Candidates for Supreme Court President questioned in parliament

The hearing had been postponed for some time as the chair of the Judiciary Committee sought out an answer as to claims that one of the candidates had shared sensitive information with her ex-husband.

The three candidates for President of the Supreme Court - Aleksandra Maganić, Šime Savić and Mirta Matić, were questioned by parliament's judiciary committee today. The hearing had been postponed by committee chair Nikola Grmoja, who believes that Matić, whose candidacy is backed by President Zoran Milanović, had disclosed secret information in an investigation to her ex-husband. Matić rejected the allegations: "I did not commit the crime that you have cited. I will say it clearly here and now. The entire public has my permission to publish the transcripts of all of my correspondence, declassify whatever you want, and publish it all. I have nothing to be ashamed of in my life."

Grmoja however, appears set to invite Chief State Prosecutor Ivan Turudić to the committee’s next hearing to have him testify on the matter.

In her hearing Maganić outlined what she felt was the key problem in the judiciary today: "What citizens expect is that the not feel disenfranchised by the system and that they have access to the legal protection they expect. This should be the focus of decision making, but I fear that under these circumstance judges have a bureaucratic approach to resolving cases as opposed to resolving a problem that an individual has."

For his part Savić presented his work credentials: "I have presided over more than twenty thousand lawsuits, with twenty hearings per day over the past twenty years. I have also trained roughly one hundred interns and today they are directors, judges, lawyers and so on. So I know the system from within."

Source: HRT