On Friday, 30 September 2022, the President of the Constitutional Court of Romania, Mr Marian ENACHE, received the visit of the President of the Court of Justice of the European Union, Mr Koen LENAERTS, and Ms Octavia SPINEANU-MATEI, Judge of Romania at the Court of Justice of the European Union. The meeting was preceded by the participation of the two presidents at the Conference “Evolution of the European Union Law – Dialogue between the Court of Justice of the European Union and the Constitutional Courts”, organised by the National Institute of Magistracy.
The discussions of the two officials focused on issues related to the institutional cooperation between the two courts in order to strengthen the judicial dialogue, a basis for the prospect of new relations between the two courts, the meeting being appreciated as particularly useful for all parties. At the end of this, the two officials made press statements at the headquarters of the Constitutional Court of Romania.
The President of the Constitutional Court of Romania, Mr Marian ENACHE, argued that the meeting falls within its main objectives, as announced from the first day of his mandate, among which one of the priorities concerns the promotion of the institutional dialogue with the constitutional courts and the Court of Justice of the European Union.
The Romanian official pointed out that the Constitutional Court of Romania marks a new stage of the judicial dialogue with the Court of Justice of the European Union, and the realisation of this meeting can be a starting point in this process, by intensifying the relations and communication, respectively a dialogue based on good faith and mutual respect. He also pointed out that, through the establishment of the European Union, there was also a different kind of diplomacy, besides the traditional, governmental and parliamentary ones, namely the judicial diplomacy, whose implementation methods consist of dialogue and judicial procedures, which contribute to maintaining the legal stability in the common space of the European Union.
The President of the Romanian Court pointed out that there is no question of a conflict or hierarchy between the national constitutional legal order and the European legal order, being, in fact, about a compatibility and complementarity of the two legal orders, both of which have been accepted at national level, from the moment of accession to the European Union.
In his turn, the President of the Court of Justice of the European Union, Mr Koen LENAERTS, argued that the meeting fits on the coordinates of the judicial dialogue with the national courts in our country, in particular with the Romanian Constitutional Court, which is highly appreciated at the level of the European Court. The Constitutional Court of Romania is an important partner of the Court of Justice of the European Union in establishing a common constitutional area in Europe, based on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, rule of law, which requires an independent and impartial justice, as well as respect for human rights in a society characterised by pluralism, tolerance, equality between women and men and solidarity. These are values that the 27 Member States of the European Union, including Romania, recognise as common to all Member States.
The President of the Court of Justice of the European Union also stated that it does not rule on the EU law in a crystal ball, but interprets it in such a way that it is uniformly and equally applied in all the Member States of the European Union. The EU law has the same meaning in Romania, Belgium, Portugal, Estonia, Greece and all 27 Member States. But in order to do so, the Court of Justice needs the contributions of the national constitutional courts, which discover problems relating to the EU law, possible aspects of the interaction between the EU law and national law, including the national constitutional law, which refers questions to the Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling, and the Court of Justice seeks to interpret the European law in such a way as to harmonise the rich constitutional traditions common to the Member States.
The European official stated “that he is very glad” to find that President Enache and his colleagues are firmly committed to contributing to the consolidation of the common constitutional space by making preliminary references to the Court of Justice of the European Union, whenever the European law is relevant for the rigorous implementation of the provisions of the Constitution of Romania, which has been intertwined with the European law since 2003, when the text of the Fundamental Law was revised with a view to joining the European Union.
In this respect, the President of the Constitutional Court emphasised that the case-law of the Constitutional Court on the admissibility of the preliminary rulings has evolved over time, and the Constitutional Court can thus formulate, at present, questions for a preliminary ruling irrespective of the type of constitutional review with which it has been given, a priori or a posteriori.
External Relations, Press and Protocol Department of the Constitutional Court