Judicial Council Fails to Elect Supreme Court Chair

Bratislava, November 25 (TASR) – The Judicial Council failed to elect a new Supreme Court chair again, as none of the candidates managed to gain a sufficient number of votes on Monday.

The repeated vote will be held on January 27, 2020 with eligible entities being able to propose candidates up to January 8, 2020.

Eight council members voted for Jan Sikuta, while nobody was against and eight members refrained from voting. Two members voted for Alena Siskova, while seven were against and seven refrained from voting. None of them thus managed to gain more than half of the votes of the 16-strong Judicial Council.

The failed candidates from the first round, namely Jana Bajankova, Jana Mesiarikova and Stefan Harabin can take part in the next election again. The Judicial Council is momentarily considering whether it isn’t time to turn a secret ballot into a public one.

The Judicial Council has failed to elect the Supreme Court chair already for the second time. The first unsuccessful election was held in September. The Supreme Court is currently being chaired by its vice-chair Jarmila Urbancova.