A group of judges from the Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ) sworn in in July 2017 by the National Assembly elected in 2015 addressed a communication to the president of that Parliament, Dinorah Figuera, to request an institutional statement on their legal status against to the process underway for a new formation of the highest court of the Republic.
The document, dated October 20, 2026, warns about the lack of response and the lack of official notification by the legislative directive. The signatories emphasize that their appointment occurred in accordance with article 264 of the Constitution and article 38 of the Organic Law of the Supreme Court of Justice, which establish a single and uninterrupted period of 12 years for the exercise of the magistracy..
The judges maintain that their constitutional mandate remains fully in force and that their departure into exile was due to circumstances of force majeure and widely known political persecution that made it impossible to take physical possession of Venezuelan judicial headquarters.. They also remember that on February 5, 2019, Parliament expressly ratified its legitimacy through article 22 of the Statute governing the Transition to Democracy..
In its legal argument, the letter emphasizes that the Magna Carta establishes in Article 265 a rigorous and exclusive mechanism for the removal of members of the supreme court. This procedure requires the prior qualification of serious misconduct by the Republican Moral Council, the guarantee of a hearing for the affected person and the final approval of two thirds of the deputies of the National Assembly, causes and steps that have not been fulfilled.
In front of the political negotiation table and the discussions to reconfigure the Judiciary, the judges affirm that any initiative must respect their investitures and formally include them. Otherwise, they request that the presidency of Parliament issue an express and duly reasoned resolution that clarifies their legal situation to exercise the corresponding national and international legal actions..
The communication has the support and signatures of judges Rommel Gil, Zuleima del Valle González, Milton Ramón Ladera Jiménez, Rafael Antonio Ortega Matos, Luis María Ramos Reyes, Beatriz Josefina Ruiz Marín, Gustavo José Sosa Izaguirre and José Sabino Zamora Zamora, who reiterated their attachment to the reestablishment of the rule of law and the independence of powers.
