Category: impeachment

sneaky snaky snarky supremes

surely, the ouster of cj sereno by fellow supremes who hate her is not good for country.  legal circles are aghast.  too many laws  defied, broken, re-interpreted.  it is all so destabilizing.  surely there is some other way of dealing with the problem.  surely a senate impeachment trial is the wiser option, let the chips fall where they may.

the original sin was pNoy’s, appointing one so young and so junior.  ang daming nilampasan, in-overtake.  kumbaga sa traffic, daig pa ni sereno ang naka-wangwang, tabi lahat ng nakapilang senior associate justices na mga next-in-line for the cj post.  at least in cj corona’s case, isa lang ang nilakdawan, ibig sabihin tipong senior na rin, may karapatan na rin si corona, besides being president gloria’s former chief of staff, or something like that.

anyway.  the original sin was pNoy’s, the mortal sin was sereno’s, for accepting the appointment.  surely she knew that she would be met with hostility, but perhaps she believed that mar roxas would succeed pNoy and then maybe leni would succeed mar, soon enough the hostile ones would have retired and LP-friendly ones appointed, and then it would all be a breeze to the end of her term.

but mar lost.  ka-DDS na ang majority supremes.  and duterte has spoken: sereno must go.  and so the house of reps got moving and built a case with the help of some five supremes, no less, and the senate has been waiting.  BUT BUT BUT what happened nga ba?

the cardinal sin was solgen calida’s.  why did he have to butt in with the quo warranto?  mahina kasi ang kaso ng house of reps?  tama ba si senator ping lacson?

PING LACSON @iampinglacson 6 hours
Ang biggest ‘winners’ sa SC decision ay ang mga abogadong pulpol na handa sanang magkalat na katangahan sa impeachment trials na hindi na mangyayari dahil malamang hindi na ipadala ng House ang Articles of Impeachment sa Senado.
11 May 2018
580 Retweets 1.4K Likes

more seriously, senate president koko pimentel is calling for the RULE OF LAW.

The Supreme Court is supreme in a lot of things but not in everything. In impeachment matters the Supreme  Court is not supreme, because the Senate is the one and only impeachment court. The Chief Justice an “impeachable official” who can be removed only after impeachment by the House and conviction by the Senate.  The reputation and esteem of this present Supreme Court will now rise or fall on the basis of the soundness or unsoundness of the this controversial decision upholding a very unusual remedy to oust a sitting Chief Justice.  Let us all uphold the RULE OF LAW. The people must be given time to reiview this decision.  And the Supreme Court itself must also take the time to review its own decision.  If the supreme court is not supreme in everything then it is also not infallible in everything.  The respondent Chief Justice must be given the opportunity to file a Motion for Reconsideration.  God bless our beloved country.

if sereno is not impeached by the senate, the supremes, of course, will be no less hostile, the situation no less untenable.  sereno may have to exit the scene anyway, to keep her sanity.  but let her cross that bridge when / if she gets there.

meanwhile, here’s praying that the supremes (even just one or two? three?) graciously change their minds about the quo warranto, and soon.  if only to shut sereno up, LOL.  her media blitz is quite effective, the message quite arresting, even exciting, particularly the call for a national conversation (!) on everything that’s wrong with filipino society, before it’s too late.

the lady is hitting the ground running.  maybe there’s hope.

SALNs in a scofflaw society

Rene Saguisag

… The marathon House (of arguably namby-pamby tutas?) hearings may finally end but then there’s the remarkable and unexpected quo warranto (QW) proceeding filed by the Solicitor General Joe Calida. All along, the talk had been of RA 6713, until Rep. Vicente Veloso (former Court of Appeals justice) triggered a Eureka! moment in the Lower House, and in the SolGen’s QW petition, Compañero Joe unexpectedly hammered on RA3019, thusly:

“80. The SALN requirement in the Charter recognized what has already been in the statute books. As early as 1960, Congress imposed that requirement in RA3019. Section 7 of the law accordingly states:

“Section 7. Statement of assets and liabilities. Every public officer, within thirty days . . . after assuming office, and within the month of January of every other year thereafter, as well as upon the expiration of his term of office, or upon his resignation or separation from office, shall prepare and file with the office of the corresponding Department Head, or in the case of a Head of Department or chief of an independent office, with the Office of the President, or in the case of members of the Congress and the officials and employees thereof, with the Office of the Secretary of the corresponding House, a true detailed and sworn statement of assets and liabilities, including a statement of the amounts and sources of his income, the amounts of his personal and family expenses and amount of income taxes paid for the next preceding calendar year:….(italics added)

Interesting. If the SolGen can show me an authentic copy of a statement timely filed by him or any other incumbent where the filer disclosed the amounts and sources of his income, the amounts of his personal and family expenses and the amount of income taxes paid for the next preceding calendar year, I’ll eat it.

