Justice gone wrong

Almost everybody agrees that the court decision on Fri. returning Vlastimil Rampula to his position as senior Prague state prosecutor says a lot about the Czech justice system. But almost no one knows so far what the decision actually says about the justice system, because the court hasn't released its ruling yet. No matter what is finally written in the ruling, one inevitable interpretation will be that the law is the law, and that in this case the court had no choice but to reprimand Justice Minister Jiří Pospíšil for not following the prescribed process for removing a prosecutor. Others will interpret the court ruling as evidence that the court system itself is corrupt, and they will look for reasons why the court wanted to bend the law to prevent the sacking of someone who clearly was facilitating large-scale corruption in the country. This is where the leadership of PM Petr Nečas could be important in impressing upon Rampula the need to leave on his own accord. But of course Nečas might be happy to see him back on the job.