Home > 5.1.3 Referendum requested by part of the electorate > MOLDOVA - Joint Opinion on the Draft Laws on Amending and Completing Certain Legislative Acts (Electoral System for the Election of the Parliament)
 
 
 
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Paragraph 65
 

Further at para. 43 and 44:


43. Thus, since they are not representatives of a faction of the population, parliamentarians may not be the defenders of particular interests, they are absolutely free in the exercise of their mandate and do not have the obligation to fulfil the commitments that they could undertake before the election or any eventual instructions of the voters expressed during the mandate. The elected do not have the legal obligation to support the Party or the decisions of their group in the Parliament. Furthermore, if the legislator, by his conduct, causes damage, the party or the group can exclude him/her, however, this exclusion does not entail the loss of parliamentary mandate. This, obviously, does not prevent the lawmaker, once elected, to honor his/her commitments and to comply with the voting discipline of the parliamentary group to which he/she is part of.
44. Consequently, the Court holds that, in the logic of free representation, the parliamentarian’s mandate is irrevocable: voters may not make it to stop prematurely and dismissals practice in blank is prohibited. Voters may not, therefore, express dissatisfaction with the way in which a candidate has fulfilled the mission than by refusing to grant their votes when he/she seeks re-election.