Read on…

midas marquez, cj sereno, and the senate

according to my facebook newsfeed, it is midas marquez, court administrator, who is leading the wear-red / sereno-resign campaign inside the supreme court.  check out this march 12 post by jovy acosta-nisperos:

Did you see a lot of people in red at the courts today?

Then you probably heard that Midas contacted courts all over the country telling them that he will visit them today, and that they should wear red for his visit. Deceptive, no? There was also innuendo that if they don’t wear red, they will lose their benefits under “the new Chief Justice.”

As court administrator of 2000 courts in charge of leaves, benefits and supplies, this Midas person is really using his position to bully judges. No wonder Sereno irks him, her decentralization reforms are really going to clip his wings.

And of course you know about the Philippine Judges Association (PJA) and some SC employees’ unions issuing statements calling for CJ Sereno’s resignation.

Well, did you know that there are a total of FIFTEEN – yep, FIFTEEN – employees’ associations in the judiciary? And that only four of them issued a resignation call? FOUR. And the boards of those four didn’t even get a vote from their members.

Did you also know that there are 1200 judges in the PJA but only 20 of them signed the PJA’s statement? It has reached a point where RTC judges are reaffirming their oath to uphold judicial independence and expressing disdain for those who try to curtail it. Have you seen that statement that RTC judges are using as their cover photo? Cool, huh?

Oh, but you have to read that post by Judge Lutero of RTC QC in PJA’s closed group. She gave them a piece of her mind. With judge-ly finesse, of course.

Wait, there’s more. MetCJAP, the association of MTC judges, has refused – with one solid voice – to join the fray. Just in case it wasn’t clear, the President of MetCJAP, Judge Leilani Grimares, changed her profile pic to one where she states her stand for judicial independence.

i remember midas, of course, when he was spokesman for the puno court, and then the corona court.  i especially remember that very gay shriek when a mic accidentally fell off the podium, lol.  i didn’t realize though that he was also court administrator, a very powerful position, and highly ranked at that —  “justice marquez” ang tawag sa kanya sa lower-house hearings where he made sereno sumbong about this and that.

dami niyang isyu against cj sereno, some of them verging on, if not downright, petty.  after googling him all day, i can see why.  he was identified with corona and when the latter was dismissed, he was replaced by ted te as spokesman.  and of course he has no chance of being promoted to associate justice, not while sereno is cj.  so it’s like he’s going for broke, so to speak?  no guts no glory?

here are some links to midas stories on the web 2012 to the present.

from Midas Marquez: Spooksperson of the Supreme Corona by ross del rosario @BeKindToUs Troll

Lawmakers are calling again on Marquez to resign … because of his ardent call of allegiance and defensive statements in support of the Chief Justice Renato Corona.

Impeachment prosecution panel spokesman Rep. Miro Quimbo said Marquez must choose between being the spokesman of Chief Justice Renato Corona or the court administrator. “Para na rin sa kapakanan ng buong SC — ayaw nga nating maapektuhan ang buong SC– magdesisyon siya. Siya ba ay magiging personal spokesman ni Corona o magpapatuloy gampanan ang makapangyarihan at sensitibong posisyon ng court administrator?” Quimbo said.

from World Bank bares Supreme Court misuse of loan for judiciary reform

The diminished internal auditing mechanism in the court was exemplified by the uncanny appointment by Corona of Jose Midas Marquez as court administrator, head of the Public Information Office, and chair of the Bids and Awards Committee of the APJR or the court’s Action Program for Judicial Reform.

…Without naming Marquez, the bank said that “this senior official, due to the combination of his appointments and functions, was the requestor of the services, the approver of the terms of reference, the end-user of the services provided by the firm, the authorizer of contract extensions, and the authorizer of payments to the firm.”

from Did Supreme Court Spokesperson Paint Himself into a Corner? 

Marquez will soon find himself in a no-win situation. Having firmly tied his fate to that of the Chief Justice; should Corona lose his impeachment trial, an Aquino-appointed replacement will likely not want Marquez around. And even if Corona keeps his job, Marquez has shown one and all that he is unfit for the job because he lacks that level of professionalism that allows him to understand that his loyalty is to the institution of the high court itself, and not to the person who happens to sit as its Chief Justice for the time being.

from The Midas Marquez touch by Ted Te

When he started speaking for the Court, it was for his former boss, Reynato Puno, for whom he served also as Chief of Staff.  When Chief Justice Puno retired, his successor, the now-removed former Chief Justice Renato C. Corona retained him to speak for the Court, on top of his now new assignment as Court Administrator. It became evident early on that he was fiercely loyal not to the Court itself, as an institution, but to one person, the then Chief Justice.

