Pressuring the Supreme Court / April Fools!

April 1 is known as April’s Fool’s Day, so better watch out for people who are out to make a fool out of you, especially at this time when there are a lot of pranksters who believe that April Fool’s Day gives them the right or the license to do something foolish. Of course we usually take these things as part of a game people play…we’re not “pikon” anyway.

However there’s no foolin’ the Filipino people by those supposedly pro-Reproductive Health (RH) rallies that was blatantly featured in the front pages of our national news dailies as if the Filipino people so desperately wanted the Reproductive Health Law as if their lives depended on it. If you ask me, there’s a bunch of people who are out to pressure the Supreme Court (SC) into forcing them to decide in the favor of Women’s Rights as if this is all that matters to the country today.

People in the Philippines, even those in living in Metro Manila are facing all sorts of hardships, price increases of basic food stuff, gasoline increases, electricity bills that went off the roof, gas for cooking, rice and yes, very long lines to ride the MRT. This wasn’t so in the time of then Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, which was only three short years ago and yet they would have us believe that people would rally for the RH law? That’s a lot of Bull! The real genuine rallies come from those demanding lower electricity bills or rallies by farmers complaining of high prices of basic goods.

Come now, we were not born yesterday. We can sense or read the numerous articles supporting the RH bill… which are clearly designed to pressure or even scare the Supreme Court into believing that the Filipino wants this law so badly. We learned from one major national newspaper that a group called the Reproductive Health Advocacy Network (RHAN) got P4.4 million from the United Nations’ Population Fund (UNPF). Many pro-RH rallies were done where 5,000 participants were given P350 each.

Even former US State Secretary Hillary Clinton has openly declared that the world needs to reduce its population through abortion, which is why she insists that abortion on demand is a woman’s sexual rights. So clearly the major objective is abortion… disguised as a Woman’s sexual rights. But the Catholic Church and Catholic Lay organizations that were staunchly against the RH Bill, their funding came from their own pockets. In short, in this country, supporting the Pro-RH Bill is very profitable for pro-RH advocates.

But while the Supreme Court is under pressure by pro-RH groups, there is no word coming from the Catholic Church that is supposed to be totally opposed to the RH Law… not even a peep is heard from the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) as a means to counter this obviously well-paid pro-RH propaganda.

That’s because of what we wrote last Saturday (which is one of my best read columns for this year) because the Catholic Bishops are not in unison against this evil that would befall the Philippines if the Supreme Court declares the RH Law constitutional. So the Lay groups have taken the cudgels to fight those pro-RH because it is the Year of the Laity.

There’s even pressure against the Supreme Court that comes from the Halls of Congress when Oriental Mindoro Rep. Rey Umali issued a draft impeachment complaint against unnamed Supreme Court Justices, which came out in a national daily. Why was this draft of unnamed SC Justices printed in that paper only tells you of the grandiose scheme by Pro-RH people to pressure the Supreme Court using other issues as if it were a clever ruse?

In fact, my good friend, Atty. Romulo B. Macalintal sent me a lengthy email warning people especially Congress from pressuring the SC. Here’s an excerpt of his open letter. “Threats such as those made by Umali are veiled attempts to manipulate the Judiciary. We must not forget that one of the basic foundations of our democracy is the independence of each branch of government, such that one department cannot impose control over the other.

The last thing that this country needs is a judiciary that is at the administration’s gunpoint; that is afraid to displease the administration. Once that happens, our country will be a failed state as there will be no respect for the rule of law. It is, therefore of utmost importance that we protect the judiciary’s independence against any form of political pressure.”

With that said, allow me to repeat a famous Internet joke about April Fool’s Day when an Atheist group filed in a US Court a complaint against the US government that they didn’t have their own day. They argued that there is Christmas for the Christians, Hanukah for the Jews, Ramadan for the Muslims... so why can’t we who do not believe that God exist have our own day? The Judge harrumphs with a remark… you already have your own day. The Atheist argued what day is it then? The Judge said “April Fool’s Day” is the day for your kind of people!

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