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Constitutional Court to Examine Act on Non-profit Making Organisations
Tuesday 16 March 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, March 16 (TASR) - The Constitutional Court is to examine the Act on Non-profit Making Organisations (NMOs), effective as of February 1, 2010, based on a complaint filed by opposition MPs, Independent MP and Most-Hid party member Gabor Gal told TASR on Tuesday.
According to Gal, the complaint has been signed by 43 MPs from the opposition SDKU-DS, the Christian Democratic Movement (KDH), the Conservative Democrats of Slovakia (KDS) and Most-Hid. Ethnic-Hungarian SMK party members didn't sign it, he noted.
Gal thinks that the aim of the Act is to nationalise the assets of non-profit making organisations, to curb their independence and to use them financially. As an example he mentioned organisations that run several hospitals in Slovakia. According to the Act, which was passed in December 2009, the structure of NMO boards in healthcare has to correspond with the ratio of state assets invested in such organisations. As of February, the state can appoint the majority of board members if its investment in the organisation concerned exceeds half of all investments.
Gal stated that the majority of the board members of non-profit making organisations have been appointed by the current Government. "It's mainly entrepreneurs who are active in the healthcare sector, so I don't know whose interests they will promote, but it seems as though it won't be the ones of the NMOs," he said.
According to constitutional lawyer Radoslav Prochazka (a KDH MP), who will represent the MPs at the Constitutional Court, the Act is at odds with norms guaranteeing the protection of access to ownership rights that guard the boundary lines between the state and the private sector. He also criticised the retroactive effects of the Act, which can interfere in already established relations.
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