New game, same names

by Karl Allan Barlaan and Christian Cardiente

The impeachment of Chief Justice Renato Corona may have the country on pins and needles but today’s news may just be another of tomorrow’s historical footnotes.

Most of the players have been on stage before—apart from one another only by a few degrees of separation—though only a few of us would care to remember.

In 1965, Ferdinand Marcos running under the Nacionalista Party defeated re-electionist Diosdado Macapagal of the Liberal Party. Benigno Aquino Jr. was Tarlac Governor at that time; Joseph Estrada was still a showbiz personality and would only enter politics, as San Juan mayor, two years later. Gloria, Diosdado’s daughter, Benigno III and Ferdinand Jr., their fathers’ namesakes, and Jinggoy, Estrada’s son—future national leaders—were 18, five, eight, and two respectively.

In 1969, Marcos won a second term. In 1971, due to clamor for a new Constitution, the country elected delegates to the Constitutional Convention. These included Teofisto Guingona Jr., Aquilino Pimentel Jr., Hilario Davide Jr., Edgardo Angara, the late Raul Roco, Heherson Alvarez, and Richard Gordon. All but Davide, who eventually became chief justice, were later elected into the Senate. Guingona and Pimentel’s sons—TG and Koko respectively—would later also become members of the same legislative house.

Guingona and Pimentel, who refused to sign the draft Charter, were imprisoned when Martial Law was declared the next year; Alvarez went underground; Davide, Angara, Roco, and Gordon, signed.

In 1972, the same year Martial Law was declared, Angara founded Angara Abello Concepcion Regala & Cruz Law Offices (ACCRA) which had then-Defense Secretary Juan Ponce Enrile as “silent co-founder”—up until latter went public with his role in the firm.

“Senator Angara is a man whose career I helped to start, and nurture: first, as a young lawyer, placing him no less as the lead and founding partner of the law firm I established (ACCRA or Angara, Concepcion, Cruz, Regala and Abello Law Office), and later as president of the University of the Philippines by recommending him to former President Marcos,” divulged Enrile. (Manila Standard Today, 4 March 2010).

ACCRA was at the top of the food chain as far as law firms went during the Marcos administration. It produced such “notables” in politics and the legal profession as Angara, Roco and Franklin Drilon. Upon Cory Aquino’s ascent into power, however, the same names—ACCRA lawyers as they are collectively referred to in lawsuits—would be embroiled in controversy for their alleged role in facilitating “crony capitalism” for the previous regime.

Accused of ties with Marcos—documented in detail by eight-year National Archives director Ricardo Manapat in his book “Some are smarter than others”—Angara and Drilon still managed to land the good graces of Cory. Angara was in the administration’s senatorial ticket of 1987. Drilon was appointed Labor Secretary (1987), Justice Secretary (1990), and Executive (1991) under the first Aquino presidency.

The ACCRA list of senatorial produce does not end with the two. According to an article by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, “The Coming of Compañero,” Rene Cayetano—father of senators Pia and Alan Peter—in the late 1970s rose to become senior partner at the powerful ACCRA law , where he was later assigned to liaise with the firm’s “special friend,” then Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile.

“It was Enrile who brought Cayetano his first taste of being in the media spotlight, via the Pepsi Paloma rape case in 1982. The teenage starlet, who said she had been raped by three hosts of a popular noontime TV show, had approached the defense minister for help. Enrile decided to refer the matter to ACCRA, and contacted Cayetano,” wrote the article.

The said “hosts” were all related to then-actor/comedian Tito Sotto.

Excerpts from news reports at that time said, “Tito Sotto’s talent in politics was first tested in October 1982 when he spearheaded the settlement for the rape case filed by sexy stars Pepsi Paloma and Guada Guarin against Tito’s younger brother Vic Sotto and his “Eat Bulaga” co-hosts Joey de Leon and Richie D’Horsie.” (Talk Show, Fundy C. Soriano)

Supposedly, the teenage starlet “disappeared” just before Cayetano was to file the rape case at the Quezon City Fiscal’s office. She was later recovered by then police captain, Panfilo Lacson.

An apology from Vic and company was issued shortly thereafter: “We hope that you will not allow the error we have committed against you to stand as a stumbling block to that future which we all look forward to. We therefore ask you to find it in your heart to pardon us for the wrong which we have done against you.” (People’s Journal, 13 October 1982)

The case was never tried. Tito Sotto did go into politics, first as Vice Mayor of Quezon in 1988 and then later as senator in 1992.

