Resumen de Rights of the citizens and their protection by the ombudsman’s bringing a case before the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Bulgaria
The institution of the Ombudsman was created for the first time in Bulgaria with the adoption of the Ombudsman Act by the 39th National Assembly on 8th May 2003, which entered into force on 1st January 2004 (SG, issue 48, 23rd May 2003). The amendment of the Constitution of Republic Bulgaria in 2006 further established the institution of the Ombudsman on constitutional level with the authority to bring cases before the Constitutional Court with an application for declaring the unconstitutionality of any law violating the rights and freedoms of the citizens – Art. 150, para 3 of the Constitution of Republic Bulgaria (SG, issue 27, 2006). For a period, a little longer than a decade the Constitutional Court developed its case-law on the Ombudsman’s authority to protect the rights of the citizens. This article is focused on it and provides an in-depth analysis of that issue. Special attention is drawn to constitutional case No. 19 of 2009 (Order No. 1 of 2010) and to constitutional case No. 14 of 2010 (Order No. 8 of 2010). The Constitutional court stated that the Ombudsman had no authority to initiate proceedings to verify the compliance of Bulgarian law with any commonly recognized norms of international law and with any international conventions ratified by Bulgaria. Besides the Ombudsman could bring cases for establishment of unconstitutionality of laws only, but not of any other acts of the National assembly or any acts of the President. Furthermore, the Ombudsman could contest only laws that violate the rights and freedoms of the citizens as determined by the Constitution of Republic Bulgaria. Classification of the basic rights and freedoms was made by the Constitutional court in Order No. 2 of 2016 on constitutional case No. 12 of 2015, examined in details here.
