The story of the election of judges for the Constitutional Court, which began in February of this year, is still not over. Since mid-February, when nine judges left the court due to the end of their term, the Slovak Parliament has been failing to elect enough candidates for the President Andrej Kiska to choose from. Kiska, whose term in the office ends in mid-June, was supposed to appoint the nine new judges from the 18 candidates elected by parliament, so far he has appointed three new judges to secure the courts functioning, as the Constitutional Court is now working on seven judges out of 13.
On Tuesday, Parliament elected another three candidates and a fourth candidate on Wednesday. However, President Andrej Kiska stated that he would appoint new judges for the Constitutional Court only after Parliament provides the sufficient number of candidates - ten. According to presidents spokesman Roman Krpelan, Kiska, who appointed three judges out of eight candidates presented by Parliament a month ago, was acting in an "emergency" situation to "ensure proper functioning of constitutional bodies", and now wants to see ten candidates to be provided by Parliament.
Especially the strongest governing party SMER-SD slammed Kiska's decision. SMERs spokesperson Ján Mažgút stated that Kiska apparently "prefers his own politickeering and ambitions to the interests of this country". Smer was referring to the fact that Kiska has announced he is going to set up a political party after he quits as president on June 15. Parliamentary Chairman Andrej Danko (Slovak National Party/SNS) said that he respects President Andrej Kiska's decision, while the junior coalition party Most-Híd via its chairman Béla Bugar encouraged Kiska to 'do his job'.
Meanwhile, the parliamentary opposition calls the results of the vote a "disgrace" and thinks that it is just a trap laid for Kiska to accuse him of obstructing the process.
