Supreme Court chooses decency, not expediency

IT is laudable and encouraging that the Supreme Court decided last week to give due course to the citizens’ petition for immediate action against officials behind the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) and the misuse of the pork barrel or PDAF by asking the Ombudsman to comment on the petition.

In issuing the order, the Supremes were not hampered by worries about the feelings of the sitting president. Instead of voting for political expediency, it declared that decency in government must come first. For this is as it should be. And this is what our people have long been craving for in this country.

Specifically, the SC ordered Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales and Justice Secretary Leila de Lima to comment on the petition that seeks the issuance of a judicial order that will compel the Ombudsman to investigate the authors, proponents and implementers of the disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) and pursue the investigation and prosecution of persons involved in the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) scam.

This is a huge step forward because until the SC decided to accept the case, we the people had been consigned to living with the seeming impunity (exemption from punishment) of high public officials for crimes in their official conduct, as no investigations and no charges were being filed against them despite decisions already made by the High Court on the illegality of the DAP and PDAF.

If anyone should be mad about the inaction, it is the SC because its decisions that are being ignored.

We have watched with frustration as Budget Secretary Florencio Abad has continued his rape of the budget, and sleeps well with his loot intact, while the public suffers from the miseries of misgovernance and government corruption.

With this case going forward, the nation now knows that President Aquino, regardless of his presidential immunity, will be investigated for his critical part in the depredations of the DAP and PDAF.

If the petition for mandamus is granted, the Ombudsman and the justice department must perform their statutory duty to probe Aquino for impeachment purposes, and to investigate Abad, Senate President Franklin Drilon and Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. for their respective roles in facilitating such a massive looting of the public treasury.

There is no question here that the president can be investigated by the Ombudsman for “any serious misconduct in office.” His so-called presidential immunity does not exempt him because no one is above the law.

Within the high court, there is one thorn which the public should worry about. Among the justices, Junior Associate Justice Marvic Leonen showed once again his total subservience to President Aquino, who appointed him to his post after negotiating the infamous Comprehensive Agreementr on the Bangsamoro (CAB).

Leonen pushed for the immediate junking of the petition, but he was totally swamped by his colleagues who believe that Aquino, like all other officials, must be subjected to investigation – even if the investigation will be conducted by officials who owe their positions to him, namely Ombudsman Morales and Justice Secretary De Lima.

Justice Leonen misunderstands the institution that he is fortunate to be a member of. He has not realize yet that temperamentally and judiciously, the Court has decisively moved towards the affirmation of decency in government and the rejection of immorality in public service. It will consistently do the right thing when asked to rule on an issue vital to the public interest.

We pray he, like the Chief Justice, herself an Aquino appointee, learns to value the dignity and vital role of the Supreme Court in keeping our Republic and its institutions alive and well by being a fount of wisdom and civic virtue.

source:  Manila Times

After granting bail to Enrile, will Supreme Court do the same for Arroyo?

The Supreme Court has final authority on questions of law, including the Constitution. In the legal community, the Supreme Court’s pronouncement is law. And the gods of Padre Faura have spoken.

Associate Justice Lucas P. Bersamin declared that “Bail for the provisional liberty of the accused, regardless of the crime charged, should be allowed independently of the merits of the charge, provided his continued incarceration is clearly shown to be injurious to his health or to endanger his life. Indeed, denying him bail despite imperiling his health and life would not serve the true objective of preventive incarceration during the trial.” The Supreme Court ruled, therefore, that the fragile state of Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile’s health presented a compelling justification for his admission to bail.

Supreme Court Associate Justice Marvic Mario Victor F. Leonen vented in his dissenting opinion that the granting of bail to Sen. Enrile for humanitarian reason set a dangerous precedent.

The decision “will usher in an era of truly selective justice not based on clear legal provisions, but one that is unpredictable, partial and grounded on the presence or absence of human compassion,” wrote the most junior member of the Court.

Every court, including the Supreme Court itself, is now bound by that precedent. Bail will be granted if the poor health of the petitioner justifies it, even if not presented by the accused as the basis of his plea for provisional liberty. Sen. Enrile did not present his feeble health as argument for his release from detention.

However, those who expect human rights lawyers to swamp the courts with petition for bail for the hundreds of enfeebled septuagenarian and octogenarian languishing in penal colonies and city jails on the basis of the new law would be terribly disappointed. Justice Leonen said that the decision was ‘especially tailored’ for Enrile. I say it was “coutouriered” exclusively for former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Take note of what Associate Justice Bersamin, who penned the decision, said of Sen. Enrile, “With his solid reputation in his public and his private lives, his long years of public service, and history’s judgment of him being at stake, he should be granted bail.” Only former president Gloria Arroyo among the many ailing lolos andlolas in prisons can be described similarly.

