The General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) celebrates 2,000 days in office this Sunday. There are five years, five months and 22 days of interim in the main institution of the third State, the one that appoints the most relevant judges in the country. The majority of its advisors swore or promised their positions on December 4, 2013, when Mariano Rajoy governed with an absolute majority, Alberto Ruiz Gallardón was Minister of Justice and the head of State was still occupied by Juan Carlos I. Except for some resignations – two retirements , four resignations and one death—the majority of members are still there more than a decade later, with the relationship between them increasingly deteriorating and accumulating clashes with the coalition government.
The five-year mandate enshrined in the Constitution concluded on December 4, 2018, but the renewal has not been possible due to the blockade of the Popular Party, which has used changing excuses depending on the political moment: from the parliamentary agreements with EH Bildu to veto of the two candidates proposed by Podemos, the pardons for the independence leaders condemned by the process or the reform that repealed the sedition. Now, the body crosses the threshold of 2,000 days in office in a precarious situation: with a reduced plenary session (with 16 of its 21 members: ten conservatives and six progressives), a second president “by replacement” who has also threatened to resign and with limited powers.
This Sunday, the Minister of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Courts, Félix Bolaños, insisted that it is “urgent” to renew the CGPJ and has accused the PP of “blocking and hijacking” the organization “because it suits them.” Bolaños added in a message in X that “if the PP continues making excuses, we will look for alternatives.” The PSOE has also published a chronology online in which it reviews the main steps taken by the PP since 2018 and that have contributed to the blockade of the CGPJ. From the agreement for renewal sealed between the PP and PSOE that year, and which was broken a few days later, to the attempt in 2021 and 2022, which was broken by the current leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
The mediation of the European Commission that Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s party demanded and that the Government immediately accepted has also not borne fruit, at least for the moment. Three meetings in Brussels and one in Strasbourg did not allow an agreement to be reached. In the PP they maintain a position of maximums: the negotiation of the CGPJ must go hand in hand with a series of legal and institutional reforms that go far beyond the governing body of the judges and that affect, for example, the Constitutional Court.
And, above all, the conservatives have demanded that the 12 members who belong to the judicial career be elected directly by their colleagues without the need for an agreement between the major political forces, which now vote on a preselection made by the judges themselves. It is a demand that coincides with the underlying claims of the European Commission – which asks to change the rule that has been in force for 38 years – although Brussels asks that the body be renewed first.
This position of the PP represents an amendment to the entire current parliamentary election formula, which was ratified in a pact signed in 2001 with the PSOE and which did not modify its two absolute majorities. It is a change of model that represents a red line for the parties on the left, as it would allow the judicial right to take over the CGPJ. This is the case with the governing rooms of the courts, which are elected with that system and where the presence of conservative associations is overwhelming.
Clashes with the Government
Meanwhile, the state of degradation in which the CGPJ finds itself is evident in the increasingly tense relationship between the members, who accumulate the wear and tear of five years of interim office; but also in the clashes with the coalition Executive. The most recent, as a result of the delay in the preparation of the report on the nineteenth-century Criminal Procedure Law (Lecrim), the major reform of the criminal procedure that the Government has pending or the insistence of the conservatives in preparing a report critical of the amnesty law even before its approval.
In several public statements, the Minister of Justice, Félix Bolaños, has questioned that the body took three years to prepare this report, while it approved a declaration on the amnesty before the law was known. “I ask the members of the CGPJ to comply with their constitutional obligations and issue a report on the criminal procedure law that has been pending for three years despite the fact that they do make reports on laws that do not exist and that are not required by law. ”, he stated last April.
However, the most notorious confrontation took place as a result of the law that, since March 2021, prevents the CGPJ from making appointments when it is in office. Until then—for more than two and a half years—an extended body outlined a good part of the composition of the main courts for the coming years by agreeing on 74 appointments to the judicial leadership, 21 of them to the Supreme Court.
Tension increased as a result of the urgency with which PSOE and Unidas Podemos, which then governed in coalition, processed this initiative. The CGPJ, with the support of 16 of its 21 members, accused both parties of breaking the “separation of powers” by expressly taking away powers and they responded – through the Congressional Board, where they had a majority – asking for “respect.” ” to their ability to legislate. The Constitutional Court endorsed this reform in October 2023, although it has caused the unfilled positions in the Supreme Court to reach 25.
With the issue of appointments neutralized by this legal change, the CGPJ has almost become another opposition platform for the progressive Government. In recent years, a group of members who are especially belligerent against the Executive have gained prominence and to whom various sources within the body attribute a “direct thread” with the PP with the desire to “wear down” the Government through the speaker that grants them their power. belonging to the highest institution of the third power of the State.
During the fall of 2022, this group of members led the blockade of the renewal of the Constitutional Court, delaying the change of majorities from a conservative to a progressive one, and the Government has sought a clash as a result of the reform of the crime of sedition, the law of ‘only yes means yes’ and, more recently, the aforementioned amnesty law. They also got the CGPJ to reject, for the first time in democracy, a proposal for a state attorney general made by the Executive. In fact, this opinion is one of the documents used by a minority association of prosecutors to ask the Supreme Court to annul the appointment of Álvaro García Ortiz as attorney general.
Misgivings among members
Behind closed doors, the wear and tear of more than five years of interim status is also evident with events such as the clashes between the members or the resignation of half a dozen positions at the first level of the technical bodies that have occurred in recent months. . All this, while the majority of the members do not consider resigning. After the departure of Lesmes in October 2021, Concepción Sáez resigned a little over a year ago, elected at the proposal of IU, which justified her departure due to the “unsustainable” situation of the body. But no other member has followed in her footsteps.
It remains to be seen if, in the coming months, the current interim president, the conservative Vicente Guilarte, leaves office as he has announced. It is a decision that the sources consulted link, in part, to the situation of great tension that exists in the body. In recent times, mistrust and distrust among members have increased. If this departure occurs, the members will be forced to elect the third president “by replacement” in less than two years.
Guilarte’s resignation may herald new departures, although the sources consulted rule out an en bloc withdrawal that could leave the body without a quorum, which would open an unprecedented scenario but that no one is considering at the moment. If the blockade persists, after the summer the CGPJ will approach the six-year mandate extended with the members elected more than a decade ago when the PP governed with an absolute majority. If there are no more exits, the correlation of forces will continue to be favorable to the right, with nine conservative councilors and six progressives.
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