site.btaEU Court Holds that Post-Term Operation of Supreme Judicial Council's Inspectorate Infringes Judicial Independence

In a judgment of April 30, 2025, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) held that the functioning of the members of the Inspectorate with Bulgaria's Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) after the expiry of their term in office, which the Constitutional Court "authorized" nearly three years ago, is inconsistent with the principle of judicial independence. The CJEU also noted that such post-rerm operation is not expressly regulated in legislation and is not limited in time.

The CJEU responded to a request for a preliminary ruling from Judge Andrei Georgiev of the Sofia Regional Court, who argued that the Inspectorate was incompetent to ask him to rule on its requests for the disclosure of banking secrecy regarding the bank account balance of 16 magistrates and their family members.

The Court reasoned that a Member State may not tolerate members of a judicial body, who are elected by its parliament for fixed terms and who have the power to scrutinize the activity of judges, prosecutors and investigators for integrity and conflicts of interest and to propose disciplinary action against them, to continue to perform their functions beyond the legal duration of their terms of office, where the extension of the expired terms of office does not have an express legal basis in national law and where it is not guaranteed that such extension is limited in time. 

The five-year term of the Inspector General and the four-year terms of all ten inspectors have long expired, and they are serving a third term running because Parliament has failed to do its duty and elect a new complement of the Inspectorate for five years now.

In 2020, when the Inspectorate's constitutional term expired, the Constitutional Court was approached about the validity of their acts. In 2022, that Court issued a binding interpretation of the Constitution according to which the Inspector General and the inspectors perform their functions until the National Assembly has elected their successors. The Court argued that maintaining the functions entrusted to the Inspectorate outweighs the risks of abuse by members thereof whose terms of office have expired. 

In the autumn of 2022, when the term of the SJC members expired as well, the Constitutional Court ruled that they, too, should nevertheless stay in office. These members are thus halfway through a second five-year term, again due to the legislature's failure to elect replacements. 

In his request, Judge Georgiev noted that the Constitutional Court judgment ignored the question whether members of the Inspectorate who continue to perform their functions after the expiry of their term of office might exercise undue influence over the judicial system or could themselves be subject to pressure from members of the National Assembly.