Sen. Enrile was confined for a year in a general hospital because his fragile health required continuous medical attention and care.

With the death of Andal S. Ampatuan, Sr. only Mrs. Arroyo, who has remained in custody in the Veterans Memorial Medical Center since December 2013, among the many aged and ill prisoners, is situated similarly.

Sometime in October 2010, retired Supreme Court Chief Justice Artemio V. Panganiban wrote in his Philippine Daily Inquirer column: “The sociological school of legal philosophy holds that to predict how case would be decided (by the Supreme Court), one must consider the personality of the magistrate and the various stimuli attendant to a case per this formula: personality times stimuli equals decision (P x S = D). The personality of a magistrate includes intrinsic qualities like upbringing, education, relationships, etc. Stimuli refer to how he/she responds to externals like public opinion, peer pressure, religious leaders, medical condition, appointing authority, appointment sponsor, close friends, etc.”

That observation strongly suggested that justices of the Supreme Court sometimes decide not only on the basis of an objective interpretation of the law and the established facts but on personal considerations as well. The suggestion led me to believe that some of the landmark decisions of the Supreme Court under former chief justice Renato C. Corona were prompted by personal considerations.

Renato Corona would not have been chosen Chief Justice of the Supreme Court if a provision of the Constitution had been observed. Section 15, Article VII of the 1987 Constitution prohibits the President from making any appointment two months before the presidential election up to the end of his/her term. The presidential election was held on May 10, 2010 and Pres. Arroyo’s term was to end on June 30, 2010.

President-elect Benigno S. C. Aquino III had made known he was not going to replace retired Chief Justice Reynato Puno with Mr. Corona. So, Pres. Arroyo appointed Mr. Corona, her former chief of staff, Chief Justice on May 12, 2010, in violation of the Constitution as the appointment was made within the prohibition period.

The same associate justices set aside the Constitution so that Diosdado Ignacio “Dado” M. Arroyo, son of Mrs. Arroyo, can have a district to represent. The representative of the old 2nd District of Camarines Sur before Mr. Arroyo wanted to be back in Congress as the district’s representative. The Arroyo-subservient Congress broke up the district into two, one for Mr. Arroyo and the other for the former representative, Rolando G. Andaya, Jr.

That act of Congress was questioned before the Supreme Court as there would be disproportionate representation of Camarines Sur in Congress in contravention of the provision of the Constitution on equal representation. However, the Court upheld Congress. So, the district formerly represented in Congress by one congressman is now represented by two whereas the two larger districts are represented by only one each.

The older brother of Dado, Juan Miguel “Mikey” M. Arroyo, also had to have a seat in Congress, his old seat having been taken by his mother. The sycophants of Mrs. Arroyo in the Commission on Elections allowed him to represent Ang Galing Pinoy, the party-list of tricycle drivers and security guards, in Congress. Some groups questioned before the Court the eligibility of millionaire Mr. Mikey Arroyo to represent tricycle drivers and security guards. The Court quickly dismissed the disqualification complaint, saying that the case was outside its jurisdiction.

But the same Corona Court moved swiftly to stop impeachment proceedings against Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez following her petition for certiorari and prohibition, when impeachment is well within the province of the House of Representatives.

In 2011, Mrs. Arroyo, who had been charged with electoral fraud, was under a hold departure order (HDO).

On Nov. 15 of the same year, the Corona Court issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the HDO. Those who voted in favor of the issuance of the TRO were Chief Justice Corona, Associate Justices Bersamin, Arturo D. Brion, Diosdado M. Peralta, Presbitero J. Velasco Jr., Jose P. Perez, Martin S. Villarama Jr., and. Roberto A. Abad, all appointees of Mrs. Arroyo to the Supreme Court. Mr. Abad retired last year.

According to some nonpartisan lawyers, Chief Justice Corona should have called an en banc session to hear the oral arguments against the TRO before issuing it and making it immediately executory. The undue and unusual haste with which the TRO was issued raised the suspicion that the appointees of Mrs. Arroyo to the Supreme Court were really giving her the chance to flee.

Those who voted in favor of the precedent-setting ruling to grant provisional liberty to the accused for humanitarian reason were Associate Justices Bersamin, Brion, Peralta, Velasco, Perez, and Teresita Leonardo-de Castro (also an appointee of Mrs. Arroyo). Associate Justice Villarama was on leave.

In our democratic system of government the enactment of laws rests with the duly elected representatives of the people, the members of Congress. But eight lawyers unelected by the people have in effect enacted a new law seemingly to benefit a person, Mrs. Arroyo, to whom they are all beholden.

Oscar P. Lagman, Jr. is a member of Manindigan!, a cause-oriented group that takes stands on national issues.

oplagman@yahoo.com

source:  Businessworld