The Senate and the Chamber of Deputies have finally chosen the members of the opposition parties for the important National Council of Magistrates (CNM), which now completes the body that will choose the new Supreme Court judges. The Senate selected Milagros Ortiz Bosch of the Partido Revolucionario Dominicano (PRD), and the Chamber chose Cesar Francisco Feliz y Feliz of the Partido Reformista Social Cristiano (PRSC). The CNM members will be President Leonel Fernandez, the president of the current Supreme Court Nestor Contin Aybar, the presidents of the Senate and Chamber of Deputies, Amable Aristy Castro and Rafael Peguero Mendez, Sen. Ortiz Bosch and Deputy Feliz y Feliz.
The selection of Sen. Ortiz Bosch and Deputy Feliz y Feliz is seemingly the result of a congressional agreement signed by the leaders of the PRD and the PRSC, in which the two parties pledged to support each other to divide control of the Congress: the PRSC in the Senate and the PRD in the Chamber of Deputies.
Another aspect of the agreement, which was not officially confirmed by the two parties but interpreted as such by many, was the support they gave to each other for the members of the opposition parties to form the CNM, as the PRSC senators voted for Sen. Ortiz Bosch and the PRD deputies voted for Deputy Feliz y Feliz, thus guaranteeing a certain degree of power in the important selection of the 11 Supreme Court judges to their leaders, Joaquin Balaguer of the PRSC and Jose Francisco Peña Gomez of the PRD.