De Lima: SC ruling vs Truth body 'political'

(Updated 4:10 p.m.) The Supreme Court's decision stopping the Truth Commission from investigating alleged anomalies during the administration of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo seems to be politically motivated, Justice Secretary Leila De Lima said on Wednesday. "The ruling shows characteristics of a political decision. The voting by the members of the court on political questions... readily shows that the lines which now divide decision-making in the court are principally political and no longer doctrinal," De Lima said. Last Tuesday, 10 of the 15 SC justices voted to declare President Benigno Aquino III's Executive Order No. 1 creating the Truth Commission as unconstitutional. In effect, the truth body that was supposed to investigate allegations of corruption and election fraud that hounded the Arroyo administration would not be able to perform its task. All 10 magistrates who voted against EO No. 1 were Arroyo appointees. "There is therefore basis for speculation that the 'investment' of the past administration in the... High Court is paying off," De Lima, who headed the Commission on Human Rights (CHR) during the Arroyo administration, said in a statement. "Present executive actions to correct injustices and abuses of the past administration and to punish the perpetrators are frustrated at every turn because of wise institutional investments of the past regime," she added. "Right is right, wrong is wrong" Chief Justice Renato Corona, meanwhile, fended off criticisms that they are beholden to Arroyo. "Just read the decision," Corona urged his critics on Wednesday. The copy of the decision, however, was unavailable as of posting time. In an interview with reporters, Corona likewise said that the court's decision is based on "what is right is right, what is wrong is wrong." He did not elaborate. SC acting public information chief Gleoresty Guerra has denied that the high court ruled against the Aquino administration because most of the justices are Arroyo appointees. "As you can see, four of those who dissented are also appointees of Gloria Arroyo. So this means that the justices resolved the case according to what they viewed was based on the law," Guerra said last Tuesday. Among those who voted against EO No. 1 was Corona, whose appointment days before the May 10 elections was questioned due to a constitutional ban on "midnight appointments" during the election season. But last May, majority of the SC justices ruled that Mrs. Arroyo, who was still president then, can pick the successor of outgoing chief justice Reynato Puno because the chief justice post is exempt from the appointment ban. Referring to the appointment controversy, De Lima's statement said, "The Constitution intended to prevent a single president from packing the highest Court in the land with his or her appointees. Unfortunately, the loopholes in the Constitution prevailed when [Arroyo] appointed the majority of the present court, including the position of the chief justice despite the ban on appointments." The vote De Lima cited a "familiar line of voting" among the SC justices, whose majority recently voted in favor of Arroyo or her allies. The most recent was last September when the SC barred the House committee on justice from holding the impeachment proceedings against Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez, perceived to be a close Arroyo ally. "This is the evil which the Constitution intended to avoid, but which now appears to be rearing its head at the cost of frustrating the administration of justices on the abuses of the past," she said. Aside from Corona, those who voted to declare EO No. 1 as unconstitutional were Associate Justices Teresita Leonardo-de Castro, Arturo Brion, Presbitero Velasco, Diosdado Peralta, Lucas Bersamin, Mariano del Castillo, Martin Villarama, Jose Perez, and Jose Mendoza. Those who dissented were Associate Justices Antonio Carpio, Conchita Carpio-Morales, Eduardo Nachura, Roberto Abad, and Ma. Lourdes Sereno. All are Arroyo appointees, except Sereno. Of the five dissenters, Carpio, Carpio-Morales, and Sereno are constant dissenters in cases that have serious repercussions against Arroyo, her family, and her allies. Equal protection clause In handing down the decision, the SC said EO No. 1 violated the equal protection clause of the Constitution for singling out Arroyo and her administration. Section 1, Article III of the 1987 Constitution provides: "No person... shall be denied the equal protection of the laws." Those who questioned EO No. 1's legality said the creation of the Truth Commission violated the equal protection clause because it only targeted specific individuals for prosecution "as if corruption is their peculiar species even as it excludes those of the other administrations, past and present, who may be indictable." But De Lima argued that equal protection clause "applies within a class, not between a few who stole and abused." "The violation in equal protection is when the privileged few are effectively exempted from investigation, prosecution and punishment, while the great majority of the people continue to wallow in the murk of their crimes," she said. Not ‘untouchable’ Meanwhile, House Minority Leader Edcel Lagman on Wednesday belied claims the SC decision on EO No.1 has made Mrs. Arroyo “untouchable." In a press statement, Lagman said the ruling was not a set back on the Aquino administration's campaign against graft and corruption. He also said the decision did not insulate Mrs. Arroyo from the jurisdiction of investigating and prosecuting bodies. "The scuttling of the Truth Commission as an unconstitutional executive creation does not insulate officials of the previous administration from the jurisdiction of the Office of the Ombudsman and the Department of Justice," he said. According to him, the two offices are the long-existing agencies authorized to investigate and prosecute officials who are alleged to have committed venality in government. "What the Supreme Court decision stops is partisan hostility and political vengeance disguised as crusade against corruption, search for truth and quest for closure," he said. According to him, what is being set back and prohibited are discriminatory shortcuts which deny equal protection to targeted respondents. All persons belonging to the same class, like the sector of public functionaries of all administrations, must be equally protected by law and must be safeguarded from discrimination by government, he added. "Equal protection demands that all must be exposed to the same processes and rigors irrespective of administrations and periods of incumbency," Lagman said. Moreover, he said that while the Aquino administration has the right to file a motion for reconsideration to reverse the SC ruling, its success is far-fetched because of the lopsided voting in favor of the decision to declare the Truth Commission unconstitutional. "Supreme Court justices are independent jurists who are not accountable to whoever appointed them, but only to the majesty of the law, the ascendancy of conscience and the merits of a case," Lagman said. On the other hand, San Juan Rep. Joseph Victor Ejercito, son of former President Joseph Estrada, slammed the SC decision. Due to corruption issues, former president Estrada was forced to leave Malacañang in 2001, catapulting then vice president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to the presidency. Rep. Ejercito said only Mrs. Arroyo and her cohorts are "the happiest persons" with the ruling. "Those who stood up for the truth and those who fought against corruption were charged in court and jailed, while those who plundered this nation and desecrated the rights of the Filipinos for 9 years have gone scot-free," he said in a separate press statement. — with a report by Amita Legaspi/LBG/KBK/RSJ, GMANews.TV