The clamorous bill on making an amendment to the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia has been placed into circulation on the website of the National Assembly of Armenia.

According to the bill, the My Step faction of the National Assembly of Armenia recommends terminating the term of office of President of the Constitutional Court Hrayr Tovmasyan and members of the Constitutional Court.

“The terms of office of the president and members of the Constitutional Court appointed prior to entry into force of Chapter 7 of the Constitution shall discontinue. Nominations for the vacancies for judges of the Constitutional Court shall be sequentially made by the Government, the President of the Republic and the General Assembly of Judges. By these amendments, the procedure and time limits for filling the vacancies emerged on the ground of part 1 of the Article shall be established through the special procedure envisaged by the Constitutional Law “On the Constitutional Court” which must be adopted and enter into force before April 1, 2020,” the draft reads.

Chapter 7 of the Constitution entered into force on April 9, 2018, after which, according to the new Constitution, 2 judges were elected to the Constitutional Court (Armen Dilanyan and Vahe Grigoryan), and the remaining 6 judges and the president of the Constitutional Court were elected prior to April 9, 2018.

The rationale of the draft states that the amendment is required in order to resolve the crisis in the Constitutional Court.

The amendment to the Constitution requires the votes of at least two thirds (88 deputies) of the total number of deputies, and the ruling My Step faction of the National Assembly has that many deputies.

Today the Council of the National Assembly will hold a closed session during which it will decide whether the National Assembly will convene a special session to consider the legislative package of deputy of the My Step faction Vahagn Hovakimyan or not.