MP questions whether Attorney General will be appointed Chief Justice

Justice Minister Owen Bonnici neither confirmed nor denied that Attorney General Peter Grech will be appointed Chief Justice in the coming weeks. He said that such a question was hypothetical.

Bonnici was replying to a question by Nationalist MP Jason Azzopardi on whether he plans to appoint Attorney General Peter Grech as Chief Justice.

“The post of Chief Justice is not yet vacant and therefore the question is hypotethical,” Bonnici told Azzopardi.

He went on to add that individuals satisfying the requirements as laid down in the Constitution will be eligible for the post.

Chief Justice Silvio Camilleri last year submitted an application to become Malta’s second judge in the General Court of the European Court of Justice, in Luxembourg. 

If selected, Camilleri’s departure in the coming weeks will open up a crucial vacancy for Malta’s judiciary.

Camilleri, a former attorney general, was appointed chief justice in 2010 after Vincent de Gaetano was nominated to the European Court of Human Rights. He was an ‘outsider’ candidate catapulted to the top post without having been a member of the judiciary.

The Court of Justice is composed of 27 judges and eight advocates-general, while the General Court is made up of at least one judge from each member state. 

Eugène Buttigieg is currently a judge in the General Court, serving his second mandate until 2019.

Following a decision to increase the number of judges in order to tackle a backlog of cases, each member state will have the right to nominate another judge.

EU judges are paid €220,000 a year excluding allowances. The addition of 28 new judges is expected to cost European citizens about €23 million a year, an increase of 6.6 per cent over the €350 million annual budget of the Luxembourg court.

Current judge Anthony Borg Barthet was a former attorney general under whom Camilleri served. He was reappointed to the ECJ in 2006 for a six-year term, and again in 2012. A panel of experts had also turned down the nomination of judge Joseph Filletti for the General Court that same year.

All appointments are made after consulting a panel of retired ECJ judges and senior EU law experts, as well as the Court’s president, who give an opinion on candidates’ suitability. The workings of the Court of Justice are conducted in French and member states are expected to nominate persons with sufficient experience and knowledge to be able to perform their duty at European Union level.