HALF TRUTH IS DECEPTIVE IN ITSELF...

WHEN THE RULE OF LAW

BECOMES RULE OF INJUSTICE—

THE SUPREME COURT SHOULD BE

HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR IT

HALF TRUTH IS DECEPTIVE IN ITSELF

The points/issues the article presented were incomplete and selective--therefore the article is deceptive in itself because it can lead to misleading and erroneous conclusions. It did not treat incontrovertible major issues, like the ILLEGAL use of Executive Privilege, as well as the stopping by the Supreme court (SC) of Ombudsman Gutierrez's impeachment by the co-equal House of Representatives, despite the latter's being empowered by the Constitution to undertake such impeachment. If treated at length, the apparently INTENTIONAL inaction against corruption by GMA, COA, and the Office of the Ombudsman during GMA's term--abetted by GMA's appointees in the Supreme Court--can consist of a whole book.

What's more, those who defend the Supreme Court and Chief Justice (CJ) Renato Corona and attack PNoy have evaded presenting the TOTAL PICTURE--the correct and meaningful basis of conclusion--as though the SC justices were spot clean, that they were free from any signs of INTENTIONAL wrongdoing, so that an attack against them is equated to an attack against the judiciary and the time-honored separation of powers among the three branches of government. They are silent on the Supreme Court's own violation of separation of powers and indirect attack against the legislators, through the Court’s stopping of Ombudsman Gutierrez's impeachment in the House of Representatives, as well as many other incidents cited in the present impeachment case vs. CJ Corona. They hide or evade the fact that the Supreme Court itself provided the STIMULUS that provoked COUNTER REACTION by the Executive and Legislative branches against it.

WHY THE SUPREME COURT CAN PROTECT EVEN A GRAFT-RIDDEN ADMINISTRATION UNDER THE TOUTED RULE OF LAW

If there is a lawyer saying yes, there is always another lawyer saying no. The reason is that there are varying laws and constitutional provisions, varying situations, and varying and conflicting evidences to consider. Judges and justices may have different appreciation of the covering laws and constitutional provisions, situations, evidences, and grounds for conclusion.

Even if Supreme Court justices would decide cases based on their own biases and loyalties--such as what clearly happened during martial law, and it seems even during GMA's time--they can easily justify their decision through citing the laws, evidences, and grounds in favor of their decision; keep quiet about the contrary provisions of law, evidences, and grounds in favor of contrary decision; let the majority concurring justices make inutile the right but minority dissenting justices; call the whole unjust process the venerable RULE OF LAW--probably the reason why it is NOT called RULE OF JUSTICE to begin with--and invoke the need to maintain the respectability and independence of the Supreme Court in case it comes under attack from aggrieved parties.

Thus, even Supreme Court justices are usually not unanimous in their decisions. In which event, in cases of gray areas where there is no clear determination of what is legal and right, then the Supreme Court justices can apply common sense and decide based on what is MORAL and beneficial to the people. Had this been done, the ILLEGAL use of GMA's EXECUTIVE PRIVILEGE in the ZTE-NBN deal would not have come to pass, and the nation would have by this time an acceptable closure of the ZTE-NBN controversy. .

TO PROTECT GMA, THE SUPREME COURT UPHELD THE ILLEGAL USE OF GMA'S EXECUTIVE PRIVILEGE FOR AN ILLEGAL PURPOSE: CONCEALMENT OF GMA'S APPARENT ROLE IN BIG-TIME CORRUPTION IN THE ZTE-NBN DEAL DURING SENATE HEARINGS-- AND GMA APOLOGISTS ARE SAYING THAT THIS IS RULE OF LAW AND HAS TO BE RESPECTED !!!

Just because the Supreme Court is unanimous in its decision does not make CJ Renato Corona free from guilt on the major issue of Executive Privilege. As Chief Justice, he should have led the other justices to the legal and correct decision. If he was unsuccessful in leading them to the right path, he should have dissented still against the ILLEGAL use of the Executive Privilege as COVER UP for an ILLEGAL act--GMA's lack of action on Romy Neri's report to her about the P200-MILLION alleged bribe offer by COMELEC Chairman Benjamin Abalos--which bribe could come from the alleged $130 MILLION overpricing in the $329-MILLION ZTE-DOTC contract, proof of which overpricing came out in the Philippine Star columns of Mr. Jarius Bondoc on February 18, February 20, and March 26, all in 2008.

As divulged during Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearings, despite NEDA Director General Romy Neri's report to GMA of said P200-MILLION bribe offer and huge "tong-pats" in the then proposed ZTE-NBN deal, concurrent NEDA Chairman GMA still allowed the ZTE-NBN deal (which needed NEDA’s prior approval) and even witnessed the contract signing in China as requested allegedly by ZTE. Because SC upheld her EXECUTIVE PRIVILEGE, her complete role in the ZTE-NBN deal was hidden to the Senate and to the nation, thereby covering up or suppressing the incriminating evidence against her that could have pinned her down for big-time corruption right at that time.

