On Monday, the Full Court decided to support a letter sent by 10 magistrates to the President of the Legislative Assembly to amend Article 165 of the Political Constitution, so that disciplinary processes become public.
The initiative was presented by magistrate Fernando Cruz and nine more magistrates. That came after a discussion where most of the magistrates indicated that it is a need to improve the transparency issue.
Fernando Castillo, magistrate of the Constitutional Chamber, commented that he was not present in the votes of the previous week but he assured that the reform of article 165 must include a radical change.
Another observation made by Castillo is that magistrates should be subject to a sanctioning regime of an external body, that would be made up of the President of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal; the Comptroller General of the Republic and the Attorney General of the Republic; where the case instructor would be the Public Ethics Ombudsman.
Castillo said he is moving away from the proposal sent by the other 10 magistrates and that he expects support for his proposal, which is more radical.
The document sent by these 10 magistrates to the President of the Legislative Power generated discomfort and some qualified it as “painful” because they were not taken into account to sign it.
Porfirio Sánchez, magistrate of the Second Chamber, said that this took him by surprise because if there is someone who knows the disciplinary regime it’s him, because he was an official of the Judicial Inspection.
Rocío Rojas, magistrate of the Second Chamber, asked the other judges not to make rash decisions.
Fernando Salazar, also a magistrate, said that the note was sent with haste and that is why it was not communicated in the magistrates’ chat.