Moral victory for Sereno
The decision was 8-6 in favor of granting the solicitor general's petition for Quo Warranto against ousted Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno. Had the six justices whom Sereno had asked to inhibit from the case inhibited themselves, the decision could have been 2-6 against the Quo Warranto.
The decision disqualifies Sereno from the chief justice position and effectively voids the then sitting president's appointment of her as chief justice. This sets a dangerous precedent that a chief justice appointed by a validly elected president can be removed anytime by her colleagues on the grounds of those cited by the solicitor general in his Quo Warranto petition.
"Sereno is hereby adjudged guilty of unlawfully holding and exercising the Office of the Chief Justice. Accordingly, Sereno is ousted and excluded therefrom," Supreme Court spokesperson Theodore Te said as he read the dispositive portion of the decision.
"Will this be the tipping point? Will there ever BE a tipping point?" asked a former classmate of mine in Law school in his Facebook page, apparently referring to the Duterte administration's manhandling of key democratic institutions in the country.
In any case, the Supreme Court has spoken, and suffice it to say, its majority decision shall be respected. The Supreme Court, after all, is the court of last resort, the apex court, and the final arbiter of all legal questions brought before it.
The judgment of history, however, despite slow to come, is the judgment that will ultimately decide which side is right in this issue.
So to answer my former classmate, no, this not yet the tipping point. In fact, there may never be a tipping point.
For one, people are tired of extra-constitutional measures ala-EDSA 1 and 2 churning out the same politicians in a game of musical chairs.
For another, Sereno is not gifted as yet with political acumen, and her personal charisma is not really a good place to start liking her, as can be attested to by my former classmates and I whom she once "terrorized" as her students many years ago.
But while Sereno may not inspire the kind of crowd and popular sentiment that kept then chief justice Hilario Davide Jr. company when he was threatened with impeachment, she has the moral upper hand in this Quo Warranto case. The lady justice has always been a straight arrow. Politicians tried to dig for dirt against her but they failed.
Over 130 Law deans and professors have already spoken against the Quo Warranto petition, saying that only by impeachment proceedings in the House and in the Senate can a chief justice be removed from office. Among them is UP College of Law former dean Pacifico Agabin, a respected Constitutional Law expert.
Retired Supreme Court associate justice Vicente Mendoza, mentor of sitting justices, has also spoken against the Quo Warranto proceeding, asserting that it will "undermine the security of tenure guaranteed by the Constitution to public officers who are simply removable by impeachment and ultimately subvert the independence of the judiciary."
The Supreme Court's decision to oust Sereno as chief justice may not rock the boat of the nation at present but it will profoundly scar its psyche. Majority of the people may take the Supreme Court's decision whole and leave it undissected, but it will remain in their consciousness until the day of reckoning comes for the Duterte administration.
Let me repeat what I said during a speech I gave last April 5 during a forum on judicial reforms which was graced by Sereno. I said: "Our failure to stand for judicial reforms and independence will only embolden those who wish to put the judiciary, in the words of Chief Justice Davide, 'at the mercy of politicians and political dynasties' --a judiciary laid bare to the fleeting events and political mood of the times."
Yesterday, the Constitution lost and the politicians won. But with the mounting blunders of the Duterte administration (saved only by the few remaining good and prudent men and women in his administration), the seemingly indifferent public may sooner or later collect the wages of Duterte's bare knuckling the country's democratic institutions.
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