The Supreme Court has partially repealed the provisions of the Administrative Instruction on dark car windows, due to the lack of legal basis. Among the repealed provisions is the one that gave the Minister of the Interior the power to decide in exceptional cases whether they should be allowed or not.

The Supreme Court has found that the Law on Road Traffic Rules and the Law on Vehicles do not contain a general ban on the placement of darkening materials or the replacement of vehicle windows with darkened windows, writes the Reporter.

‘On the contrary, the legislation in force foresees the possibility of modifications to vehicles, provided that they are subject to technical verification procedures and attestation according to the standards set by law”, it is emphasized in the announcement.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs was sued in connection with this issue by the Non-Governmental Organization “Marakli t’Kerreve” and the Institute “TriPika – Sport, Sociale, Ekonomi”.

“According to the Court’s assessment, paragraph 1 of Article 7 imposed a restriction that is not found in the law, allowing tinted windows only for vehicles that have them installed by the manufacturer, while paragraph 3 generally prohibited the placement of tinting foils on vehicle windows. The court assessed that these provisions did not constitute a simple implementation or concretization of the law, but created new material limitations that the legislator had not foreseen”, the announcement states.

The court has found that the paragraph which provided for the authorization of exceptions by decision of the Minister of Internal Affairs, was closely related to the provided prohibition and, therefore, could not remain in force since the basic prohibition itself proved to be illegal.

“The administrative body cannot reserve for itself the authorization to allow individual cases of an action that the law itself does not prohibit”, says the decision.

“In its decision, the Court has emphasized that the administrative bodies can issue by-laws only to implement and concretize the law, but not to create new prohibitions or restrictions that do not originate from legal provisions. Any restriction of rights or opportunities to use vehicles must be based on clear legal authorization and respect the principles of legality, legal certainty and proportionality,” the announcement states.

The court has assessed that the repealed provisions created different treatment for vehicles that are in comparable situations, without a clear legal basis and without proving the need for such a difference in order to protect the interest public.

“However, as regards paragraph 2 of Article 7, the Court has found that it constitutes an administrative and technical provision that regulates the evidence of dark windows in the vehicle registration documentation and does not impose restrictions or prohibitions that contradict the law. For this reason, this provision has remained in force”, the decision continues./Reporter.

Source: prizrenpost