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Lawyer Amram Makinyan has reacted to the statement of MP Vahagn Hovakimyan that My Step ruling faction will not pass the draft Constitutional amendments in the first reading and will propose lawmakers to put the bill to a public referendum.

The lawyer called MPs’ attention to Article 86 of the constitutional law on the Rules of Procedure of the National Assembly, according to which draft constitutional changes are set to pass two parliamentary readings.

“Only after being adopted in the first reading and being endorsed by the Constitutional Court can the National Assembly consider passing and putting the draft law on a referendum,” he said on Facebook. “Until the bill on constitutional amendments is adopted in the first reading and is endorsed by the Constitutional Court, it cannot be put to a referendum.”

“Stop this legal buffoonery. It completely contradicts both the Constitution and Article 86 of the Rules of Procedure of the National Assembly,” Makinyan stressed.

The constitutional changes drafted by several lawmakers of the ruling My Step faction would dismiss the Constitutional Court chairman and its six members who were installed before the entry into force of Chapter 7 of the Constitution amended in 2015.