MANILA, Philippines - President Aquino countered yesterday the attacks of Chief Justice Renato Corona as he clarified he was not fighting the judiciary but was only moving against certain personalities running the institution who were stumbling blocks to reforms.
Aquino said he was no dictator, contrary to Corona’s claim in a speech delivered in front of the Supreme Court in Manila last Wednesday.
The President said he was not able to watch Corona’s speech since he was being interviewed by a journalist from Time magazine at the time.
“I don’t think it is the Supreme Court and the executive that has an issue. It is certain personalities that are not doing their branch of the government due service that are causing these problems,” Aquino told reporters in an ambush interview after signing the budget for 2012 at Malacañang.
The President said it was the High Court’s actions that would show dictatorial tendencies.
“Let’s see, whose actions are proving something? Example: isn’t it that when we go to the courts, we expect that with the symbol – the lady of justice – having her eyes blindfolded as she carries the scales of justice, that what would happen would be nothing but fairness and certainty when it comes to the laws,” Aquino said.
“If you lose that certainty and predictability in the laws, when the interpretation of the laws keep on changing, who will be followed? Who is dictating now? I think it’s quite difficult to understand that we are the ones dictating when we are the ones who get dizzy with the changing decisions that also affect the people,” Aquino said.
The President also kept his cool and said he did not want to copy the style of Corona, who made personal criticisms against him and the alleged shortcomings of his government.
“But one notable thing is, as I understood it, he said he was filing his SALN (statements of assets, liabilities and net worth) every year. But it would have been easy, when he was speaking, to show the copy of the SALNs that he filed, isn’t it? Isn’t it when you want to make a point that you’re filing (SALNs), you say here is what I filed. But did you notice anything that he presented?’ Aquino said.
“But maybe next week, he will be able to present what he claimed to have filed. That would have been the most statement in action isn’t it? This was what I filed? Clear? But he did not do it. Why is that so?” Aquino asked.
‘Walking constitutional violation’
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima also defended President Aquino from the Chief Justice’s allegation that the administration’s “baluktot na daang matuwid” (crooked righteous path) is now the road leading to a dictatorial government that his late great parents had fought.
“The title could very well apply to him (Corona). There can be no more apt description of a tyrant than someone who holds himself above justice and accountability,” De Lima said in a strongly worded statement distributed to reporters at the Department of Justice.
She described Corona as a “walking constitutional violation” and likened his midnight appointment to the “Hello, Garci” controversy that hounded the previous administration.
“A midnight appointee held by the neck by Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Corona should be as he was rightly impeached for the simple reason that, like Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, he is nothing more than a usurper to a public office,” she said.
She also accused the SC chief of ordering the judges
and court personnel to hold their “court holiday” last Wednesday when the “wheels of justice had to stop turning for a day” just because he wanted to say something to them.
De Lima believes the people know better and they understand that Aquino’s bid to oust Corona is not to put a chief justice he could hold by the neck.
She also reiterated questions on the legality of the midnight appointment of Corona in May last year, an issue already resolved with finality – but not without controversy – by the high court under the watch of then Chief Justice Reynato Puno but was again revived in the impeachment complaint filed by the House of Representatives with the Senate.
The DOJ chief further alleged that “unlike the President, all that Corona can show for himself is his illegal and unconstitutional appointment as a usurper to the office of the chief justice by the other usurper Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.”
Hinting on more actions from the Palace against Corona’s fellow magistrates whom she described as “Arroyo justices,” De Lima said “it is time the President and Congress reclaim the court for the people.”
Difficult but historic decision
Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. said the impeachment of Corona was a difficult but historic decision that was “reached freely and voluntarily by a collective of equals” in the House of Representatives.
In his adjournment speech on Wednesday night, Belmonte said the chamber exercised its power to impeach with care and lawmakers were fully aware of the consequences of such a move.
“The impeachment of the chief justice, fifth in line of succession to the presidency and head of the Honorable Supreme Court—a coequal branch of government—was an important and difficult decision, perhaps the most challenging that we have to confront in our present term,” Belmonte said.
“The power to impeach is an awesome power, the exercise of which is vested in this House to be used only in the most extraordinary of circumstances,” he said.
“It is reserved to exact accountability upon a privileged group of public officials whose mandate to stay in office arise not from periodic elections, and who are even beyond the reach of dismissal by the highest appointing power,” he said.
On Monday, 188 administration lawmakers voted to impeach Corona on eight charges, including alleged misuse of the Judiciary Development Fund. It was the second time in nine months the House impeached an official.
Last March, the chamber impeached former Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez for her alleged inaction on cases involving Arroyo. Gutierrez succumbed to pressure and resigned.
The Speaker noted the decision to impeach Corona was arrived at by “an overwhelming number” or almost two-thirds of the 284-member House.
Senatorial bet
Quezon Rep. Erin Tañada has another suggestion to Corona – to resign and run for senator instead.
Tañada, a party mate of President Aquino in the Liberal Party, said Corona’s remarks before court personnel on Wednesday sounded like a “campaign speech.”
He said the Chief Justice cannot remain as head of the Supreme Court and the entire judiciary and continue delivering political speeches.
He should quit the judiciary and run for the Senate in 2013, he said.
At the same time, Tañada criticized judges and court personnel throughout the country for walking out of their offices or engaging in a sit-down strike on Wednesday in sympathy with their chief.
“It is not fair for them to punish the people just so they can show support for Justice Corona. I appreciate the sentiment of loyalty, but who are they really hurting here? Litigants who were not apprised of this unceremonious proclamation of a holiday have already paid their lawyers for the appearance and have themselves spent time and effort to make it to court, only to be refused,” he said.
“Closing down our courts is infinitely more damaging than any so-called constitutional crisis. In fact, the continued operation of our courts is so essential to the existence of our government that not even during the period of martial law did they ever close down, not even for a day,” he said.
Another congressman, Teddy Casiño of Bayan Muna, said he and his militant colleagues supported Corona’s impeachment to make him accountable for “protecting” Arroyo “from prosecution.”
“Impeachment is the manner in which we show the people that even the highest executive official, our constitutional commissioners, and yes, even the gods in Padre Faura, are always accountable to the people and cannot rise above them. This is not an attack on the Supreme Court by its enemies. This is an attack by the people’s elected representatives on those who would use the Court for evil, selfish ends,” he said.
“We supported the impeachment complaint because we believe that the judiciary should be independent and not kowtow to the whims and caprice of the executive (branch). We do not want the Arroyo court to become an Aquino court. That is the last thing we want to do. We want the Supreme Court to be independent and to be the bastion of justice that it is supposed to be,” he said.
Also yesterday, Department of National Defense spokesman Peter Paul Rueben Galvez said the Armed Forces is maintaining its neutrality in the wake of the brewing battle between the executive branch and the judiciary. - With Edu Punay, Paolo Romero, Jess Diaz, Jaime Laude, Delon Porcalla - By Aurea Calica (
