The Speaker of Parliament or the Prime Minister will hold office of President on an interim basis in order to issue the decree to promulgate the law by which changes were made to the Broadcasting Code given that President Igor Dodon refused to issue the given decree even if he was obliged to as the legislative body readopted the bill immediately after reexamining it at the request of the Head of State. On January 5, the Constitutional Court (CC) pronounced a judgment that justifies the suspension of President Dodon from office. Thus, it is for the third time that Igor Dodon is suspended from post, IPN reports.

Under the CC judgment, the President of Moldova Igor Dodon, by his refusal to promulgate the law at a time when this was adopted by Parliament two times, violated the constitutional norms and the oath that he took when he was sworn in.

The representatives of the presidential administration were absent from the meeting and didn’t inform the CC about the reasons for the absence.

After the judgment was passed, President Igor Dodon wrote on a social networking site that he will no way concede before the government and will not sign laws that run counter to the people’s interests. “What the government does now with the help of the Constitutional Court will not pass without consequences,” he wrote.

The Democratic MP Sergiu Sarbu on January 4 filed an application to the Constitutional Court whereby he requested to ascertain the circumstances that justify the necessity of suspending the Head of State from office in order to promulgate the law by which changes were made to the Broadcasting Code given that President Igor Dodon two times refused to promulgate this law.

The same day, President Igor Dodon requested the Constitutional Court to determine the constitutionality of provisions of the given law. The law amends the Broadcasting Code and bans the transmission of news, feature, military and political radio and TV programs produced in other states than the EU, the U.S., Canada and the states that ratified the European Convention on Transfrontier Television.

Earlier, the CC pronounced two more judgments that justify the necessity of suspending the Head of State from office so that the decrees to name new members of the Cabinet could be issued.