The spokesperson for the Popular Party in the Congress of Deputies, Miguel Tellado, filed a complaint against the president of the Lower House, Francina Armengol, after being disavowed by the Supreme Court when the secretary general of the Cortés dismissed a lawyer who criticized the amnesty law.
Manuel Fernández-Fontecha, the second most senior jurist in the House, appealed his dismissal from the Constitutional Commission to the High Court in December 2023, after being dismissed by Congress General Secretary Fernando Galindo, coinciding with the publication of two articles on ABC in which Fernández-Fontecha criticized the amnesty law, alleging that he had been the victim of an “ideological purge” and an “unmotivated, arbitrary, dictated and discriminatory” act.
Today, a year later, the High Court agrees with the lawyer and the opposition’s response is not long in coming. Tellado reacted on social networks to the information published by this newspaper with the details of the judgment to which ABC had access. “The lawyers of Congress are obliged to turn to Justice so that their rights are respected,” declared the parliamentary spokesperson of the PP, who directly designates the president of the Lower House, “This is how Armengol acts and his faithful servant Galindo, leave now.
This is how Armengol and his faithful servant Galindo, the main lawyer, act.
They confuse the Cortes with their Cortijo, and the lawyers of Congress are obliged to resort to Justice so that their rights are respected.
Armengol, leave now. Stop harming the institution. pic.twitter.com/HUY4VGbr9V
–Miguel Tellado (@Mtelladof) November 23, 2024
It should be remembered that, driven by media pressure, Galindo restored the avocado two weeks later, but he kept his appeal pending before the Supreme Court so that a future High Court ruling would deter the Secretary General of the Lower House from similar actions.
This event is added to the list of controversies surrounding the general secretary of the Congress, disavowed by the Supreme Court, which underlines in the judgment that the attribution of the lawyers of the Cortes to the various commissions is an act liable to prosecution and affects their rights, contrary to what Galindo maintained.
The appointment of the lead lawyer was already controversial because it involved a person of maximum government confidence socialist who was undersecretary in the cabinet of the then head of territorial policy, Isabel Rodríguez, today Minister of Housing. Galindo was also responsible for the report that cleared obstacles in qualifying the amnesty law.
