Argentinean judges must be held accountable

By Roberto Morejón

The request by the Argentinean government and several governors for an impeachment trial of the Supreme Court of Justice highlights the high degree of confrontation between the two powers.

Asking for impeachment against four magistrates of the Supreme Court, including its head, Horacio Rosatti, is accompanied by the accusation of having incurred in misconduct qualified as malfeasance in office.

The process, which is expected to be heard in Congress, has the consent of several local representatives, social movements and some union leaders.

All of them point to the high court for what they consider to be its links with an opposition political sector.

In other words, they claim that the Court is subordinate to the powers that be and violates the rule of law.

Other critics of the highest court claim the existence of an inadmissible degradation that jeopardizes the republican system of division of powers.

The course of the reproaches was encouraged after the Supreme Court ordered the federal government to favor the city of Buenos Aires with the increase of funds, even though it is not included in the budget. 

According to the critics, the ruling was engineered together with the opposition alliance Juntos por el Cambio (Together for Change) to prop up the head of the Buenos Aires government, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, with presidential aspirations.

This is not the first time in Argentina that the judiciary has been accused of benefiting former president Mauricio Macri and persecuting sympathizers of the current government.

The most striking case is that of Vice-President Cristina Fernández, sentenced to six years in prison and life disqualification from holding public office for allegedly defrauding the State during her term as President. 

Fernandez accused the judiciary of being a parallel state and a mafia and the governor of Chaco, Jorge Capitanich, accused the judges of being co-opted by the economic power.

Previously, a newspaper and an Internet portal published chats in which officials, directors of a journalistic group, judges and prosecutors agreed to manipulate evidence of a trip to a luxurious property of a British tycoon.

Regardless of the course of the impeachment trial in Congress, where the accused will try to avoid conviction, for many Argentines the judiciary is moving further and further away from transparency and impartiality.