… When the smoke settled and the former Chief Justice was removed, it became a question of “when,” not “if,”  he would be relieved as spokesperson of the Court.  And it came as a surprise to very few that one of the first acts of the Court, in its special session after the removal of the former Chief Justice, was to confirm that Atty. Marquez was no longer speaking “for the Court,” as the post was coterminous with the former Chief Justice. That, by itself, was telling — that the Court itself would acknowledge that its own spokesperson was not speaking for the Court but for one man alone because of the coterminous nature of the relationship.

from Court Administrator Marquez joins nominees for SC justice 

Historically, court administrators are promoted to the SC. Court administrators, through whose office the SC exercises its administrative supervision over all lower courts in the country, who have been appointed to the SC were Senior Justice Josue Bellosillo (retired), Presbitero J. Velasco Jr., and Jose Portugal Perez (retired).

from Sereno impeachment: RCAO, JDO, and Midas Marquez

When Sereno was still associate justice, she was vocal in her criticism of Corona’s management decisions. She also once criticized Marquez for supposedly misinterpreting a court decision. Marquez stood as court spokesman during Corona’s time.

Marquez has also been nominated to be Supreme Court justice under the Duterte administration, but has yet to make the shortlist.

In 2012, when Sereno’s AO generated controversy, Senator Francis Pangilinan said in a statement that then chief justice Corona “suspended the decentralization of courts during his helm”, contrary to what Marquez claimed in his testimony.

“I cannot help but ask if this controversy stems from the OCA refusing to give up the powers it had enjoyed under former Chief Justice Renato Corona. Former Chief Justices Hilario Davide Jr. and Reynato Puno both implemented the decentralization. Why was it right then and wrong now?” Pangilinan said in a statement then.

from Sereno camp: Court administrator’s presentation ‘low blow, fake news’

Marquez appeared at the impeachment hearing at the House of Representatives on Tuesday. He said TWGs (Technical Working Groups) formed by Sereno in 2015 caused a delay in the release of benefits for retired judges and justices, and in the approval of survivorship benefit claims of spouses.

It took the committee and TWGs two years before 12 of 29 applications were approved, Marquez added.
…
Sereno’s camp first disputed that the groups were formed by the Chief Justice alone. Lacanilao pointed out the committee also consisted of Associate Justices Antonio Carpio and Presbitero Velasco Jr., and Sereno only signed the document.

… Lacanilao denied the TWGs are causing delay, saying there was only one application pending in the committee level, 79 in the Office of the Court Administrator, and around nine pending in the Supreme Court en banc.

The spokesperson slammed Marquez’s presentation as “selective,” saying he only picked five cases which probably had administrative issues — which therefore took a long time to process.

“The data [was] not complete. He didn’t say when the en banc gave it back to the committee, how long the committee worked on it, when these people applied to him,” said Lacanilao. “It was unfair, it was very unprofessional for him to do that.”

from SC records show Midas, not Sereno, sat on Mamasapano transfer request

In a statement Thursday, Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II blamed Chief Justice Sereno for the delay … in transferring the Mamasapano murder trial from Cotabato City to Metro Manila.

It’s the Office of Court Administrator (OCA) Midas Marquez, said the Supreme Court (SC) Public Information Office (PIO) on Friday, January 26.

… Citing SC records, the PIO press statement said, “Under the applicable procedure, considering the request involves the lower courts, the Office of the Chief Justice wrote an endorsement letter dated February 9, 2017 which was sent to the Court Administrator on February 13, 2017 and stamped received by the Office of the Court Administrator on February 14, 2017.

from Sereno: Marquez likely behind ‘Red Monday’ protest 

Embattled Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno believes Court Administrator Jose Midas Marquez was likely behind the “Red Monday” protest at the Supreme Court that sought her resignation.

“Marami ang nagsasabi sa akin na ganun. Marami akong nabasang report na ‘yun ang impression. Palagay ko no, oo,” she said Wednesday in a Bandila DZMM interview.
…
It was last year, she shared, that she faced mounting pressure to step down.

