Arroyo Court is born. My worst nightmare is here

by Atty. Manuel J. Laserna Jr.

http://attylaserna.blogspot.com/2010/05/arroyo-court-is-born-my-worst-nightmare.html

My worst nightmare as a member of the Bar, as a former law professor and as a local Bar leader has come!

Pres. Gloria Arroyo, a nonlawyer whose brain is programmed to know and do nothing else but to accumulate and perpetuate power and to insure her family dynasty’s political survival, has appointed his former senate chief of staff and Supreme Court Associate Justice Renato Corona as the new Chief Justice of the Philippines in replacement of Chief Justice Reynato Puno who retires on May 14, 2010.

The dreaded Arroyo Court is finally and fully born and delivered!

If Arroyo thinks this is the end of the game and that she has won it, she better think twice.

The new president, Noynoy Aquino and the entire Filipino nation will not allow her to continue to prostitute, abuse, rape, intimidate, bribe and insult the Philippine justice system as what she has been doing since that great historical error and abnormality called Edsa II on the basis of which she craved for and assumed presidential power and insanely arrogated unto herself the status of a great deity in Philippine politics.

Read the latest news on the matter below.

Arroyo appoints Corona as new chief justice
By Tetch Torres, TJ Burgonio
INQUIRER.net, Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 10:34:00 05/12/2010

MANILA, Philippines – (UPDATE) President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo named Supreme Court Associate Justice Renato Corona to replace Chief Justice Reynato Puno when he retires on May 17, Malacañang announced Wednesday.

“The President has chosen Supreme Court Associate Justice Renato Corona to be the next Chief Justice when incumbent Reynato Puno retires on May 17,” the Palace said in a statement.

Malacañang said Corona was the “most senior” Supreme Court justice among the four nominees of the Judicial and Bar Council.

“Considering that he has been nominated by the JBC, he happens to be the most senior. And nobody I think can question this announcement and his eventual appointment,” Raul Victorino, chief presidential legal counsel, said of Corona’s appointment at a Malacañang news briefing.

The JBC submitted four nominees, including Corona, on May 5 after the high tribunal ruled that Ms Arroyo could appoint Puno’s successor even during an election period or as the end of her drew near – a matter that stirred furious debate for weeks.

The other nominees were Supreme Court Associate Justices Teresita Leonardo de Castro and Arturo Brion, and Sandiganbayan Acting Presiding Justice Edilberto Sandoval.

The JBC excluded Associate Justice Antonio Carpio and Associate Justice Conchita Carpio-Morales – who stood their ground that Ms Arroyo was barred by the Constitution from making such an appointment, and expressed no interest in the post under those circumstances.

Malacañang vouched for the qualifications and integrity of Corona to lead the high court, and scoffed at claims he was beholden to Ms Arroyo.

Malacañang vouched for the qualifications and integrity of Corona to lead the high court, and scoffed at claims he was beholden to Ms Arroyo.

“There were many considerations. He’s the most senior among recommendees. He worked under many administrations, but he had been at SC for quite some time. He has all the qualifications,” Executive Secretary Leandro Mendoza said in the briefing.

Contrary to perception, Ms Arroyo’s appointees to the high tribunal even disagreed with the positions taken by the solicitor general in landmark cases, he said.

Victorino agreed: “If we say he’s beholden to the sitting President, my question is: How can he be beholden when GMA is no longer the President on June 30?”

He advised critics questioning the eventual appointment of Corona as chief justice to go to the courts.

“A rejection of his appointment is a rejection of the Supreme Court,” he said.

Corona was appointed associate justice by Arroyo on April 9, 2002. He graduated law from the Ateneo Law School in 1974. While studying, he also worked full time in the Office of the Executive Secretary. He ranked 25th in the 1974 Bar exams out of 1,965 candidates.

After law school, Corona studied Master of Business Administration at the Ateneo Professional Schools and in 1981, he was accepted to the Master of Laws program in Harvard Law School, where he focused on foreign investment policies and the regulation of corporate and financial institutions.

In 1992, he joined President Fidel Ramos as assistant executive secretary for legal affairs. Two years later, he was promoted deputy executive secretary and eventually became the presidential legal counsel.

After Ramos, he was invited by then Vice President Arroyo to become her chief of staff and spokesman. When she assumed the presidency in 2001, he became the presidential chief of staff, spokesman, and later as acting executive secretary.

He became a faculty of Ateneo Law School, teaching Commercial law, Taxation and Corporation law.

He was born on Oct. 15, 1948 in Tanauan City, Batangas. He is married to former Cristina Roco and they have three children.

Corona appointment as Puno’s successor slammed
By Christine O. Avendaño
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 18:38:00 05/12/2010

MANILA, Philippines—By appointing Justice Renato Corona as Chief Justice Reynato Puno’s successor when he retires from the Supreme Court on May 17, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is providing a “casus belli” for Senator Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III, who only needs an official proclamation by Congress as the country’s next President, an opposition senator said Wednesday.

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. recalled on Wednesday that Aquino has said he would not honor any midnight appointments to be made by Arroyo before her term ends on June 30.

And by announcing her choice of Renato Corona as the next chief justice, Pimentel said, Arroyo “in effect is daring Aquino to do what he said he would do.”

“She is providing a casus belli for Aquino,” he said in a phone interview.

Pimentel said Arroyo’s appointment of the next chief justice “adds confusion and anxiety” which he stressed was something “we don’t need now, especially after the generally peaceful and orderly automated elections.”

Pimentel joined Senator Francis Pangilinan and former Senate President Franklin Drilon in slamming Arroyo’s naming of Puno’s successor which they all said she should have left to the incoming president.

Both Pimentel and Drilon made it clear that their objection was not over the qualifications of Corona but the outgoing President’s insistence on making the appointment.

Pimentel said there was still no vacancy because Chief Justice Reynato Puno was set to retire on May 17 and thus, the President should have “not anticipate” the vacancy.
“Therefore, prudence should have dictated the choice of the new CJ should be left to the incoming President,” Pimentel said.

Both Drilon and Pangilinan agreed that Arroyo should have not made the appointment “out of delicadeza” and “out of respect” for her successor.

Drilon said while he did not agree—although he respected it—with the Supreme Court ruling allowing the President to appoint a replacement for Puno, Arroyo should have not exercised such prerogative.

“The most ideal (move) would be to allow Senator Noynoy to appoint the CJ,” Drilon said in a phone interview.

In a text message, Pangilinan said that Arroyo should have not made the appointment considering that she had only six weeks to go before stepping down from power and new President would have been elected by the time Puno retires on May 17.

“Ms Arroyo should have, out of delicadeza, allowed the next President to make the appointment. Sadly, it appears there is no such thing as a sense of propriety when it comes to her political survival,” Pangilinan said.

Posted by Atty. Manuel J. LASERNA Jr. at 8:47 PM