A day ago, the Democratic Institute of Kosovo evaluated the work of the Assembly of Kosovo for the first six months of the 2022 spring session, while announcing that from the beginning of this year's spring session, in January until the end of June, based on the data obtained from the monitoring, the Assembly held a total of 45 sessions, including 19 continuation sessions, while 23 sessions failed due to the lack of a quorum of 61 deputies.

According to the data provided by the Assembly, until the end of June, the deputies were absent a total of 699 times.

If the average of MPs' absences for each session is calculated, it turns out that on average up to 16 MPs were absent.

"If we analyze the data on participation in the sessions that failed due to lack of quorum, it turns out that in each of those sessions, more than 90 MPs signed.

This only exposed the problem, now and in some legislatures of the Assembly, of the lack of individual responsibility of the deputies towards the obligations they have as representatives of the citizens, who sign the participation lists but who do not stay in the session during and until the end of her", it is stated in the announcement of the KDI

"From the total number of sessions held for the reporting period, a total of 23 sessions have failed due to the lack of a quorum of 61 deputies present to continue with the voting process.

In 15 of these 23 failed sessions due to the lack of a quorum, the agenda was the review of draft laws, which has influenced the delay of their review", it is further stated.

The parliament of Kosovo

The lack of a quorum in plenary proceedings during this period of time has been very frequent, mainly for basic laws that require a simple majority of votes, despite this legislature having a consolidated majority in numbers.

In many of the sessions, the parliamentary majority has failed to secure the necessary number of deputies to push forward its initiatives, causing them to drag on.

"On the other hand, the opposition has shown a constructive role by participating in the voting of issues that require 2/3 of the votes, such as the case of international agreements, which the parliamentary majority cannot pass alone.

Although, in some cases, the opposition has conditioned its vote on the voting of certain agreements, in exchange for meeting their demands, as was the case with the formation of the investigative commission for energy", it is further stated.

However, taking into account that the main burden for the smooth running of the works and the fulfillment of the agenda is with the parliamentary majority, despite a consolidated majority in numbers, however, it seems that this numerical value is not reflecting the political power to make important decisions in the Assembly of Kosovo.

"The case of the failure of the approval of the Civil Code, which despite having received the full support of the government and the importance of this legal document for Kosovo, did not have the same support even from the deputies belonging to the parliamentary majority.

The parliamentary debate that took place during the consideration of this Project - Code exposed the great differences between the deputies of all parliamentary groups, but most importantly it exposed the differences among the deputies of the parliamentary majority, which is why its approval fails," it is said. Further.

Another equally important bill that last week failed to be approved in the second reading due to lack of quorum was the one on the declaration, descent, and control of wealth and gifts.

Since it did not find support among the opposition for the differences they had in terms of the categories of public officials who would have to declare their wealth, the parliamentary majority did not manage to secure the necessary numbers to approve that draft law since only 60 deputies were present at the session of the majority.

The parliament of Kosovo

On the other hand, in the absence of the necessary consensus between the parliamentary majority and the minority MPs, the draft law to supplement - amend the Law on Local Self-Government, which, because it entered the category of laws of vital interest and requires a double majority, has over for four months it is being carried from one session to another, unable to be put to a vote.

Another factor that has caused the lack of quorum in plenary works, are the trips abroad of the deputies, which, although they are done in order to develop parliamentary diplomacy, in most cases they take place without a clear agenda and with a lack of information about what they have produced those trips.

As for the legislative agenda, the number of draft laws in the procedure in the Assembly for the first six months of this year is 108, of which 43 have been approved so far, or 39% of those in the procedure.

The legislative agenda of the Government of Kosovo for this year contains a total of 150 draft laws of which so far, that is, for six months, only 23 draft laws have been submitted to the Assembly.

However, the large number of draft laws that the Assembly currently has in the procedure is due to the very low dynamics of the work in the last session after the local elections that had taken the attention of all parliamentary political subjects.

There are 80 draft laws that failed to be approved, which have been carried over from 2021 to this year, thus overloading the agenda of the Assembly and parliamentary committees.

Of the 65 draft laws that are being considered in the Assembly, only 14 of them are still within the procedural deadlines provided by the Work Regulations.

Meanwhile, 51 other draft laws that are currently in the review procedure have passed all procedural deadlines, either within two readings or before the first reading as provided by the Regulation.

One of those that has already passed the procedural deadlines for review but has not yet been approved is the Draft - New Work Regulations, which, although it has been in the works for some time and it seems that to some extent there is consensus among the parliamentary groups, it has not yet has received an epilogue.

Waiting for consideration is one of the most important draft laws derived from the Agenda for European Reform 2, the one on the financing of political entities, which has been continuously challenged by the lack of political will to change it.

This bill has passed more than three months since it was approved in the first reading and has not yet been processed for final approval.

/Telegraph/