Saving the judiciary from another circus?

Supposedly today, the House committee on justice was to make a decision whether to impeach Supreme Court (SC) Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno or not, however it deferred action on this issue until the SC comes up with a resolution regarding the Quo Warranto petition filed by Solicitor General Jose Calida before the Supreme Court last Monday to challenge the legality of Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno’s hold over her position as Chief Justice. A Quo Warranto proceeding is an action used to determine whether a person has legal right to hold public office.

Just when we thought that the only legal way to remove a sitting Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is via impeachment proceedings, suddenly, there is another way that Solicitor Calida is trying to use when he asked the Supreme Court (SC) to remove her for her failure to submit her Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN) for the last seven years.

In a press conference last Monday, Solicitor Calida insisted that a “Quo Warranto” proceeding is a “proper remedy to question the validity of Sereno’s appointment.” Now where did Solicitor Calida lodge his Quo Warranto complaint? At the Supreme Court! So now the legal question is, does the Supreme Court have jurisdiction over one of their own that would end up removing their own from office? No doubt, this is a very intriguing question supposedly without precedent.

But on the contrary, my Facebook friend, Bobi Tiglao called my attention to a precedent on a Quo Warranto case that was filed by the Aquino regime in 2012 against Chairman Reynaldo Villar of the Commission on Audit (COA) an official appointed by then Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Because of the Quo Warranto case filed against him, Rey Villar resigned and that would have been the end of it as he was replaced by Grace Pulido-Tan. 

His resignation and eventual replacement would have been the end of this story, as any court decision against him would have been rendered “moot and academic,” however the Supreme Court still decided on this issue saying, “Justice demands that we act, not only for the vindication of the outraged right, though gone, but also for the guidance of and as a restraint in the future.” Call it ironic that six years later we are travelling the same road, but this time, it is against a sitting Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.

I would have thought that the Supreme Court would have thrown the petition of Solicitor Calida out of the window, but as the headline report in the Philippine STAR yesterday declared, “Answer ouster plea SC orders Sereno.” This could only mean that the SC has already acquired Jurisdiction over this case, which makes it all the more interesting.

Incidentally, Solicitor Calida is not alone on this issue, Department of Justice (DoJ) Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre, III also said, “If your appointment is void ab initio or invalid from the beginning, I believe that a petition for Quo Warranto will suffice to remove you from your position notwithstanding the fact that you are an impeachable official.” We therefore wait with bated breath on how CJ Sereno would respond to the order of the SC and how the SC would respond to her reply. These are interesting times indeed!

Go to any coffee house in Metro Manila or Metro Cebu and this issue is the topic of the month. Many people believe that the SC would not acquire jurisdiction on this case… however it seems that they have already done so. Perhaps the reason why the SC might make a ruling on this case is due to the realization that the Judiciary has already been badly bloodied in the impeachment trial and eventual conviction of the late CJ Renato Corona and would not want the Judiciary to face another impeachment circus.

While CJ Lourdes Sereno is raring to fight in a Senate trial, however, between the late CJ Corona who was convicted for not revealing his dollar assets in his SALNs, as I already pointed out many times before, the failure (or should we say, her refusal) to make her SALNs for the last seven years is more than enough to convict her. But then this is mere speculation on my part because after all, an impeachment proceeding is a political exercise.

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I just got and read the Time Magazine Special Report on the Opioid Crisis that has plagued America, which should give you a bird’s eye view of the magnitude of the problem happening in the United States. This is probably the reason why US President Donald Trump doffs his hat to Pres. Duterte for fighting the war against drugs here at home. But take the case of Mayor Parojinog and his minions who were killed last year. The Parojinogs were known as the criminal gangs in Ozamiz, but they became legit when they won their candidacies for the local government posts. Yet, they were killed in a legitimate police operation. If we didn’t have this war against drugs, the Parojinog’s would still have control of this part of Mindanao!

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