Last Tuesday, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled that the Slovenian Constitutional Court violated the rules of fair trial. Namely, the court violated the right of access to the court for Vitomir Gros, a former member of parliament and mayor of Kranj.
The constitutional judges rejected his initiative to assess the constitutionality as too late, even though he could not file it at all within the time they envisioned. This is the first blow from ECHR to the new composition of the Constitutional Court. Let us remind you. In 2008 and 2011, in the denationalisation procedure, the administrative unit returned to the denationalisation beneficiaries the land on which the local road was located. In 2016, the administrative unit, at the suggestion of the Ministry of the Environment, declared the return of the property null and void, as it was a public good. In 2017, the Ministry annulled the decision of the administrative unit and returned the procedure to the administrative unit where the procedure is still pending. In April 2018, Gros became one of the heirs who inherited the land. In February 2018, the Constitutional Court rejected Gros’s initiative to assess the constitutionality of a municipal ordinance that categorized a local road in 2004. The ECHR unanimously ruled that Slovenia had violated the right to a fair trial under Article 6 of the ECHR. The court awarded Gross 4,360 euros in damages and costs.