Cloak and dagger

Et tu … ? Julius Caesar said it once. Chief Justice Ma. Lourdes P.A. Sereno is clearly saying it not just once but … more than twice! Yes, the most interesting workplace in government these days has to be the en banc session room of the Supreme Court. It is also the cleanest with all their linen spinning at the Congressional laundromat.

Many were skeptical when news first broke that an Associate Justice would appear before the committee on justice. A member of the co-equal Court venting on internal administrative disagreements? Hard to believe. In this bastion of separation of powers, the parchment barrier separating the Judiciary from the political departments has always been jealously guarded and fastidiously respected.

This is in stark contrast to the procession of Executive officials, including Cabinet members, who regularly trek to Congress for patronage and to dispense the same. The adage speaks of a singular Executive. The first ever American President, Gen. George Washington, was served only by a single aide – his nephew who was on the General’s own personal payroll. Today, however, the bureaucracy that mushroomed to assist the Executive in the execution of laws can hardly move without congressional budget approval followed by post congressional oversight.

Bastion no more. The balance of power has clearly tilted. Whoever has been sounding the clarion call has breached the Jericho wall surrounding the Court. Three sitting Associate Justices have already appeared before the committee, giving their own critiques of the Chief Justice’s administrative leadership. We are hearing of at least three more lining up for their turn. No one is hiding daggers in cloaks anymore. And we thought the instinctive reaction of the Justices would be to close ranks.

It is entirely possible that not enough Justices will remain for a quorum should any incident in the proceedings be elevated to the Supreme Court on justiciable grounds. Talk of Constitutional crises!

These testimonies, and the demeaning circumstances endured to give them, are all surely made with the Court’s best interest in mind. Yet their effect on the institution’s mystique and on judicial independence is worrisome. To the uninformed observer, what he sees on display is a supposed co-equal branch of government on its knees before another.

When our Justices swore to uphold the Constitution, they embraced the duty to defend their branches’ prerogatives. The constitutional order that the doctrine of separation of powers was counted on to preserve works only if officeholders protect their institutions against the other branches. It has been written that in constitutional struggles, the branch of government that fails to defend its turf loses its turf.

Congress ascendant. As the Supreme Court’s moon is on the wane, that of Congress is clearly ascendant. Who would have thought that under the leadership of more junior public servants, and acting more as investigators and regulators rather than legislators, the branch closest to the people would retake its place as the strong branch envisioned by the founding fathers.

Congressional might was at its zenith in the years immediately before and after the Marcos Martial Law years. In the more recent Presidential administrations, it is the Executive that has been dominant. Under President Rodrigo Roa Duterte, the model of a strong Executive continues. But the Legislative, rubber stamp or not, has earned an equally tough image. All these at the expense of the Supreme Court’s own prestige.

The larger issue here is not just the respective rights and prerogatives of the branches but the very viability of the Constitution. When a branch is diminished, the entire system of checks and balances is affected. In the end, the Constitution itself is placed at stake.

It’s this easy? Last Wednesday, Congress voted overwhelmingly to extend Martial Law in Mindanao for the entire 2018. It was the second such extension following the initial 60-day declaration and the first extension until Dec. 31, 2017.

The proposal breezed through the joint session. The safeguards and hurdles intended by the Constitutional Commission to make it more difficult to declare Martial Law were intended to protect us and our officials from the imprudent resort to this remedy. Yet here we are, seeing Martial Law declared in one year not just once but … more than twice!

Opposition legislators and interest groups continue to question the cavalier reduction of this awesome power to one that is effectively available on demand. There are those who continue to decry the past Martial Law experience. I am sure that they who exhort a moving on mindset hardly envisioned a situation where the Martial Law power was shown to be this susceptible to actual use.

Again, the larger issue is the prospect of seeing Martial Law declared indiscriminately across the nation and a backward slide to authoritarian rule.

BILL, BILL, BILL! This is truly a proactive Congress. Immediately after approving the extension of Martial Law, Congressmen started discussing the proposed shift to a federal form of government. Over at the Senate, its members are equally energetic though they are mired in a controversy that may tend to derail the Tax Reform Bill’s passage and implementation. We refer to the allegations of a hidden hand deleting a provision that would have lifted the VAT and other tax exemptions currently enjoyed by the local coal industry.

These are serious allegations that, unless resolved, could severely affect the faith and confidence of the people in the legitimacy of our legislation. In the rush to provide our people with the service they deserve, there is no place for compromised truths.

Remembering KC. Today marks the 13th celebration of the birthday in heaven of my dear cousin KC de Venecia. She would have been 30 years old in April. There is much silver lining from her ashes: higher quality standards for electric christmas lights; the provision of adequate fire fighting equipment to our local bureaus of fire protection; the establishment of burn units in hospitals, among others.

In death, she has given so many others a fighting chance at life. I would have wanted to know her as the fine young woman she could have become. We also missed out on the chance to see her proud of her older brother’s accomplishments as the Congressman from the 4th district of Pangasinan.