Procedural problems occuring during individual application to the Constitutional Court

Abstract

Individual application to the constitutional courts is a legal remedy that has been designed to ensure effective protection of the human rights and fundamental liberties. This legal remedy provides the citizens with the right of alleging concrete breaches of their fundamental rights enshrined in the constitution. The protection of the human rights by the expert courts in the field of human rights have been introduced in the different countries legal order by taking into account various reasons. In Turkish practice, the main reason for the introduction of individual application to the constitutional court is the high number of applications and violations before the European Court of Human Rights. The individual application system was introduced into the Turkish legal order by the constitutional amendments approved in the result of a public referendum held on 12 September 2010. Two years of preparation period were projected until 23 September 2012. As from the latter date, the Turkish Constitutional Court has started to receive individual applications, the commissions and the sections of the Constitutional Court have rendered many judgments which present the approach of the Courts as to the admissibility criteria as well as the essence and the contents of the rights that may be subject for individual application. However, the excessive number of the applications based on various human rights claims brought by the Court have given rise to workload that may risk effective protection of human rights by the Court. Therefore, the spesific procedure is designed for the individual applications to avoid the risk of workload. The procedure concerning individual application is composed of all the procedural acts carried out by the applicant, the court and the other that have right to take part in the proceeding. Within this framework, the formal and substantive requirements of the individual application, the composition of judicial and administrative units of the Constitutional Court that deal with individual application, the scope and the rights of the examination by the Constitutional Court,the procedures related to registration and administrative review of individual applications, the exhaustion of administrative and judicial remedies rule, time limits foır individual applications, the role played by the Ministry of Justice have been examined in this study. The judgment rendered by the Court concerning individual application have constituted the main subject of this study. Keywords: Constitutional Court, Individual Application, Procedural Admissibility Criteria, Procedure of the Individual Application.