Govt Submits Controversial Emergency Powers Bill

But the text that regulates a “declaration of emergency” is ambiguous. Article 3 of the bill stipulates: “The request to declare a state of emergency be submitted to parliament jointly from the president and prime minister. Parliament will meet to consider the request, in accordance with the provisions of the constitution, within seven days from the date after [the bill] is registered in the office of the speaker of the house.”

Article 4 stipulates: “The decision of parliament to approve a state of emergency is sent to the president of the republic and the prime minister within 24 hours from the time of issuance.”

But the law ignores the mechanisms and procedures that apply if parliament doesn’t approve the request to declare a state of emergency.

More importantly, the law deals with all the requirements of a state of emergency according to a single standard. Not all disasters and not all security challenges should grant the prime minister absolute powers of “martial law,” as Article 8 stipulates.

That article details those powers and grants the government power to restrict the freedom of movement, arrest suspects, impose house arrest on dangerous people, restrict the freedom of people to meet, break up meetings and gatherings by force, release some parties, isolate others, prevent travel to and from the country, censor the media, censor foreign newspapers, seize and prevent circulation of newspapers, impose controls on essential commodities and order people to work. According to the bill, anyone who violates the prime minister’s orders during the period of emergency can be imprisoned, fined or both.

The bill should have defined the powers of the prime minister according to the degree of the state of emergency and according to rankings that are prepared in advance for the degree of risk. The bill should have given parliament the right to assess the level of danger and grant powers in light of that assessment.