“Kung hindi ka magre-resign, pahihirapan namin ang buhay mo. Kung hindi ka magre-resign, ipapahiya ka namin. Sisiraan ang iyong character. Yuyurakan ang pangalan mo,” she said.

i’m not even all that crazy about cj sereno.  i was most disappointed when she did not inhibit from voting on torre de manila, considering that her husband once worked for DMCI.  and in the oral arguments i was dismayed when she pointed out how other monuments are in the midst of malls and high-rise buildings — the unsaid being, why should jose rizal deserve better?

associate justice carpio was no less dismaying:

“his (Rizal’s) dying wish was to face east but the captain of the guard said no so he died facing west.” …“Now, Rizal is still facing west. We still deny him his dying wish…”

ironically, it was associate justice teresita de castro i lauded for hitting out at the NHCP’S inefficiency and inconsistency.  it’s too bad that she went along with midas and the lower house on sereno’s impeachment.  dami rin niyang isyu against the chief justice, but the biggest, i bet, is that she will have retired by the time sereno retires, the cj being so young, which means no chance no hope no prayer of herself rising to chief justice.  unless na nga sereno is impeached by congress, or unseated by the supremes themselves via a ruling that her 2012 appointment was illegal.  or something desperate like that.

which brings me back to midas marquez, who is relatively younger.  but wait.  the internet has no data on his birthyear so i don’t know, is he maybe the same age as the CJ, and so he has no chance of making it to associate justice man lang while sereno seats?  or is he younger than sereno but simply impatient, nagatungan nga ba ng duterte diehards?

i visited his facebook page.  top post is a Duterte Kami 13-minute video of erwin tulfo, iniisa-isa ang mga kasalanan ni noynoy aquino. including, i guess, corona’s dismissal.  below that is an araw ng kalayaan video 2017 by presidential comms, and below that, this, on revenge:

Atty. Jose Midas P. Marquez
5 April 2017 ·
Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone. Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, “I will take revenge; I will pay them back,” says the Lord . Instead, “If your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads.” Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.
Romans 12:17‭-‬21 NLT

hmm.  if what he is alleged to be doing to unseat the CJ is not revenge, i don’t know what is.  but what appalls, if true, is that it’s like he thinks he can swing a PNoy?  oust a chief justice?  in the lower house, yes, it would look like it, though it’s certainly taking forever, but in the senate?  umm, come to think of it, i’ve seen facebook posts warning that the senators are puro bayaran.  well, whoever’s behind midas marquez must have very deep pockets.

the senate will be tested.

the sereno shebang

read raul palabrica’s Ominous precedent in the hight court, narciso reyes’s Supreme Court quandary, rene saguisag’s …cost of judicial independence, jose sison’s Wrong move, ana marie pamintuan’s Shortcuts, and elinando cinco’s If the impending Sereno impeachment were a new- product launch, it sorely needs industry endorsements.

clearly, the solgen’s  big idea (or was it the speaker’s) of asking the supreme court to remove cj sereno from her position via a quo warranto proceeding instead of letting her go through an impeachment trial is actually a very bad idea.

hindi bale sana if the supremes had stayed above the fray, distanced themselves from the lower-house impeachment hearings, as behooved them.  then it would be a different story, then we would not be under the impression that the supremes would kick her out in a heartbeat if it were up to them, and that’s not fair.  sereno deserves to be heard, must be given the opportunity to respond to accusations in the proper court, that is, the senate trial court.  she was right to stay away from the snakepit, the cesspool? that is the lower-house.

hindi rin bale sana if we were not under the impression that the case against the chief justice is weak, or why else did the honorable reps need some seven months, over some 15 day-long hearings, to come up with something, anything, as in, best efforts ang peg? anyway it’s more a political rather than a judicial matter, the senate sitting as an impeachment court cannot NOT take into consideration that very powerful ones in the  duterte admin want her out, full stop? by hook or by crook? no ifs or buts?

the “honorable” reps should stop appearing on tv, trying to convince us that the chief justice is as bad, as evil, as corrupt, even, as crazy, as they are, i mean, as they say she is.  and media peeps should stop giving them airtime.  they’ve had seven months.  it’s the cj’s turn and we badly want to hear her defense, yes?

tama si cj,  tapusin ng congress ang sinimulan nila.  wag tayo pumayag na basta na lang sipain ng supremes si sereno.  we need to hear her side, so we can all make up our minds who and what to believe.  they made us suffer through 7 tortuous months of lower-house hearings, we deserve the closure that a senate trial will bring, whatever the outcome, for good or ill.

at the moment i’m not sold on the notion na walang panalo si sereno.  na kahit hindi pa siya ma-convict sa senado di na siya makakabalik sa supreme court, that the damage to the institution would be reparable only if given a fresh start, without sereno.  yeah, right, armed with a whole new set of precedents to judge by, how fresh is that.

of course the supreme appeal of the quo-warranto scheme was that it would save the lower house from the hard work of  prosecuting the case vs. sereno in the senate.  it would seem, however, that the “honorable” ones have recovered from that moment of weakness.  the news is that former senate prez juan ponce enrile himself, who supported the midnight appointment of, then presided over the trial court that impeached, corona has joined the prosecution panel, woohoo, let the games begin.