AMMAN - Amidst the recent revolutions and protests in the Arab streets, Jordanian activists and law experts have been calling for constitutional reforms that include the return to the 1952 version of the Constitution.
Jordanian protesters say amendments to some 29 articles of the Constitution that took place since 1952 have affected the balance between the Kingdom's three authorities, granting the executive more power at the expense of the legislature.
Reversing these amendments was the main demand of political activists, who insist that the conditions that necessitated the amendments in the past have vanished. These conditions include political unrest as a result of the struggle with Israel and several unsuccessful coup d'états against the late King Hussein.
In addition to having a parliamentary government, activists say revoking several past amendments is becoming increasingly indispensable.
Prime Minister Marouf Bakhit has stressed that "calls for a constitutional monarchy harm the balance of our political system", but later told dailies' chief editors that his Cabinet was open to discuss proposed amendments to the Constitution as part of the ongoing democratic reforms.
Why the 1952 Constitution
This Constitution saw light during the short reign of the late King Talal, King Abdullah's grandfather, and states that the "system of government is parliamentary with a hereditary monarchy", and that "the nation is the source of all powers".
It also maintains that the King is "the Head of the State and is immune from any liability and responsibility", adding that the Monarch's verbal or written orders "shall not relieve ministers from their responsibilities".
Amendments that activists are calling to revoke include one that was introduced in 1960 to Article 68 of the Constitution making it possible that the King prolong the term of the Chamber of Deputies for a period ranging from one to two years.
In 1976, an addition to Article 73 stated that "the King may postpone the holding of the general elections if a force majeure has occurred which the Council of Ministers considers as rendering the holding of elections impossible".
Two years earlier, Article 34 was amended allowing the Monarch to dissolve the Senate or relieve any senator from membership. This, say lawyers, undermines the power of the legislative authority and gives more power to the government, which is the party that is entitled to propose the dissolution.
Force majeure
The "force majeure" that urged the last two amendments was in fact Israel's 1967 occupation of the West Bank, then a Jordanian territory, according to Mohammad Hammouri, constitutional law expert and former minister of higher education.
"Holding elections was not possible in the West Bank under occupation, and excluding this part of the country from being represented in Parliament would have appeared a step to abandon it on the part of the Jordanian government," Hammouri told The Jordan Times.
But following Amman's decision of administrative and legal disengagement with the West Bank in 1988, these texts have become unnecessary and have "enabled successive governments to overuse its power", the law professor noted.
In 1958, an amendment to Article 57 made the Senate president also the chief of the Higher Council for the Interpretation of the Constitution. Before that, a judge used to head the council.
The same year, Article 94 was amended allowing the government to issue temporary laws in the absence of Parliament when "necessary measures" are needed. In the original 1952 copy, these measures had been specified in "catastrophes, a state of war or emergency and expenditures incapable of postponement".
The three Cabinets of former premier Ali Abul Ragheb (2000-2003) were widely criticised for issuing dozens of temporary laws in the absence of Parliament between 2001 and 2003 while none of the above conditions prevailed.
Hammouri explains that shortly after the 1952 Constitution was born, an amendment made it compulsory that the government resign immediately if the Lower House was dissolved.
But this "positive" amendment was later reversed following the dissolution of the political party-dominated 1956 Lower House, explained Hammouri, adding that governments then made use of regional unrest to tighten its grip on the country's political life.
The former minister explained that the 1952 Constitution is based on a parliamentary system and inspired by the Belgian constitution.
Belgium had copied Britain's unwritten constitution and enforced it in 1831, before several European monarchies and other countries of the world started using the same principles, Hammouri noted.
He explained that the Belgians have also made several amendments to their constitution, including one in 1921, on which Egypt and Jordan based their constitutions.
© Jordan Times 2011
