“I am the State & rdquor ;, the phrase attributed to Louis XIV of France, the Sun King, may be apocryphal, but what already seems certain is that for the President of the Supreme Court and General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ), Carlos Lesmesthe “Judicial Power is me & rdquor ;.
Nobody is remembered who tries to squeeze so much, as if it were a lemon, a threat of resignation like the one he made before the group of journalists after his opening speech of the judicial year on September 7. Last Friday the 23rd, he pressed the juicer hard and announced that it is he who, based on a report commissioned from the services of the CGPJ, establishes that his successor, in an “automatic” way, in case of resignation, will be the magistrate Francisco Marín Castán, president of the First Chamber of the Supreme Court, the oldest of said body. Likewise, he reported from the CGPJ portal that on Monday the 26th (yesterday) he would take to the Government Chamber of the supreme court said succession report.
In spite of all this, at least most of the 18 vocal companions of Lesmes – with the exception of the so-called GAL (Group of Friends of Lesmes) – were unaware that the new Sun King had embarked on the succession process. It was supposed that, in any case, the president should submit to the consideration of the members, who have accompanied him since December 4, 2013 and who elected him to be president, any plan. When one resigns, the milonga ends. Not with Lesmes, who has not submitted his resignation. Feint, but what is to give, not yet.
The new step announced on Friday took place this Monday when Lesmes met with the presidents of the Supreme Court. And he informed them, rather than “his vowels & rdquor ;, about succession prevention plan. A meeting in which, according to sources consulted by EL PERIÓDICO, nobody said this mouth is mine, and from which a statement came out.
The government room, made up of Lesmes and five magistrates, “takes note of and shares the report of the director of the technical cabinet of the CGPJ & rdquor ;, in reference to the succession of Lesmes. The Chamber also points out that “it deeply regrets that the president it supports may be forced to resign from office and still trusts that the Congress of Deputies and the Senate will fulfill their constitutional obligations without further delay before reaching this point & rdquor ;.
Lesmes exhibits, therefore, the support of the governing chamber of the Supreme Court and will present as a fact his succession by Judge Marín Castán next Thursday in the Plenary Session of the CGPJ. By the way, Marín Castán was present at the meeting, and from what has been known, he accepts the appointment ‘in pectore’.
But what Lesmes had to get first is the support of his fellow members for a person to preside, no matter how respectable, who has not been elected to said State body. Lesmes intends to achieve two things with this succession: appoint a conservative magistrate and, of course, ensure that the sector does not lose a vote with his departure.
Because in the only precedent, that of 2012, substitution of then president Carlos Dívar, those who took over the presidency of the Supreme Court and the CGPJ, respectively, were two magistrates: Juan Antonio Xiol, president of the First Chamber, the most old, he was appointed president of the TS, and Fernando de Rosa, the vice president of the CGPJ, took over the presidency. But now applying the same method meant that the oldest member, Rafael Mozo, assumed the presidency. And, of course, that meant one more vote for the progressive sector, when Lesmes left.
Now, after the retirement of Ángel Juanes in October 2019 in the position of vice president of the TS and CGPJ, who chaired the permanent commission when Lesmes was absent? Rafael Mozo, the oldest member. And the plenary? Rafael Fernández Valverde, the oldest.
But now, Lesmes launches a paratrooper from the Supreme Court (by the way, he wants to be a candidate to be a magistrate of the TC) to preside over a body in which he will vote without being a member. In other words, it lacks legitimacy. “The Lesmes maneuver can only be defined for what it is: a self-coup & rdquor ;, a judicial source tells this newspaper.
But it will be said: man, Lesmes has played it, he has demanded on September 7 in his opening speech of the judicial year together with King Felipe VI and with Alberto Nuñez Feijóo, president of the PP sitting in front of him, that the renewal of the CGPJ be done with the “current legislation & rdquor; and without “successive conditions”.
In fact, he couldn’t have said it more clearly. But immediately afterwards, in his round of contacts with the PP justice spokesman, Esteban González Pons, and the Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, he forgot what he had pointed out. And he presented Bolaños with the PP conditions program to renew the CGPJ. “What points do you disagree with?” says a source who told the minister. Bolaños did not enter the game.
It is that both the sudden emphasis on the renewal of the CGPJ by the conservative sector – before the arrival in Madrid of European Commissioner Didier Reynders next Friday – and the statement from the Government Chamber of the TS make “as if & rdquor; forget the real problem: the four members must now be appointed to replace the four expired, including the president and vice president of the Constitutional Court (Pedro González-Trevijano and Juan Antonio Xiol, respectively).
Why is it a priority?
Because as of June 20, this CGPJ has the power to make appointments in the TC, power that the Government had suspended in the organic law of 2021 for the CGPJ expired from December 4, 2013. And because although the Government made their two appointments, President González-Trevijano, and Lesmes himself, have transmitted to La Moncloa that they would not be sworn in if the four were not appointed coincidentally in time.
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To the constitutional crisis -the TC is vegetating- and of the judiciary -no renewal for three years and nine months- now joins Lesmes succession engineering. This ends, as a prosecutor has told this newspaper, “like the rosary of the dawn & rdquor ;.