Official Gazette, Issue 24 App. (a) on 14 June 2012 19 the Constitutional Declaration issued on 30th March 2011, considering this the constitutional document governing the affairs of the country during the transitional period through which the country is currently passing after the suspension of the provisions of the Constitution of 1971, by virtue of the first Constitutional Declaration issued on 13th February 2011. The referral decision relates to the text that introduces the penalty of the deprivation of the exercise of political rights for events which happened before the issue of the text, in violation of the general principal to avoid retrospective penalties. In addition, it establishes a legal presumption upon which imposes a penalty, without a legal ruling following legal proceedings which guarantee the right to a defense. The penalty contained therein is based solely on attributes and circumstances, not on specific actions. Finally, this text violates the principle of equality before the law, in that it arbitrarily distinguishes between those who have occupied certain positions through appointment and others who have not, without basing this on significant subjective criteria. The ruling of this Court has been taken on the basis that the Constitution is the supreme essential law which anchors the frameworks and principles upon which the system of rule is based. It awards freedoms and general rights, and offers the essential guarantees to protect them. It determines the functions and powers of each legislative, executive and judicial authority, and sets the controlling limits and restrictions for their activities. In this way it sets the limits and restrictions governing the powers of each authority, to prevent any authority interfering in the operations of another, and to prevent them disputing the powers awarded to them by the Constitution. This being so, Article (33) of the Constitutional Declaration awards the legislative authority the power to introduce laws, whilst Article (46) awards the judicial authority the power to settle disputes and arguments. This must mean that the legislative authority’s power to introduce laws does not permit it to interfere in those operations entrusted by the Constitutional Declaration to the judicial authority and restricted thereto, or else it would violate such operations and the principle of separation between the legislative and judicial authorities, and unduly assume those powers designed by the legislation to be wielded by the judicial authority. The text of the second paragraph of Article (19) of the aforementioned Constitutional Declaration states, “All crimes and all penalties shall be based on the law; penalties shall only be imposed by virtue of a legal verdict…” This shows that it is not possible to impose a penalty except by virtue of a legal verdict, with the aim of realizing the independence of the judicial authority in this regard. The scope of the text of Article (19) of the Constitutional Declaration is not restricted to criminal penalties, but also covers other penalties which can be ruled for and which may be of a different type, such as the deprivation of particular rights or freedoms. It is not necessary for the stipulated penalty to be of a punitive or reformative nature; it may just be preventative; none of these penalties may be imposed except by virtue of a legal verdict. This being the case, the referred text calls for the deprivation of the exercise of political rights for a period of ten years as of 11/2/2011 for anyone who held any of the positions named therein exclusively, in this manner calling for a penalty to be imposed upon such persons automatically without a legal verdict, which represents a