AS if fated by heaven, the two stories of ex-CJ Sereno’s ouster from the Supreme Court and the court’s ruling on the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) of former President Benigno Aquino 3rd are converging in a miasma of bad government.
Will retired Chief Justice Hilario Davide, Jr. do the legal lifting or lawyering in his ambitious project to impeach the eight associate justices of the high court who voted to oust Ms Maria Lourdes Sereno as chief justice of the Supreme Court?
Many are asking because it is well-known in the legal community that Davide had zero judicial experience when he was plucked from politics by President Cory Aquino to serve as an associate justice of the Supreme Court on January 24,1991.
Davide vs 8 justices
In impeaching the eight justices, he will be squaring off against legal luminaries who have nearly a century of judicial experience between them. Except for Justice Francis Jardeleza, the justices all served in the judiciary, evidently in distinguished fashion. And Jardeleza can take care of himself, because he was an able solicitor general under Noynoy Aquino and is a veteran corporate lawyer for companies as big as San Miguel Corp.
Many are wondering how Davide will fare in this matchup. He is more experienced in securing for himself appointments to cozy positions after his retirement from the high court.
To Davide’s credit, he has a keen sense of the news cycle. He grabbed newspaper headlines last year when he declared that the Philippines 1987 Constitution, which he helped in drafting, is the best in the world, and hence should be totally spared from amendments or change.
Morass of inexperience
Davide is not alone in being a chief justice with no judicial experience. Former Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban (CJ 2005-2007) also did not serve a day on the bench. His legal experience was strictly in law practice and teaching. Newly ousted chief justice Maria Lourdes Sereno (CJ 212 to 2018) completes this triumvirate of Philippine chief justice with zero experience in judicial decision-making.
How did our legal system and constitutional history wind up in this morass of inexperience and superficiality? Why is Cory’s made-to-order Constitution so easily transgressed?
How will Davide defend in court his contention that the eight justices should be impeached for ousting from office a chief justice who lacked basic qualifications for the job, and basic competence, integrity and probity?
If these three personages had to pass through a confirmation process in the Commission on Appointments on their way to becoming members of the Supreme Court, would they have escaped being asked by at least one impertinent legislator whether they have any experience as a judge?
The Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) must explain to the nation why they summarily waived or set aside the requirement for SC nominees of 15 years’ experience in the bench in favor of private law practice and teaching.
Senate resolution on quo warranto ruling
The Senate is also astir with talk of holding the Supreme Court to task for its decision to oust Ms Sereno as chief justice in resolving the quo warranto petition.
The chamber will take up on Monday a resolution signed by 14 senators, including the Senate president and Senate president pro-tempore, which will ask the SC to review its decision.
The resolution seeks to express the sense of the Senate “to uphold the Constitution on the matter of removing a Chief Justice from office and respectfully urges the Supreme Court to review its decision to nullify the appointment of Maria Lourdes Sereno as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Philippines.”
Opposition lawmakers contend that the ruling is a blow to judicial independence because it would allow President Duterte to destroy his opponents in all branches of government.
Catalogued as Senate Resolution 738, the resolution was filed by Sen. Francis Pangilinan, the LP president.
Fourteen senators have reportedly already signed the resolution, in addition to Pangilinan. The 14 are: Francis Escudero, Antonio Trillanes 4th, Sonny Angara, Leila de Lima, Grace Poe, Paolo Benigno Aquino 4th, Sherwin Gatchalian, Risa Hontiveros, Joel Villanueva, Loren Legarda, Minority Leader Franklin Drilon, Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto and Senate President Aquilino Pimentel 3rd.
This development in the Senate sent me hunting in the Times archives for old stuff that I had written about the controversy over the DAP. I remember doing much research on the Supreme Court’s decision on the DAP, and writing several columns on the bribery of senators by Noynoy Aquino with DAP funds.
Reading the list of senator-signatories of the proposed resolution on the quo warranto ruling, it struck me that a number of them are explicitly cited in the high court’s ruling. I discussed in two columns the payouts by then budget secretary Butch Abad in the last week of July 2014.
Seven signatories got DAP money
I have now verified the names of seven senators/signatories of the Senate resolution who are cited in the Supreme Court decision. They are the following (the amounts given them are in parenthesis)
1. Francis Pangilinan (P30 million)
2. Antonio Trillanes (P50 million)
3. Aquilino Pimentel 3rd (P45 million)
4. Franklin Drilon (P100 million)
5. Ralph Recto (P50 million)
6. Loren Legarda (P50 million)
7. Francis Escudero (P99 million)
In its DAP ruling, the Supreme Court lists down each senator by name and the incentives/rewards they got for Chief Justice Renato Corona’s impeachment, including the dates of fund releases. And it was the budget secretary Abad himself who attested to making the payoffs.
The details can be found on pages 113-114 of the consolidated SC decision (which includes the majority opinion, and the concurring and separate opinions).
The damning information forms a key part of Justice Arturo Brion’s concurring and separate opinion. He reproduces as a footnote the full text of Secretary Abad’s official statement on the DAP releases to the senators. In 2012, most releases were made during the period October-December, based entirely on letters of request submitted to him by the senators.
I am aware that this week has been a time of mourning for the sudden passing of former senator and former Senate president Edgardo Angara. Sadly, his name is also listed in the SC decision. I apologize for the additional grief that this may give his family.
The incriminating list in the Supreme Court’s DAP decision was never destined to be buried forever. Many of the recipients of Noynoy Aquino’s payoffs will be running in the elections of 2019.
The Supreme Court is also destined to become a more forthcoming voice in our public affairs.
yenmakabenta@yahoo.com
http://www.manilatimes.net/chief-justices-with-no-judicial-experience-senators-who-took-dap-money/399692/?ref=findshare-recs
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