BY AMADO P. MACASAET
MALAYA
‘Delicadeza should have prevailed on Renato Corona to reject the appointment.’
IN junking the midnight appointments of President Carlos P. Garcia, the Supreme Court ruled “when a nation embarks on electing its leadership, our Constitution, laws, judicial and historical precedents all emphasize that incumbents must be barred from abusing their powers to give themselves or their partisans undue advantage, thwart the public will, or harass by means of maliciously-motivated appointments.”
Garcia was a lameduck President when he made the midnight appointments in the sense that Diosdado Macapagal had been proclaimed winner in the previous national elections.
I can remember that Garcia appointed Dominador B. Aytona, his secretary of finance as governor of the Central Bank a day or two before Macapagal was to take his oath as the newly elected President.
The Supreme Court further declared in those infamous midnight appointments “it is common sense to believe that after the proclamation of the election of President Macapagal, his (Garcia’s) was no more than a ‘care-taker’ administration. He was duty bound to prepare for the orderly transfer of authority the incoming President, and he should not do acts which he ought to know, would embarrass or obstruct the policies of his successor.”
The present Supreme Court and then President Gloria Arroyo must have known about this precedent. But then they found a way of skirting or reversing it. The Court ruled that the President can make appointments to the Judiciary during a period prohibited by the Constitution.
In effect, the Court reversed a previous ruling but thought that the appointment of Renato C. Corona as Chief Justice, sits with the Constitution and the laws because the majority of the magistrates, presumably yielding to the pressures of Gloria Arroyo, allowed her to make the appointment.
In a very large sense, the present Court reversed itself but sanctified the act using the doctrine that the appointment during the prohibited period is valid because the Court ruled so.
The impeachment complaint explains “(And yet) then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo decided to ignore all past (sic) precedents, including the one established by her own father, President Diosdado Macapagal, in order to appoint a Chief Justice when by any measure – the history of the Court as shown by the delicadeza of former Chief Justice Manuel Moran; the landmark case of Aytona, the 1987 Constitution itself; and the Nov. 9, 1998 en banc resolution. voiding President Ramos midnight judicial appointments – such an appointment was viewed as dangerous and inimical to authentic democracies.”
Delicadeza should have prevailed on Renato Corona to reject the appointment.
The Court, yielding to pressures from Gloria Arroyo, interpreted the Constitutional prohibition against appointments during a national election period, precisely to facilitate the appointment of Mr. Corona as Head Magistrate.
It must be clear to all, however, that Mr. Corona did not participate in the deliberations that made his appointment possible. It must similarly be emphasized that the ruling was collegial although it was penned by Associate Justice Lucas Bersamin.
There is truth, however, to the allegations in the complaint that “Faced with a vacancy in the position of Chief Justice she (Gloria Arroyo) then went one step further and conspired with (respondent) Corona to maneuver his appointment as Chief Justice: breaking precedents established by her own father which premised midnight appointments as malicious interference in the ability of a newly-elected president to have a free hand in fulfilling his mandate.”
Circumstantial as it may seem, the whole dispute was created by the retirement of then Chief Justice Reynato Puno. The flaw is in the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Constitution.
The “lapse in judgment” was not asking Mr. Puno to retire long before the period of prohibition.
If Chief Justice Puno had retired say in January or February of 2010, and Gloria Arroyo immediately appointed Renato Corona as the successor, there would be no question whatsoever about the legitimacy of her decision.
The lapse forced the Supreme Court to make a ruling which is presumed to sit with the Constitution. But it does not seem to sit with the minds of the people who now demand – through their representatives – that Chief Justice Corona be impeached.
Most critical in this dispute is the question of whether or not the people through the House of Representatives shall close their eyes to the fact that the Supreme Court made the ruling, not in defense of the Constitution, but for the personal benefit of Gloria Arroyo and Mr. Renato Corona.
If the ruling that does not sit with the Charter or with the minds of the people is to be tolerated, this country may expect that all cases involving Gloria Arroyo will be decided in her favor by the present Court.
It must be emphasized that majority of the Court, all appointed by Gloria Arroyo will retire long after President Aquino steps down on June 30, 2016.
In other words, if Chief Justice Renato Corona is not convicted in the impeachment trial, Gloria Arroyo will have the Court in her pocket for the next six or so years or up to the time the successor of President Aquino is elected.
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