El Salvador has made important changes on its legislation of Public Administration actions. Undoubtedly, we are in a transition phase towards a new administrative system, similar to the existing in other countries of the region, and which had remaining as a pending issue in our country.
At the beginning of this year entered into force two important decrees that are already regulating and directing the Public Administration towards a new structure: on the one hand, the “Transitory regulation of the Administrative Proceeding and the Public Administration System”, and on the other hand, “Contentious-Administrative Jurisdiction Law”. The first decree, provisionally rules the Public Administration System, while the new Law of Administrative Procedures becomes effective, and gives applicability to the second of the decrees, to which we will refer in this opportunity.
One of the most important changes of the new law, is the creation of the Unipersonal Courts of the contentious-administrative jurisdiction to resolve conflicts of this nature, which was previously centralized in one entity, the Contentious Administrative Division of the Supreme Court of Justice. The judicial authority has now been decentralized in these courts, which implies greater agility in the processing of contentious processes, and a decrease in the times when they are resolved. Another new and important aspect is the jurisdictional control object, which previously fell only in one type of acts of the administration, extending to other actions and omissions of the same.
The Intellectual Property Process, for being administrative procedures that are solved before the Intellectual Property Registry and its different areas, also enter into this new dynamic of access to Contentious Administrative Jurisdiction. This implies a real alternative for the users of the system, who previously resigned themselves many times to use it, considering that, in the number of years in which their case was resolved, at that time they might have no interest in the Intellectual Property asset. In other words, with this legislative change, there are new opportunities to access to the jurisdictional route to challenge those resolutions that are considered to transgress the procedure, erroneously applies the law, or even on omissions of the Public Administration in this area.
As a law firm we have been preparing ourselves to be able to develop within these new judicial processes area, which is based on the Civil and Commerce Process Law that has many years of validity in our judicial system, to make use of the system to protect our client’s rights. If you need to know more about this law we are at your services to help you.
Also we will be informing the next validity entrance of the Administrative Procedures Act and its impact in our legal work.
Managing Partner
García & Bodán
El Salvador