UST law dean is new SC justice

President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo on Friday appointed University of Santo Tomas law dean Roberto A. Abad as associate justice of the Supreme Court. Abad is the 165th magistrate to be appointed to the high court. His appointment completes the 15-member high tribunal, which had been two justices short with the retirement of associate justices Alicia Austria Martinez on April 30 and Dante O. Tinga on May 11. A senior partner of the Abad Law Firm, Justice Abad was included in the short list of six nominees submitted by the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) to Malacañang. The short list also included Court of Appeals Justice Mariano C. Del Castillo , who was appointed to the high court on Thursday. The appointment of Del Castillo and Abad came amid a controversy over a perceived attempt by the Palace to sneak in more nominees even though the JBC had already submitted its short list. There were speculations that the Palace wanted acting Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera to be included in the list. But the JBC, chaired by Chief Justice Reynato Puno, rejected the Palace request. "With due respect, the JBC cannot acquiesce to (the) request to expand the short list of nominees...The decision whether to include three or more than three names in the short list of nominees exclusively belongs to the JBC," said Puno in a letter addressed to Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita. With the appointment of Del Castillo and Abad, Malacañang officials said the speculations should end. "In fairness to the Acting Justice Secretary, she is inhibiting herself in all meetings pertaining to this. Speculations are up in the air because it is the political season," deputy presidential spokesman Anthony Golez said. Like Del Castillo, Abad earned his law degree at the Ateneo de Manila University.

For the latest Philippine news stories and videos, visit GMANews.TV The 66-year-old Abad worked for about a year at the Jose W. Diokno Law Office in 1968 before he joined the government as technical assistant (1969-1973) and associate attorney (1974-1975) at the Supreme Court, supervised then by the late Chief Justice Fred Ruiz Castro. In 1975, he joined the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) as solicitor and by the time he quit government service in 1986, he was assistant solicitor general. He then put up his own law firm and practiced law for more than 22 years. While working at the OSG, Abad started teaching at the UST law college since 1978, and was named dean only last year. He had also worked as legal consultant for the Presidential Committee on the Nuclear Power Plant under the late Justice Secretary Sedfrey Ordoñez from 1988-1990, and was counsel for the Equitable Banking Corp. and its officers and branch managers during the impeachment trial of former President Joseph E. Estrada. Apart from authoring two books Practical Book in Legal Writing in 2002 and Fundamentals of Legal Writing in 2004, he was a contributing staff editor in the Supreme Court Reports Annotated (SCRA) from 1972 to 1996, and has also rendered free legal aid for the militant Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), and the Angels of Hope Orphanage, Pulong Bunga, Silang, Cavite. He is married to the former Victoria Martinez, a lawyer, with whom he has four children namely Liliarosa, Ma. Leila, Rex Niño, and Blessilda. - With Carlo Lorenzo, GMANews.TV