NOW, because the Supreme Court protected her from being found out through upholding her Executive Privilege, GMA's camp is gloating that the evidence against her is weak. Of course, even if she is guilty, the evidence against her is weak simply because COA, the Ombudsman, and the Supreme Court manned by her appointees are protecting her under the vaunted RULE of LAW, such as through the Ombudsman's inaction on big-ticket corruption cases that could eventually reach all the way to GMA, who authorized speedy fund releases for graft-tainted projects, as exemplified by the P728-MILLION fertilizer scam in the Department of Agriculture.

Incidentally, thru emails, eight (8) times I requested Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez--as well as Senate Blue Ribbon Committee Chairman Richard Gordon and COA Chairman Reynaldo Villar--to act on Mr. Bondoc's above expose on ZTE overpricing, but all of them did not do anything about it, and yet, as pointed out above, the Supreme Court prevented Ombudsman Gutierrez's impeachment.

ON TWISTED RULE OF LAW THAT EQUATES TO RULE OF INJUSTICE

Chief Justice Corona cited equality before the law in invoking GMA's constitutional right to travel. Firstly, he did not mention that this right is not absolute--such as in case a convicted murderer would like to travel abroad--therefore SC should have justified in its TRO that GMA's case belongs to the general rule that a citizen can travel, that even if the Department of Justice (DOJ) circular on hold departure order (HDO) is not yet invalidated or outlawed by SC, she should be allowed to go for medical reason--which reason turned out later to be not valid.

The SC justices issued the TRO in complete haste without bothering to validate GMA's one-sided self-serving claim for the need for medical treatment abroad, even if a SC hearing was already scheduled in less than a week, and even if the legality or illegality of DOJ's authority to issue HDO is not yet resolved by the Court. As it turned out, had SC waited for its hearing in less than a week before issuing the TRO, by the time the hearing was held, a court case could have been filed already so that GMA could not reason out that she should be allowed to leave because no case has been filed against her in the first place. (NOTE: The court case was filed on Friday, the SC hearing was scheduled on Tuesday of the following week.)

Secondly, hold departure orders or HDOs as authorized by the alter ego of then President GMA, then Secretary of Justice Raul Gonzales and later Alberto Agra, have been implemented for so long. One of my friends who was not even notified about it was stopped in her foreign travel to the USduring the time of Sec. Gonzales, to her great embarrassment before the husband and in-laws of her daughter whom she would visit in the US. Her estafa case was still in the DOJ prosecutor's office, not yet in Court, yet she was stopped from leaving for abroad even when she showed the prosecutor's decision dismissing the case against her. She had to secure clearance (normally about a week's time) from the office of GMA's secretary of justice before she could travel to the US. For being in the DOJ watchlist, she was again barred from leaving for Hong Kong when she subsequently tried to travel. She had to seek clearance a second time from DOJ Sec. Raul Gonzales' office before she could go.

Now that the shoe is on the other foot, now that GMA is the one being barred from traveling abroad on the basis of the very same DOJ authority used against my friend and many others similarly situated, CJ Corona wants to revoke that DOJ authority in recognition of GMA's constitutional right to travel. How can CJ Corona invoke equality before the law for GMA, when she is being allowed to escape suffering from the same instrument that she used against my friend and others during her administration? To them, what we have is the RULE of IMPERFECT LAW in favor of the rich and powerful!!!

Now that GMA is the one who wants to travel abroad, the DOJ rule on hold departure orders--in effect implemented by GMA herself through her alter ego Secretary of Justice--has to be revoked in her favor. And the Supreme Court calls this equality under the rule of law.

THE DIFFERRENCE THEN AND NOW

During GMA's time, big-time cases of corruption in government were perpetrated and condoned. Thus, high civil and military government officials need GMA's approval before they can testify before Senate and House Committee hearings, and her approval was not given even if needed. Military officials who testified without her approval were sanctioned or subjected to court martial, while others, like Economic Planning Secretary and NEDA Director General Romy Neri, were stopped from exposing incriminating facts on the illegal ground of Executive Privilege. And some lawyers call this the rule of law.

During the present PNoy administration, all civil and military government officials are allowed and even encouraged to tell what they know about corruption. He wants to serve a lasting lesson to one and all that continuing CRIME AGAINST THE 100 MILLION FILIPINOS DOES NOT PAY, to the extent of his running after GMA and her protectors in the Supreme Court.

If the Supreme Court justices are impeached, this will serve the unforgettable lesson that all future Supreme Court decisions should be legal, moral or just, and defensible before the Senate and the bar of public opinion--just in case a time of reckoning comes. And some lawyers consider this as destroying the judiciary and violation of separation of powers. They are not right. On the contrary, it will redound to a Supreme Court which will be constrained to walk the straight path from hereon.

No wonder, the public is supportive of PNoy in his fight against GMA and CJ Corona.

MARCELO L. TECSON

A Concerned Citizen

San Miguel, Bulacan

December 14, 2011