The TC will still take "a while" to resolve the appeals after the latest reform of the CGPJ

If he has not already done so, it is because he did not want to "interfere" in the "political negotiation"

MADRID, 6 Nov. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Constitutional Court (TC) will still take "some time" to resolve the appeals of PP and Vox to the reform approved by the Government to modify the Organic Law of the Judiciary to prevent the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) from making appointments while was in office.

Sources from the Constitutional Court point out that "the speakers have their presentations in advance, although the recent legal amendment imposes time for examination and reflection."

The speakers of the appeals presented by Vox and PP in April and May 2021 are the magistrates Juan Antonio Xiol and María Luisa Balaguer and the appeals were not included in the agenda until September 16, 2021.

"It is true that an appeal of unconstitutionality does not take ordinarily to be brought to plenary more than 15 days from its filing. It is taken to the first plenary session that is convened. It is immediate, since the legitimacy, the term of filing and the correction of the I beg with the legal claim of the appellant", they explain from the TC.

In this sense, they recall that it is up to who is at the moment president of the Constitutional Court to set and take the agenda of the affairs in plenary session.

Thus, they point out that in comparison of the deadlines with the processing of the two sentences of the state of alarm, the first of them, of which González Trevijano, the current president of TC, was the rapporteur, was the subject of an appeal of unconstitutionality by deputies of Vox on April 28, 2020 and the matter was taken to plenary session and was admitted on May 6, 2020, only 8 days later.

The second of them, for which Antonio Narváez was the rapporteur, was also the subject of an appeal of unconstitutionality by Vox deputies on November 6, 2020 and the admission was agreed by the plenary session, under the then same presidency, on November 17. November 2020, that is, 10 days later.

Source of the TC recall that on the day of the election of the current president, on November 19, 2021, he indicated after seeking the opinion of Vice President Juan Antonio Xiol "that the College of Magistrates, if no renewal agreement is foreseen in the months of June /July 2022, it would take the utmost urgency to bring the drafts of the two rulings to plenary."

And already in the month of March, after the previous resolution of the multiple challenges of some magistrates, which prevented the hearing of the most important matters of the Court, together with the resolution of the sentences of some of those convicted by the Second Chamber of the Court Supreme in the so-called procés, the president and the two rapporteurs ratified the early decision to bring the drafts of the two sentences, "if the Council had not then recovered its powers or there was no political agreement on the renewal of its members."

"The deadline was the one indicated for the months of June or July", they indicate and emphasize that "the Court was aware that it could not defer such an important matter sine die and that it could not be responsible in parallel for the impossibility of appointing its two own magistrates by the General Council of the Judiciary".

However, sources from the TC explain that after the recovery of powers of the CGPJ in July 2022 to appoint the two magistrates of the Court, "and also given the existence of the negotiation of the Government and the main opposition party for the renewal of the Council, it was decided, as has always been done, not to interfere - in accordance with the inveterate practice in these forty years - in the political negotiation processes or in the pending electoral processes".

At the same time, they indicate that the CGPJ is empowered to appoint its two magistrates in the Constitutional Court from July. "Simultaneously, the negotiations were under way by the two main political formations," they underline.

"The Court is aware of the present situation," declare TC sources, who emphasize that "the speakers have their presentations in advance, although the recent legal amendment imposes time for examination and reflection."