Even climate activists could vandalize European monuments without consequences thanks to a new rule in Brussels.
The institutions of the European Union, together with the representatives of the European left, decided to highlight the so-called civil organizations, defenders and human rights activists from the constitutional order of the member states' judiciary, wrote in his analysis the lawyer Petri Bernadett, the XXI. Század Institute researcher in connection with the fact that the new EU regulations on lawsuits against human rights organizations are among the items on the agenda of this week's plenary session of the European Parliament.
As he pointed out, all of this would be done by granting them the strongest existing public law privilege: if a lawsuit jeopardizes their participation in public life, the court could immediately terminate the proceedings.
It would be sufficient for a "fact-finding" organization that publishes false statements to refer to public participation, and then it could be freed from the rectification lawsuit in an expedited procedure without a substantive investigation. Even climate activists could damage European monuments without consequences, since any lawsuit initiated against them would hinder their participation in public life, so the court proceedings could be terminated immediately, pointed out the lawyer, a member of the Free Europe Working Group.
Unfortunately, this world is not a distant utopia, but will soon become the reality of the European Union. A new Brussels rule creates the framework for a procedure where NGOs, fact-finding journalists, lobbyists and public activists can be freed from the burden of lawsuits initiated against them without special proof, the specialist concluded.
The concept of an unfounded or abusive court procedure that hinders public participation (SLAPP, i.e. slap) was created in the late eighties in the United States. The EU institutions are now trying to set it up as a new phenomenon in Europe, even though the Hungarians and the Central and Eastern European nations have unfortunately acquired quite a broad knowledge of the autocratic methodology of the true concept trials during the decades of the communist dictatorship, Petri Bernadett reminded. He emphasized: Brussels has decided to protect NGOs from its own member states even at the cost of the rule of law.
He drew attention to the fact that no one elected NGOs, activists, and advocates for the task of representing citizens' interests, yet the European Union offers them an absolute exception to the legal order.
However, from the point of view of public authority, their operation is characterized by a clear representation deficit, a lack of authority. Despite the fact that in most cases they make political decisions, they never show themselves in the democratic competition, they are not backed by the authority derived from the results of the election process. Civil organizations authorize themselves, or at most each other, to act in certain cases. However, their influence is a form of exercising power, which, however, lacks the relevant constitutional restrictions and guarantees, the researcher opined.
He declared: Europe deserves a real rule of law, the rule of law means the rule of law instead of the rule of people. When we see that the EU institutions protect the interests of civil organizations even at the cost of reducing the rule of law and democracy, they do not do so altruistically, but actually strengthen and secure their own position of power. SLAPP legislation is a slap in the face to the rule of law. A court decision that ignores the appropriate legal procedure and decides in favor of one of the parties is obviously not considered justice, at most justice. The judgment made in this way cannot be fair in any case, he pointed out.
Petri Bernadett put it this way: where the provision of law and the administration of justice do not belong together, it is not a rule of law, but a dictatorship.
Hiding behind the protection of civil interests, the institutions of the European Union build arbitrariness that replaces the principles of the rule of law, which aims to bypass the sovereign member states and increase their own power. He reminded: the Hungarians have seen this before and they also know what a concept trial actually means. There were already victims of similar efforts, they were defeated and they will not be allowed to return through the back door, he warned.
The time has come to strengthen the sovereignty of the member states, to strengthen the role of national parliaments and to create a mechanism for the accountability of the EU institutions under the rule of law, because Europe deserves a better democracy and a real rule of law - concluded the XXI. Század Institute researcher.
