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Anastasia Balezdrova

The decision of one of the departments of the Supreme Court of Appeal in Greece that the participation of foreigners in the local elections held in November was unconstitutional caused sharp responses.

Body of seven members of the 5th division of the State Council approved the controversial proposal made by one of the magistrates. According to him, the Ragousis law passed in 2010 and named after the interior minister, entitling immigrants in Greece to vote and run contravenes a number of constitutional regulations. The proposal was sent to the plenum of the Supreme Court of Appeal to rule on.  

Senior judges believe constitutional amendments had to be introduced before the vote of the law because the constitution in force stipulated that only Greek citizens were entitled to participate in elections and this right could not be granted to persons who did not meet this condition.

State counsellors based their decision on the opinion that the constitutional legislator had taken care to preserve national uniformity of the state in many ways. One of them was the right of citizenship the regulations of which were based on the "right of blood", i.e. on the origin of the parents who were Greeks.

According to the text of the decision, "Greek citizenship acquiring is not connected with the period of legal residence of the applicant or his family, studying in Greek school for a specific period of time and lack of convictions for serious criminal offenses or other formal requirements," law rationale sets out.
 
Judges believe that the foreigners who participated in the elections acquired Greek citizenship without any ground. The text stresses that for this purpose the applicant for naturalization must be substantially connected with the country, “to voluntarily adopt values associated with Grecism and Greek consciousness.”

The president of the Hellenic Forum of Immigrants Ahmed Moavia told GRReporter that if this interim decision was adopted by the plenum of the State Council the process and itself the integration of immigrants into the Greek society would return to the outset. He defined the decision as "adverse" because "this law is the only measure of significant integration of immigrants in Greece."

According to him, this decision was in direct contradiction with the current trend in the European Union to strengthen the legislative process in all Member States to intensify immigrants’ presence in society.

If the law is repealed "Greece will face a very serious obstacle in trying to implement this policy in the face of Europe. I do not know whether this decision could be adapted to European decisions and guidelines."  

In response to the press comments that if the law is repealed as unconstitutional local elections would have to be cancelled Ahmet Moavia said that the participation of immigrants could hardly had a serious impact on the election results.

"2500 immigrants in Greece registered.to participate in the elections. We do not know how many of them have voted but their number can be found very easily in electoral lists. But I think that their participation in no case have affected the elections results so seriously."

According to some publications, this decision coincides with the intensified debates on immigration in a strange way. Government sources claim that the decision was not by coincidence announced just days after the occupation of the Law School by illegal immigrants which provoked strong public reactions.

According to the government, the decision turns upside down the entire law on acquiring Greek citizenship by foreigners having not accepted as valid its acquiring by foreigners’ children born in Greece.

The claim for the Ministry of Interior’s law cancellation was filed by lawyer Yannis Andriopoulos. The decision of the Minister was supported by the Greek Union for Human Rights and the Albanian Edda Gremi who had requested to participate in local elections in the municipality of Nikea.

Left parties in the Greek Parliament explicitly opposed the decision of the Supreme Court, defining it as the result of racist views.