KZBlog

According to Yermukhamet Yertysbayev, advisor to the President, The Leader of the Nation Law can still enter into force [RU] despite the fact that the President refused to sign it.

According to Yertysbayev, refusing to sign the law is not equivalent to vetoing the law. So the President never vetoed this law. He claims that according to the law “On Parliament and the Status of its Members”, if a law is approved by Parliament and sent to the President, he has one month to sign the law or return the law to Parliament for revision. Laws which are not returned within one month, enter into force.

The Elbashi law, which would give Nazarbayev the title “Leader of the Nation” and increase his power after leaving office (I posted a a full discussion of its provisions earlier), was passed by Parliament on 13 May and the President made a public statement on 4 June declining to sign it. The law would comprise a series of changes to the Constitutional Law on Elections in Kazakhstan,” the law “The president of Kazakhstan”, and the law “On the first president of Kazakhstan”.

Pavlodar.com hosts a text of the law On Parliament and the Status of its Members in Russian and Article 19 is here. It does appear to say clearly that, “Невозвращенный в течение названного в пункте втором настоящей статьи срока закон считается подписанным. (Laws that are not returned in the period named in the second paragraph of this article are considered signed)”. This paragraph appears to have been added on the 19th of June 2007 as part of the general Constitutional amendments of that time.

So now the question is, was this planned the whole time? The President rejects the law, but it becomes law anyway? And if this does happen, which is worse? If the President says he purposely didn’t return the law to Parliament or if he claims ignorance of this point? Of course, it looks like he still has a few days to return the law. Or, I assume, veto it outright.

If there are any legal scholars out there, what is the difference between the President not signing a law and vetoing it. Also I’d love to know what the point of this paragraph is? Off-hand it seems like an odd way to override reluctance on the part of the President, although I suppose it might be to prevent the chief executive from blocking up the legislative process by just refusing to sign anything. One could imagine such a point being useful in the UK or the US where there can be some contention between the law makers and the executive branch.