Constitutional Court

KI57/19, Applicant: Slavica Mirić, Constitutional review of the Decision AC-I-16-0238 of the Appellate Panel of the Special Chamber of the Supreme Court on the Privatization Agency of Kosovo Related Matters, of 10 January 2019

KI57/19, Resolution on Inadmissibility, adopted on 12 December 2019, published on 26 December 2019

Keywords: individual referral, manifestly ill-founded referral, 

On 20 March 2006 the Applicant filed two claims at the EU office in Belgrade against the SOE “Eximkos”, requesting that he be paid several salaries. The Liquidation Authority of the Privatization Agency of Kosovo issued two decisions rejecting the Applicant’s claim.

The Applicant appealed against the decisions of the Liquidation Authority of the Privatization Agency of Kosovo in the Special Chamber of the Supreme Court on Privatization Agency of Kosovo Related Matters (SCSC), but the latter by Judgment C-IV-13-3739, rejected the Applicant’s appeal as unfounded and confirmed the decisions of the Liquidation Authority of the Privatization Agency of Kosovo, on the ground that the Applicant had not filed the claims within the set deadline, namely until 13 September 2007, as per the notification of the Kosovo Trust Agency. The Applicant also complained to the SCSC Appellate Panel, but her complaint was considered withdrawn due to non-payment of the court fee, even though she had been notified by a warning of the SCSC for the consequences of failure to pay the court fee.

The Applicant’s allegations made before the Constitutional Court, in its essence relate to the issue of payment of court fees. The Applicant alleged before the Court that she does not have to pay court fees because the Administrative Instruction exempts her from the payment.

The Court, relying on its case-law as well as that of the ECtHR, held that the issue of the court fee was reasoned by the Appellate Panel and that no fact or allegation submitted by the Applicant shows that the proceedings before the regular courts were unfair or arbitrary, so that the Constitutional Court be persuaded that the essence of the right to fair and impartial trial has been violated, or that the Applicant has been denied the procedural guarantees set out in Article 31 of the Constitution and Article 6 of the ECHR.

Consequently, the Applicant’s Referral was declared manifestly ill-founded on constitutional grounds in accordance with Rule 39 (2) of the Rules of Procedure.