Supreme Court head accuses justice minister of acting unconstitutionally
The president of Poland's Supreme Court has expressed concern that the newly-appointed justice minister is initiating policies that undermine the country's constitutional foundations, including the tri-partite division of powers and judicial independence.
Malgorzata Manowska was responding to information released on Friday by the Justice Ministry that the minister, Adam Bodnar, had submitted for consultation draft amendments to the rules governing common courts.
The ministry explained that the proposed new rules would mean that applications to remove a judge on the grounds of the way they were appointed would not be considered by other judges appointed the same way.
A press release said the rules would exclude judges appointed by the National Council of the Judiciary (KRS) from considering such applications as they would not be assigned cases through the Random Case Allocation System.
The ministry justified the move by saying it was due to the fact that a 2017 law on the KRS introduced a selection procedure for the KRS that was unconstitutional.
"The greatest concern is aroused by the fact that the new head of the Ministry of Justice is starting his term of office by submitting projects aimed at violating the fundamental order of the Polish constitution, including the principle of the separation of powers and the independence of judges," Manowska wrote in a statement issued on Sunday.
The Supreme Court president continued: "The First President of the Supreme Court as the constitutional body governing the Supreme Court, which... supervises the activity of common courts in the field of adjudication, draws attention to the obvious and blatant unconstitutionality of two draft rules in the Regulation on the operation of common courts which represent specific violations: of judicial independence; of the independence of judicial authorities, and of the constitutional hierarchy of the sources of law."
The statement went on to say that the Constitutional Tribunal had repeatedly ruled that regulations on the removal of judges based on their means of appointment were inconsistent with the constitution.
Manowska added that Bodnar's actions were being undertaken in a way "that the executive power did not dare to do even in the times of the PRL (Polish People's Republic - PAP)." (PAP)
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