The conservative members of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) have chosen this Wednesday the magistrates of the Supreme Court César Tolosa and Pablo Lucas as their candidates for the Constitutional Court. They have done so in a new extraordinary plenary session petition to the President of the Council, Rafael Mozo, to finalize the appointments to the guarantee court with the current rules.
This Tuesday, Mozo rejected the request of the conservative members to convene this extraordinary plenary session, because they had not provided the names of the two candidates in accordance with the agreed rules. Sources from the conservative block acknowledged to the Efe agency that "it is true that there is a formal defect" because according to the rules of procedure established on September 8 "names had to be provided and that was not done" last Friday.
For this reason, this Wednesday they have met and registered a letter that reiterates the request to convene an extraordinary plenary session and adds their candidates: the president of the Contentious-Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court, César Tolosa, and the magistrate of this same Chamber Pablo Lucas, whom they prefer instead of José Manuel Bandrés, because they see in him a profile close to the Government.
It is the first time that the conservative bloc has finally revealed the names of its candidates, although it remains to be seen how the progressives react since they recently endorsed Bandrés as their candidate, despite pressure from the conservatives.
What is clear, according to legal sources to the Efe agency, is that this extraordinary plenary session will be held "surely before December 22", which is when the ordinary plenary session that was going to vote on the appointments is set and that it could coincide with the processing, already in the Senate, of the legal reform of PSOE and Unidas Podemos that seeks to disarm the blocking strategy of this same group that prevents the renewal of the TC.
The parties that support the Government have introduced some amendments to the reform of the Penal Code that establish an imperative mandate with a calendar for the renewal of the two magistrates of the TC that correspond to the Council and that opens the door to criminal responsibilities for those members who fail to comply the law, as is currently the case.
