Bulgaria’s SJC resumes proceedings to elect new prosecutor-general
Bulgaria’s Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) decided on September 12 to resume the process of electing a new prosecutor-general to replace Ivan Geshev, who was dismissed half-way through his seven-year term in June 2023.
The council voted in favour of the proposal put forth by the prosecutors college, which in turn passed it earlier this week, despite opposition from several members of the SJC.
Their argument was that the current SJC should not elect a new prosecutor-general because most of the current members of the council were in office on a caretaker basis, their terms having expired in 2022. Despite that, a majority of 18 of the council’s 25 members voted in favour.
The proposal envisioned that nominations can be made at any of the next four sittings of the SJC (the last one being October 10), with nominees given until October 24 to present their “conceptual views” on the position and their plans for action should they be elected.
Under the proposal’s timetable, the prosecutors college would announce which nominees met the pre-requisites for the position on November 5 and the general meeting of the SJC would announce the date for the public hearings of the qualified candidates on December 5. The proposal put forth January 16, 2025 as the prospective date for the hearings.
To win the job, a candidate will only require a simple majority of 13 members of the SJC, following constitutional amendments that lowered that threshold, which was previously a two-thirds majority of 17.
The SJC suspended the process to elect a new prosecutor-general in July 2023, after Geshev lodged a Constitutional Court appeal against his dismissal.
Geshev was sacked for bringing the judiciary into disrepute in June 2023, after surviving two previous motions on the same grounds in 2021 and 2022. His former deputy Borislav Sarafov was later appointed as acting prosecutor-general.
There has been some political opposition in recent days to the idea of resuming the election of a prosecutor-general. Critics have said that the current line-up of the SJC, which elected Geshev and firmly backed him – until it did not – should not elect his successor.
(Photo: Clive Leviev-Sawyer)
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