Malaya publisher defends self from possible contempt raps

Amado "Jake" Macasaet, publisher of Malaya newspaper, on Monday defended himself from being slapped with indirect contempt by the Supreme Court. This, after Macasaet wrote in his column last month that an unnamed lady justice fired her secretary after the latter found out about the magistrate’s alleged P10-million payoff inside five gift boxes. In a 28-page explanation to the high court, Macasaet said that he wrote his column “to call for an investigation" on the alleged payoff and help “preserve the integrity of the Honorable Court and the administration of justice." On September 25, the high court ordered Macasaet to explain why he should not be cited for indirect contempt after he wrote about the lady justice in his column published in Malaya from September 18 to 21. Online magazine Newsbreak, later on identified the justice in question as Supreme Court Associate Justice Consuelo Ynares-Santiago and the secretary as Daisy Cecilia Muñoz-Delis. Newsbreak said the alleged payoff might have something to do with two decisions that Ynares-Santiago penned: the dismissal of the criminal case against Henry Go, former chairman and president of the Philippine International Air Terminals Corp, and the Maysilo land dispute. In his reply to the high court’s order, Macasaet said the investigation on his alleged liabilities “is not only unsettling but signals a chilling effect on free speech." “Yet, without that call (for an investigation), truth would be not exposed to the scalding light of public inquiry," he said. He also pointed out that a scrutiny of the statements in the column would show that he never alluded to or mentioned that the lady justice was an associate justice of the Supreme Court. Macasaet said that as early as the first issue of his column he said that, "(W)e will never know who this justice really is. The members of the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals, the Sandiganbayan, are all called justices," and "the head of the Office of Government Corporate Counsel is also honored by being addressed as such. So is the head of the Court of Tax Appeals." - GMANews.TV