Official Gazette – Issue No. 7 (bis) February 18, 2013 3 Court Having reviewed the Constitution and the presented draft law and after deliberation; Whereas article (177) of the Constitution promulgated in December 2012 stipulates that “The President of the Republic or the House of Representatives shall present draft laws governing the exercise of political rights as well as presidential, legislative and local elections before the Supreme Constitutional Court, to determine their compliance with the Constitution prior to dissemination. The Court shall reach a decision in this regard within 45 days from the date the matter is presented before it; otherwise, the proposed law shall be considered approved. If the Court deems one or more parts of the text non-compliant with the provisions of the Constitution, decision thereof shall be implemented. The laws referred to in the first paragraph are not subject to the subsequent control stipulated in Article (175) of the Constitution”. Whereas the aforementioned text determines the bodies which have the right to present draft laws regulating the exercise of political rights as well as presidential, legislative, and local elections to the Supreme Constitutional Court to apply precontrol procedures thereto; and whereas it stipulates that only two bodies are entitled to do such, namely: President of the Republic and the House of Representatives; thus, the presented draft law was supposed to be presented to the stated court by one of these two bodies. However, since Article (230), Section (3), Chapter (5), of the Constitution, which includes Final and Transitional Provisions, says that “The existing Shura Council, in current formation thereof, shall assume full legislative authority starting the date on which the constitution comes into force until the new House of Representatives is formed.……….”. This means that the Shura Council shall undertake full legislative authority during the transitional period which starts from the date on which the Constitution comes into effect until the new House of Representatives is formed. Based on that, the stated Court decided to accept the submitted request. Whereas this court, in reviewing the draft law hereof, asserts that pre-control procedures thereof are limited to comparing the draft law with the Constitution to determine whether or not it conforms to provisions thereof. Hence, the following are excluded from the scope of the said control: 1. Reviewing the legal wording of the draft law. 2. Examining whether the provisions of the draft law are contradictory or contradict other legal texts, unless such contradiction is not deemed as a constitutional violation. 3. Determining the conformity of some of the provisions included in the draft law, since such matter falls within the legislator authority. Having reviewed the present draft law, the Court hereby concludes the following: I: Article (2) replaced by Article (1) of the draft law says: "In applying the provisions of the present law, the word “farmer" refers to anyone who has taken agriculture as a