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Criminal code modification pressurises Basque institutions

01 November 2003

On 31 October 2003, the Council of Ministers decided to appeal to the Constitutional Court against the plan presented the previous week by the Basque government for discussion in the Parliament of the Basque Country, (see Statewatch vol 12 no 5). The Spanish government's decision is an attempt to prevent discussion of the proposals and their possible approval by the Basque chamber. The Constitutional Court will reach a decision on whether to allow the appeal at the end of December or in January 2004. If it is admitted it will paralyse debate in the Basque parliament, possibly for years.

As part of the strategy of pressurising Basque institutions (see Statewatch vol 13 no 3/4), the parliamentary steering group that failed to carry out a Supreme Court order to dissolve the parliamentary group, Sozialista Abertzaleak, was called to give testimony in early December in the Basque Country's Tribunal Superior de Justicia (Superior Court of Justice). It was facing an charge of contempt. The latest move was through a reform of the criminal code (Código Penal) (that the government is set to approve before the end of the year), that would criminalise a public authority that calls a referendum without being authorised to do so. The responsible individual will risk being sentenced to several years imprisonment. All of the opposition parties, including the Socialist party, expressed objections both to the measure itself, and to the way in which it has been presented as part of a Ley de Acompañamiento (Supplementary Law) that has nothing to do with the Código Penal. They are considering an appeal against this reform on grounds of unconstitutionality.