The Judicial Administration Body (OAJ) has informed that the payment of severance pay to judges dismissed due to the judicial reform will take place on 10 December. To collect the compensation, federal judges and magistrates will have to show up with a witness at the OAJ headquarters on Avenida Revolución in Mexico City. The announcement was seen as a big step forward for these workers, who until a few days ago didn’t even know whether they would receive severance pay, but it also raised questions about the risk of bringing hundreds of judges together in one place or what seniority and salary criteria they will use for compensation. Faced with these questions, the dismissed judges are maintaining their protest for Wednesday.
On September 1, a change in the Mexican justice system went into effect. 800 federal judges took office, elected in June, and hundreds from judicial careers left. Since then, those fired have been waiting for the compensation provided for by the Constitution. In the tenth transitional article of the judicial reform it was provided that magistrates and judges “who cease from their functions for having renounced their candidacy or for not having been elected by the citizens for a new period will be entitled to the payment of an amount equal to three months’ integrated remuneration and twenty days’ remuneration for each year of service provided, in addition to other benefits due”.
The OAJ provided information in a statement Monday afternoon about this “extraordinary single payment.” The body, born from the defunct Federal Council of the Judiciary, summoned the dismissed judges and magistrates from 8 in the morning to 7 in the afternoon in its Palace of the Revolution. “This appointment is a big step forward because at the beginning they didn’t even tell us if they would pay us, now we have confirmation and a specific day. The question is how they will pay us,” says retired judge Marlen Ángeles.
The dismissed workers first and foremost raise a safety issue. “Why are they sending us all away together? At some point in our judicial careers, we have all been threatened. How will they bring us all together? Will they offer us security?” asks Ángeles. Judges and magistrates also wonder why the payment must be made in person and with a witness, rather than electronically into the accounts on which they received their salaries until two months ago. Even the figure, “indispensable”, according to the OAJ, of a witness worries the judges, especially due to the cost involved not only in traveling to the building in Mexico City but also for another person, coming from states such as Sinaloa, Sonora or Quintana Roo, for example, which are more than 1,000 kilometers from the capital. “There are other, easier ways to get paid,” this federal judge concludes.
Furthermore, the justices ask the OAJ that the compensation established by the Constitution conform to the integrated salary (which includes benefits) and not the base salary; that pending supplementary pensions for retired workers are also paid “immediately” and that seniority is respected throughout their judicial career. These aspects are those that are not specified in the Organism’s statement, which is why the dismissed workers will organize a march this Wednesday between the headquarters of the Federal Judiciary. “The announcement was a very important advance, but we need clarification on the points that make the difference,” says Marlen Ángeles.
