By The Star Staff
Gov. Pedro Pierluisi Urrutia insisted Tuesday that he will not present to the Legislative Assembly appointments for the Supreme Court, Office of the Comptroller or Office of the Women’s Advocate.
“I don’t want to rule out future appointments, but it’s obvious that those appointments are greatly hindered by the current composition of the Legislative Assembly,” the governor said in response to questions from reporters. In the case of the Supreme Court, I appointed an excellent judge. And it didn’t have the Senate’s endorsement. And I wouldn’t want another distinguished person to go through the same ordeal. In the case of the comptroller, the comptroller is, as they call it in English, ‘holding over;’ that is, she has every right to remain in office. As long as I don’t appoint someone ‘in ownership’ and I believe that they are doing an excellent job, I do not rule out the [possibility] that [someone] does appear, someone who could go through that crucible of the House and Senate in that case, which again is difficult because of the partisan political divisions, then I’ll appoint them. But I’ll admit it’s not something I’m envisioning doing in the immediate future.”
“The women’s advocate is something similar,” Pierluisi continued. “I nominated an excellent candidate and no, she didn’t get a majority vote in the Senate. The current women’s advocate, who is serving on an interim basis, [Madeline] Bermúdez is keeping the house in order.”
“As for vacancies in the judiciary, and prosecutors’ offices, I will be making appointments at the beginning of the session, because there were many, many, many appointees who were not served, that is, on average 30 percent,” the governor noted. “Of the people I appoint to positions subject to confirmation … they vote confirming them or are not attending to it. In other words, at the beginning of the session I will again be submitting a large number of appointments for the consideration of the Senate. I am talking about judges, prosecutors, registrars.”