Today, the Senate backed a new constitutional bill, the Constitutional Court Bill. The bill is expected to be signed into law by the President. The bill has proposed full-fledged electronic proceedings, sets a 15-day deadline for preliminary review of petitions, clarifies the consequences of a regulation being declared unconstitutional and provides for a reserve pool of candidates for Constitutional Court judgeships.
Several of the provisions presented during the Senate discussion, however, are already contained in the current 2021 law.
One of the main innovations is the deployment of a Constitutional Court information system.
Through it, petitioners will be able to file appeals electronically, track their progress and take part in hearings by video link or through a mobile app. Open hearings may also be broadcast live online.
Electronic procedural documents will carry the same legal force as paper ones. Hearing transcripts can be prepared in electronic form and certified with an electronic digital signature.
The current law has no separate, comprehensive regime for electronic constitutional proceedings. It governs the traditional procedure for filing and reviewing petitions and only permits audio and video recording during hearings.
The new law establishes a separate stage of preliminary review of incoming petitions, to be completed within 15 days. At this stage, the court will check its jurisdiction, the petitioner's standing and compliance with filing requirements.
If a matter falls outside the court's jurisdiction, the petition may be forwarded to the competent body or rejected.
The current law already provides for registration of a petition, preliminary examination by judges, and acceptance or refusal. It does not, however, set a general 15-day deadline for this stage.
The ability of citizens and legal entities to bring complaints to the Constitutional Court is not new in itself.
The current law already allows people to challenge the constitutionality of a law applied by a court in a specific case, provided all other avenues of judicial protection have been exhausted.
The new law lays out in more detail how such complaints are filed, which documents must be attached and how petitioners must show they have used other legal remedies.
The option of having a state-funded lawyer take part is also already provided for under current legislation and has been in effect since 2026.
A substantive change concerns the time a government body has to bring its regulation into line with the Constitution after a Constitutional Court ruling.
At present, the limit is one month. The new law allows up to three months, or another period set by the court itself.
The rule requiring a review within one month of decisions taken by government bodies on the basis of an unconstitutional regulation is effectively preserved, as the current law already contains it.
What is new is that the Constitutional Court Law will directly set out the procedure for reviewing court rulings issued on the basis of a regulation later declared unconstitutional.
Senators also noted that the court's rulings and opinions must be published within three days of adoption.
That requirement is already in force. The current law provides for official publication of the court's rulings and opinions within three days.
On this point, the new law mainly systematizes the types of court acts: rulings will be issued on key issues, opinions on others and orders on procedural matters.
Current legislation already provides for the preparation of a report on the state of constitutional legality.
The new law spells out the procedure in more detail. The Constitutional Court will prepare the report annually, based on a review of judicial practice, consider it in the first quarter and send it to the chambers of the parliamnet and to the president.
The court will also be able to discuss how government bodies have handled the proposals and recommendations in the report.
Another new feature will be a reserve pool of candidates for Constitutional Court judgeships, to be formed jointly with the Supreme Judicial Council.
The current law sets requirements for candidates and the procedure for electing judges but contains no separate mechanism for such a talent pool.
The new law also regulates the work of the Scientific Advisory Council and certain aspects of the court's funding in more detail.
Legislation on the Constitutional Court is being revised for the third time in the past decade, after 2017 and 2021. Mirza-Ulugbek Abdusalomov, chairman of the Constitutional Court, announced the drafting of the new law in mid-August.
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