Angola: Parliament Adjusts Supreme Military Courts Organic Structure to Constitution
Rabu, 30 April 2008
| 08:39 WIB
Luanda-The National Assembly Tuesday here approved the draft of creating the Plenary of the Supreme Military Court as a maximum legal instance of appeal, thereby adjusting the Law Nº5/94, of February 11 (Law on the Organic Structure of the aforementioned court) to the Constitution.
Previously, the instance of appeal was the Supreme Military Justice Council, which was in charge of observing the appeals over sentences on generals and other defendants tried by the Supreme Military Court.
Meanwhile, such organ never functioned because the mechanism of its setting up and nomination of its member did not abide, in practice, to the context of the articles 125º and 126º of the Constitutional Law, which prohibits the creation of courts with exclusive competence to judge on certain matters.
According to the report of the commission of Constitutional, Legal and Regiment Issues of the National Assembly, although included in the law, the referred council never functioned, which reflected the lack of a court of appeal of the sentences passed by the Supreme Military Court. This situation, still according to the document, disagrees with the constitutional guarantees of equality of right and the defence entrusted to citizens.
The new organ of appeal of the Supreme Military is made up of every judge, except those who intervened in the first instance, in accordance to the conditions on hindrances of judges and cancelling their jurisdictional powers and limits.
The draft was approved by 127 votes in favour, non against, and an abstaining by the leader of the parliamentary seat of the opposition FNLA party, Benjamin da Silva.
In this Tuesdays session, the MPs also approved the draft on alterations to the electoral provincial commissions and district offices, submitted by the main opposition UNITA party last week.
Source: http://allafrica.com/stories/200804291235.html
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