Draft Amendment XXXIII – Protection of Marriage or Limiting the Right to Private and Family Life?

The exclusive constitutional definition of marriage, civil unions, and any other form of registered partnership is discriminatory toward LGBTI people by restricting their right to family life and all the civil and social rights arising from it.

Defining the union (marriage and civil union) between one man and one woman as the only form of shared life producing legal effects violates the right to family life; the principle of equality of all citizens; the principle of justice; the rule of law; the principle of plurality; the right of citizens to be the bearers of sovereignty, dignity, and individual autonomy guaranteed under the Constitution of the Republic of Macedonia;and by that violates the right to protection against discrimination, as well as other rights that guarantee equal treatment of all citizens.

Additionally, these amendments to the Constitution violate the democratic, secular, and civil structure of the constitutional order of the Republic of Macedonia, replacing it with a tradition and a system of values?? contrary to it, leading to the exclusion of justice and the inclusive practices that this structure once provided.

The European constitutional precedent defining a civil union exclusively as the union between one man and one woman and the consequences that this definition of marriage and civil union will have on the right to family life, collide with ratified international documents which are a part of the national legal system of the Republic of Macedonia and are superior to national legislation (see Article 8 of the ECHR, COE recommendations on the right to respect for private and family life). In this way, the legislator risks creating a flagrant contradiction and practical conflict between constitutional provisions and the provisions of ratified international documents. Also, if this effort of the Macedonian Government gets voted by the Macedonian Parliament, it will create precedence in European law on restricting the right of family life through the use of Constitutional mechanisms.

You can view the entire analysis here.