Enrile and Cayetano eventually became law partners at PECABAR, Ponce Enrile Cayetano Reyes Manalastas Law Offices.

In 1990, Enrile was arrested in connection with the December 1989 military uprising against the Cory Aquino government. It was the bloodiest coup attempt of that period led among others by Enrile’s former aide, then Armed Forces Col. Gregorio Honasan.

PECABAR defended both Enrile and Honasan. Cayetano was the firm’s spokesman.

United Press International reported: “Enrile was among seven people indicted... for ‘rebellion with murder’ in connection with the coup attempt Dec. 1-9 in which at least 113 people were killed and more than 600 wounded... Enrile’s law partner Renato Cayetano said he would ask the Supreme Court to release the senator (Enrile) for his own safety and because the charges were false.” (28 February 1990).

In its defense, PECABAR attacked the charge of “rebellion with murder” against Enrile. “There is no such animal in the juridical zoo,” it argued. The high court later ruled in favor of petitioner Enrile (G.R. No. 93335, 13 September 1990).

One of the brains behind that masterful bit of legalese was former Justice, now defense chief legal counsel Serafin Cuevas, then doing private practice. Cuevas, to this day remembers his main line of argument: “There is no such crime as rebellion complexed with murder.”

Cuevas, one of the justices of the Supreme Court that was abolished by the 1986 revolutionary government, had earlier figured in the very first uprising against the newly installed Cory presidency—the “1986 Manila Hotel siege.”

United Press International wrote: “(Arturo) Tolentino who was (Ferdinand) Marcos’ running mate in the Feb. 7 election that led to his ouster had himself sworn in as acting president in the driveway of the Manila Hotel ... Tolentino was sworn in over a bullhorn by an ousted associate justice of the Supreme Court, Serafin Cuevas, another Marcos loyalist.” (7 July 1986)

That was the first of nine “rebellions” under the first Aquino presidency, quelled mostly because of the loyalty of then-Armed Forces chief-of-staff Fidel Ramos and military support from the United States, which was authorized to shoot down rebel-flown aircrafts according to the Davide Commission Report (p222).

Cory made it to the end of her term, endorsed Ramos as her successor, who in turn defeated Miriam Defensor-Santiago in a tightly fought and controversial 1992 presidential election. Santiago, another favorite Aquino appointee—Immigration and Deportation Commissioner (1988) and Agrarian Reform Secretary (1989) — who accused Ramos of massive electoral fraud, would later become senator.

Honasan, receiving amnesty from Ramos in 1992, parlayed the fame borne of his adventurist exploits into a Senate seat in 1995. The “model” would be replicated by another disgruntled soldier-turned-senator, Antonio Trillanes IV of the 2003 Oakwood Mutiny fame—a failed power grab where Honasan was also implicated, this time as Kuya, adviser and big brother to younger coup plotters.

As Ramos did for Honasan, President Benigno Aquino III, three months into the presidency and in a bid to expand influence in the Senate, also extended amnesty to Trillanes and around 300 other mutineers. Trillanes, a supporter of 2010 losing presidential candidate Sen. Manny Villar, has turned Aquino ally since. The same could not be said of Aquino’s critic who was his mother’s Executive Secretary, Joker Arroyo.

Then again, in politics, only family names and jousts for control remain constant. Political loyalties shift frequently and perpetually.

Then-House Speaker Villar was an Estrada ally until he banged the gavel that paved the way for the latter’s impeachment trial at the Senate. Bong Revilla was with the Estradas until he sided with the Arroyos. Loren Legarda was an Estrada critic, until she ran as the vice presidential running mate of Estrada’s “chosen one,” Fernando Poe Jr. Lacson was Estrada’s friend and protégé until he openly attacked his political benefactor. The Cayetano siblings were supporters of Arroyo until they let go of her coattails. Francis Escudero was an Estrada campaigner in 1998 and Poe campaign manager in 2004 but became Aquino’s public relations strategist in 2010. Lito Lapid is Arroyo’s cabalen and political ally but nobody really knows when he will somersault to the other side. Ralph Recto and Serge Osmeña could not be seen on the same stage but nonetheless belong to the same side of the political fence, the same one where Francis Pangilinan was caught saying “noted” one-too-many times; the “Liberal side” where even then-Congressman Benigno Aquino III, on 30 June 2005, voted against the playing of the “Hello Garci” tapes in Congress, only to call for Gloria Arroyo’s resignation a few days later on 8 July 2005.

Judging by history, who knows how the Senate will vote? Looking 20 years into the future, who will remember.., much less care?