Without giving room for the echoes of Tuesday to dissipate, the president of Congress, the socialist Francina Armengol, reaffirmed yesterday in her speech at the solemn opening of the Courts to warn of the “dangers” that a democracy can face if citizens feel that the judiciary is not independent, one day after two controversial and unprecedented decisions by the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) and the Supreme Court (TS) against the Executive of Pedro Sánchez. The first, to declare the state attorney general, Álvaro García Ortiz, unfit, and the second, to overturn the appointment of Magdalena Valerio as president of the Council of State.
Alienated from the criticisms of the deputy secretary of autonomous and municipal policy of the PP, Elías Bendodo, of the Spanish Government for its “permanent colonization of the institutions”, the president of the Congress argued in an interview with Ràdio Nacional de España that to “consolidate ” Spanish democracy and to make it “stronger” it is necessary that “citizens feel very close to their institutions, including the judiciary”. And he insisted on the “strangeness” that causes him that “someone can put buts” to the legitimacy of the parliamentary majority of Congress that emerged from the elections of July 23, because to question it “is not to understand the basis of democracy”.
Armengol’s was not the only socialist reaction to the PP’s attempts against the PSOE in judicial matters. The Minister of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Courts, Félix Bolaños, congratulated himself for seeing how the amnesty law had “punctured the balloon of the right and the ultra-right, who said that Europe was very worried”. “In Europe they already know very well his exaggerations” and his “overacting” with the subject.
Bolaños reaffirmed this in his statements the day before that, in his opinion, there are “zero concerns” in Brussels about this issue, despite the fact that yesterday the European Commission replied that it is too early to make such a statement categorical, as it will not be pronounced until it is approved. “The analysis [of the legislative draft] is still underway. Therefore, in this sense, the commissioner has not said for now that the amnesty law does not raise concerns”, replied the spokesperson of the European Commission, Christian Wigand, when asked for the Spanish minister’s summary of the meetings held in Brussels with the European Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders, and the vice-president of the institution, Vera Jourová.
Wigand specified that the meetings were “constructive” and that it was agreed to “continue” the dialogue on the issues related to the rule of law in Spain that were put on the table, especially the need to renew the General Council of the Judiciary and the amnesty law. “The commissioner informed the minister that he has questions and wants to continue the talks with the Spanish authorities,” said the EU spokesperson to finish answering questions from the press at the European Commission’s daily press conference. In view of Brussels’ punctuation of Bolaños’ words, the leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, demanded not only a rectification, but also an apology. “We demand that he acknowledges his lie, corrects it and apologizes to the Commission and the Spaniards”, he claimed on the X social network.
Every year, Brussels prepares a report on the state of the rule of law in each country of the Union and in its last two editions it has included specific recommendations to each government to improve the democratic health of the member state in question. In the case of Spain, they refer to the urgency to renew the CGPJ, reform the system for electing judges and also the need to separate the mandates of the Attorney General and the Government to guarantee their independence. The next report will not be issued until July next year, and Brussels cannot act preemptively, but in early November Reynders took an interest in the amnesty debate and asked for information from Acting Spanish government on the law, even before the PSOE submitted the draft to Congress.
Bolaños sent him the draft as soon as it was presented, and the preliminary analysis of the Community Executive, according to sources consulted by this newspaper, is that the text avoids the two points that could have been problematic in terms of law community, since it does not at any time refer to the concept of lawfare and also makes it clear that “crimes affecting the financial interests of the EU” are excluded from its scope. The European Commission, however, reaffirms the fact that it will not evaluate the law until the final text is approved, which is why it does not consider the matter closed.
