Ten Judges Nominated for Supreme Court Refuse on Posts
By Gvantsa Gabekhadze
Wednesday, January 23
Ten judges, who were nominated at the end of December to serve a lifetime in the Supreme Court of Georgia, stated on Monday that they no longer want the seats as “artificial negative turmoil” created around their names “affects the court system.”
The judges wrote in a joint statement that an “unhealthy campaign” has been launched against them, the High Council of Justice-a body which nominated them and the general court system since their nomination on 24 December 2018.
They claim that the council raised their candidates through the protection of the law, while certain individuals and organizations “intimidated several judges on the list and demanded the closure of the High Council of Justice.
“While the Supreme Council of Justice has acted within its mandate unambiguously and strictly abide by the current laws, we do not want certain people to be able to use this situation for their political purposes and to further damage an ongoing process by the artificially created noise.
“We are taking into account the fact that the Georgian parliament is unable to recall the list of the candidates nominated by the High Council of Justice of Georgia and, to avoid unhealthy speculation, we ask the parliament not to discuss our candidacies, “the statement reads.
A non-judge member of the High Council of Justice Anna Dolidze, who was against the list which included “biased judges,” says that the statement might be the part of a deal between the government and “a clan of controversial judges”.
“As the civil sector was strongly against the list, now the government and the clan of biased and controversial judges may decide to recall the list of judges affiliated with high-profile cases and re-nominate the list with the judges who are less known to the public. However, the judges, who will be on the new list, would be under the control of the government and the clan,” Dolidze said.
Head of the Transparency International Georgia NGO Eka Gigauri says that now it is important the parliament provides the procedures which will “filter out” controversial judges and will make their lifetime appointment in Georgian courts impossible.
Georgian Prime Minister Mamuka Bakhtadze says that the current state leadership listens to people and the procedures will definitely be elaborated to encourage fair decisions in the court system.
However, Bakhtadze strongly dismissed the government’s involvement in the court’s issues.
After the turmoil regarding the list the Georgia parliament, which is obliged to approve or not judges for the Supreme Court, postponed discussions regarding the judges until the spring session and vowed new procedures for the selection of judges.
Top figures of the ruling party stated that the motivation of the High Council to nominate 10 judges for the court in an accelerated manner was that the Supreme Court currently has 10 judges instead of 28.
Only the High Council of Justice has a right to recall the list of judges.
