To date, one of the important tasks of the ongoing constitutional reform is to optimize the activities of all public authorities, including the country’s parliament. The issues of improving methods and increasing the efficiency of parliamentary activities in order to exclude cases of parallelism and duplication in the powers of the chambers, including when they perform control functions, are of particular importance.

“For example, there are facts when repeated requests are sent to the same department and their heads are heard. All this creates a significant burden with the attraction of additional resources on the executive authorities, which distracts them from the implementation of the direct tasks facing them. In this regard, the powers of the Oliy Majlis Chambers are being reviewed in the draft new version of the Constitution,” Lyudmila Yugay, Doctor of Law, said.

Article 95 of the updated Constitution establishes the exclusive powers of the Senate of Oliy Majlis, which are expanded from 14 to 18.

The exclusive powers of the Senate include the election of the entire composition of the Supreme Judicial Council, the heads of the anti-corruption and anti-monopoly bodies on the proposal of the President, which makes it possible to strengthen the role of the parliament in ensuring the rule of law, the independence of the judiciary, as well as to exercise control in the field of combating corruption and compliance with anti-monopoly legislation.

At the same time, in the draft of the new version of the Constitution, the Senate is authorized to consider and approve candidates for the positions of the Prosecutor General and the Chairman of the Accounts Chamber, presented by the President. In the current Constitution, the Senate approved the adopted presidential decrees on the appointment of these officials. Now the appointment will be carried out only after the Senate’s approval.

Also, in order to strengthen parliamentary control over the activities of the special services, a procedure is being introduced for holding consultations in the Senate on the appointment of a candidate for the post of chairman of the State Security Service, proposed by the President.

In addition, the prerogative of the Senate has included the approval of presidential decrees on the formation and abolition of ministries and other republican executive bodies. This provision is aimed at ensuring prompt and effective management of the vertical of executive power.

At the same time, the Senate introduces the practice of hearing reports from the heads of diplomatic and other representations of Uzbekistan in foreign states and at international organizations on issues of their activities.

It is important to send a parliamentary request to officials of state bodies and to exercise other forms of parliamentary control, which will improve their efficiency, targeting and effectiveness.

Due to the fact that the Senate is a chamber of territorial representation, it is planned to strengthen the powers related to the activities of the councils of people’s deputies. The Senate promotes the activities of local councils and at the same time can cancel their decisions in case of inconsistency with the law.

“The consolidation in Article 95 of the new version of the Constitution of the expanded powers of the Senate of Oliy Majlis will serve to strengthen control over the activities of judicial, anti-corruption, anti-monopoly and other bodies, close interaction and control over the activities of local authorities, improve the mechanism of checks and balances, which will ensure the rule of law, efficiency and optimization of the activities of all branches of government,” the expert concluded.