Integrity through Transparency

Current Slovakia's Justice minister Lucia Žitňanská has the ungratifying task to partly clean up the image of the justice system as a whole; a process that has been initiated by the former Duzrinda governments, but somewhat un-done by the blessings of Fico and his comrades. The question is; where to start first? Feels like moving Mount Everest with a hand spade.

The government has, however,  implemented a fairly essential measure to start with; the making public of court verdicts. Firstly, let me assure my foreign readers that this is not a hoax. Indeed in Slovakia - contrary to other democratic countries - has known the practice of not disclosing court decisions. Whereas this is considered a natural requirements for a western judiciary, Mr Harabin himself populistically declared this to be another tool of the present government to intimidate judges and to politicise the judiciary. Until today, I am still eager to find a law  professional to explain to me with rational arguments what the logic is of Mr Harabin's statement, unless - and that could be easily deducted - Mr Harabin has ulterior and much darker motives. Unfortunately, his weak credibility is only reinforced by such an illogical view.

Because of the brittle political equilibrium, and a rather effectively populist opposition, many measures must be carefully weighed. In addition, the formal measures themselves, do not always guarantee the change within the human factor itself. Likewise, a red-rimmed sign with a 50, will not make all drivers stick to the maximum speed - unless there are controls; either uniformed or nowadays with cameras. And it is indeed such a control on the judiciary, which give the public a tool to understand the judiciary (let's be fair; also to see the quality behind those, who do their work well, and indeed to filter out the ones, who have a less flattering output) as well to the judges themselves to compare their work. In business we talk about benchmarking.

By means of this partly self-reflection but above all by public control - which is, as said earlier, fairly common in all other democratic countries - the move towards a more professional and stable system, building up its integrity from within and mending the damaged image.

As we approach the date the law comes into effect (1st May), I am more than eager to see the discussions and the dynamics of exposing both the good as well as the less good... Let's all be on top of it.