The key date has arrived. This Monday, the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) meets again, as agreed in mid-August. The purpose of this appointment is none other than to try to appoint a president (or chairman) of the governing body of judges, who will also be the president of the Supreme Court. But time is running out: September 5 will be the opening of the judicial year. And the King is presiding over it.
Since then, during these fifteen summer days, the negotiation teams of the two sectors – the wing considered conservative and progressive – have maintained contact by telephone and video conference. But for the moment, Negotiations remain blocked. There is no agreement.
The members proposed by the PSOE continue to insist that the head of this new CGPJ must be a woman to demonstrate a change of cycle. They want them to be Pilar Teso either Ana Ferrer. Both are judges on the Supreme Court. But the conservative wing rejects them. It does not want either of them to preside over the governing body of judges or the court that occupies the top of the Spanish judicial hierarchy.
Sources from the Council confirm to EL ESPAÑOL that the progressive sector, in recent weeks, has made an offer to the other bloc: that Ferrer be president and that the vice-presidency be occupied by a conservative candidate.
To the detriment of Teso, also rejected by the conservative sector, considering him the government’s favourite, Progressives have opted more strongly for Ana Ferrer in recent days.
Her CV is that of the first woman to become a judge in the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court and that of a permanent member of the Criminal Law Section of the General Codification Commission. She is also a member of the Judges for Democracy (JJpD). Today, the offer has fallen on deaf ears.
The conservatives do not want Teso or Ferrer to preside over the CGPJ. When the progressive wing insisted on a woman, the PP elected officials suggested Carmen Laméla. There was no agreement.
They also failed when the Conservatives proposed the magistrate. Paul Lucas as President of the Council. Lucas, acting President of the Third Chamber of the Supreme Court, is favored by the PP elected officials. They consider him “neutral”, “independent” and they praise his career, although he is considered a progressive. However, this possibility did not materialize either: the members proposed by the PSOE did not perceive him as their own candidate.
In response to the latest offer from the progressives, the conservative wing once again insisted that Lucas chair the CGPJ and proposed that Ferrer be the president of the CGPJ. number two. There was no agreement on this either.
So, if nothing changes and the situation is not resolved, its current elderly president will continue to lead the Council: Bernardo FernandezHe is the member who currently heads the institution because he is the oldest of the twenty who make it up.
However, if this were the case, the new course would begin without the two blocks of the new CGPJ, although it has already held several plenary sessions since last July, having managed to agree on the very relevant challenges that the body will address in the coming months, such as undertaking dozens of meetings or evaluating a proposal for reform of the organic law of the judiciary (LOPJ).
