August due to the controversial campaign. According to whistleblowers, the poster with Roma boys is racist, spreads hatred towards the Roma minority and defames it.
Okamura then told CTK that the criminal charges confirm that the SPD “hit the nail on the head” with its posters. He called the images allegories. Before that, the police had already initiated criminal proceedings because of the SPD poster with a dark-skinned man with a knife in his hand.
In the summer, the Constitutional Court also rejected Krejčí’s complaint, which criticized the PRO party’s campaign in this year’s European Parliament elections. According to the complaint, the way the campaign was conducted was incompatible with the values of a democratic rule of law. Krejčí demanded that the election of new MEPs and substitutes be declared invalid, i.e. essentially a repeat of the elections. However, the legal regulation does not allow such an intervention, the court said.
“The proposal of the complainant was thus doomed to failure,” read the resolution of the plenary session with reporter Jiří Přibáně. But the court admitted that the campaign of some candidates can be seen as “at the very least falling”.
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