Nikolai Tomenko raises alarm: "We've managed it! The Constitutional Court is left without a quorum."

Today, the terms of office of three judges of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine have ended, reducing its effective number to 11.

Furthermore, since December 29, 2020, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine has been without a Head, with an acting official in place: Sergey Holovaty until May 29, 2024, and Viktor Kryvenko from May 30, 2024, to the present.

Since May 29, 2020, the Constitutional Court has also lacked a Deputy Chairman, as this position is elected solely upon the proposal of the Court's Chairman.

As is known, all members of the Constitutional Court form the Grand Chamber, which will now be unable to make ANY decisions regarding constitutional representations and appeals.

The Grand Chamber, in turn, consists of two Senates, each comprising 9 judges. A Senate is authorized with the participation of at least 6 judges. Consequently, the second Senate will become unauthorized (with only 5 judges remaining), which was addressing the issue of the compliance of Ukrainian laws (and their individual provisions) with the Constitution of Ukraine concerning constitutional complaints.

I would also like to remind you that currently, the Advisory Expert Group is assessing candidates for 5 positions of judges in the Constitutional Court (for three vacant positions from the President's quota and two vacant positions from the Verkhovna Rada's quota).

Therefore, from January 27, 2025, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine will be unable to make ANY DECISION within the Grand Chamber and one of the two Senates.

This concerns, in particular, the following issues:

- compliance of Ukrainian laws, presidential acts, CMU, and VRU with the Constitution of Ukraine…;

- official interpretation of the Constitution;

- compliance of current international treaties or international treaties submitted to the Verkhovna Rada for consent to their binding nature with the Constitution;

- compliance of issues proposed for a nationwide referendum with the Constitution;

- adherence to the constitutional procedure for investigating and considering the case of the President's removal from office through impeachment…

(For more details, see Article 35 of the Law of Ukraine "On the Constitutional Court of Ukraine.")

However, even before January 27, 2025, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine could not boast of its fruitful activity.

Thus, the most resonant constitutional representations by the deputies of DOHI have not been considered. Among them:

- on the official interpretation of the provisions of Article 4 of the Constitution regarding single citizenship dated December 20, 2021;

- on the compliance of the Resolution of the Verkhovna Rada "On the Formation and Liquidation of Districts" dated October 20, 2020, with the Constitution of Ukraine;

- on the compliance of the provisions of paragraph 6 of part one of Article 4, part three of Article 11 of the Law of Ukraine "On the Voluntary Association of Communities" dated October 19, 2020, with the Constitution of Ukraine;

- on the compliance of the Law of Ukraine "On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine on the Conditions of Circulation of Agricultural Land" dated March 31, 2020, with the Constitution of Ukraine…

The authorities, however, do not acknowledge their fault and reassure the public that nothing terrible will happen if the Constitutional Court does not make ANY DECISIONS for some period. They claim that we have lived without a CHAIRMAN of the Constitutional Court for 5 years and nothing has happened. It is impossible not to mention the immortal work of Ostap Vyshnia "CHUKHRAINTSY," where one of the main and characteristic traits of this unique nation and its authorities is described as:

“SOMEHOW IT WILL BE!”

For reference.

For the budget of 2025, 332 million 718.7 thousand hryvnias have been allocated for the maintenance of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine.