translated from Spanish: The selection of senior officials and the candidacy of Judge Repetto to the Supreme Court

Among the problems facing the country is the increasing deterioration of the professional qualification of the highest State officials, particularly those who – for the roles to be performed and the type of organization they comprise – require high technical and political standards. 
The issue has two edges that have not been systematically confronted by the responsible bodies of the State and the Government. One is systemic in nature and is mainly referred to as the modern state being a complex institutional and legal machinery, requiring high degrees of interaction and synchronization at its various levels – at speeds increased for environmental reasons increasing complexity of the issues. This, in general, has been confronted with an elementary method of job training and improvised organizational aggregations, where it is first thought of installing a boss and then the functions, as was the case of the headquarters, in the Ministry of the Interior, of security computer science in the country.
The second problem is that of the mechanisms of selection of the high civil servant – the one who is not the political trust of the government in turn – which has stuck in the modes and uses of the middle of the twentieth century: political clientelism, nepotism and empty formalism, which is completely inept to cater to a public system of complex and modern services. 
One of the most sensitive areas of selection is the Judiciary and, within it, especially the procedures for deciding on the highest judges of the Republic.
On Tuesday, July 3, she appeared, without sorrow or glory, before the Committee on Constitution, Legislation and Justice of the Senate, the Minister of the Court of Appeals of Valparaiso María Angélica Repetto, in order to present her arguments and background of her candidacy for the post of Minister of the Supreme Court of Justice. 
The occasion was of particular interest, as the previous candidate, Dobra Lusic, Minister of the Court of Appeals of Santiago, had failed in her attempt to reach the highest court of the country, following acidic questions to previous actions, which had not have been timely transparent. For this reason, between the Government and the Senate – in the midst of a strong institutional impasse – suggested that, from now on, a new and more transparent procedure would be used, and for the public, with the distribution of previous backgrounds on biography and the civil service of the new would-be Supreme Court minister.
Unfortunately, the senatorial act to receive such a contender was, politically and administratively, more of the same, without straying from what has hitherto known in such selections and without taking the opportunity to listen to the judicial process of the Candidate. The only novelty was a group of guests, who nothing really contributed. Parliamentarians became hesitant, insecure and light on the issues, with too many relevant issues left on the table, without anyone touching them.
Judge Repetto made two very momentous human rights claims, asserting the inappropriateness of amnesty in these crimes and their imprescriptibility. This is done, after making a clarification that he had always been barred from hearing these cases, given his kinship with the Minister of the Interior of the dictatorship, Ricardo García. However, it did not occur to anyone to ask their opinion on the controversial media prescription that the Supreme Court has applied years ago, or about prison benefits to human rights violators, for example.
In terms of family, the candidate made another couple of relevant statements, which may have attracted the interest of the passive Senate committee, which did not happen. Nor did it happen when he opined on procedural matters, hinting at the need for a jurisprudential mechanism or procedure, without touching the immutable senators.
They also did not react when she firmly stated not to be a feminist and that she is against abortion, without being clear about her view of the three-case abortion law already in force. 
Socialist Senator Alfonso Urresti asked him coyly about the system of controls and visits to the secondary branch of the judiciary (which includes notaries), but was unable to ask him directly about whether he has any relationship with the notary Luis Fischer Yávar – who is one of the most powerful and influential interest managers in the V Region – as there is a history of thinking that Fischer is behind Judge Repetto’s candidacy for the Supreme Court. 
The icing on the cake was the judicial situation in the Quintero-Puchuncaví area. Let us remember that in January of this year the highest court in the country amended the flat slate to the Valparaiso Court of Appeals, by rightly hosting the protection remedies filed by the victims of pollution, forcing the state to take drastic action against polluting companies, remedies which the porteño high court – of which the candidate Repetto is a part – had rejected in the first instance.
Consulted confusingly on this subject by the socialist senator of the region, Isabel Allende, the supreme court candidate could not answer and no one called her to do so. Thus, the applicant gave no theoretical or doctrinal explanation as to the position of the Court that she integrates, which did not grant the slightest protection to the victims of pollution in the Quintero-Puchuncaví area.

Original source in Spanish

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