The Slovak Judicial Council on Tuesday, March 8, elected fourteen judges to serve on the Disciplinary Court. They were drawn from more than thirty candidates in a secret ballot at a session held near Snina, in eastern Slovakia, election committee chairman and council member Juraj Sopoliga said, the SITA newswire reported.
Four candidates proposed by judicial councils, five candidates proposed by parliament and five candidates proposed by Justice Minister Lucia Žitňanská became disciplinary judges. Several candidates for the post of disciplinary judge nominated by parliament and the Justice Ministry complained that while they had to pay for the expense of attending the session, the Judicial Council members were technically in Snina on a business trip and thus had their expenses paid by their courts.
Štefan Harabin, the president of the Supreme Court and chairman of the Judicial Council, did not comment on the issue, saying he does not govern the economic affairs of the courts. The Judicial Council session, which took place in a holiday resort, was attended by only one third of the 33 candidates running for places on the Disciplinary Court. Harabin asserted that the session proceeded in a normal way and that the working conditions were good. Zuzana Wienk of the transparency watchdog Fair-Play Alliance, also present at the meeting, told SITA that holding the session in a restaurant was undignified. In her opinion, the resort’s location – Snina is in the far east of Slovakia, around seven hours’ drive from Bratislava but only 30 kilometres from the Ukrainian border – as well as the inappropriate venue represented obstruction of the candidates and was deliberately chosen by Harabin for this reason.
Source: SITA
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
