Susan won’t joint street protests — Escudero

Actress Susan Roces, wife of the late popular actor Fernando Poe Jr., won’t join street protests being planned by her husband’s supporters, House Minority Leader Francis Escudero said yesterday.

"I think she’s not disposed to take part in protest actions at this time. She is presently considering her legal options, what she should do following the unanimous decision of the Supreme Court dismissing her and her husband’s election protest against President Arroyo," he said.

"But she will not encourage them in what they are planning to do. She won’t discourage them, either," Escudero told The STAR.

Her late husband once joined his angry supporters who were protesting Mrs. Arroyo’s election near the Welcome Rotunda in Manila, but police gassed them, forcing Poe to retreat to a nearby store.

Poe supporters are planning protests this week to take advantage of the presence here of parliamentarians from all over the world who are attending the 112th Inter-Parliamentary Union assembly.

Last week, police officials said they have dissuaded protest organizers from holding mass actions in the vicinity of the Cultural Center of the Philippines along Roxas boulevard, where IPU members are holding their conference.

Escudero said Poe’s wife was briefed by him and her lawyers on her options over the weekend.

"She has until April 14 to decide what to do. Definitely, something will be filed with the Supreme Court. Whether it would be a motion for reconsideration or a statement of disagreement and disgust, it is she who will decide," he said.

He said he and the lawyers toyed with the idea of appealing the decision of the high tribunal, sitting as Presidential Electoral Tribunal, to the Supreme Court functioning as the highest court of the land and where all court decisions eventually go on appeal.

He explained that the Presidential Electoral Tribunal is a distinctly separate body from the high tribunal, though their members are one and the same set of justices.

Since the decisions of the Senate Electoral Tribunal and the House of Representatives Electoral Tribunal can be brought to the Supreme Court on appeal, is it not possible that the decision of the Presidential Electoral Tribunal can also be appealed with the Supreme Court? he asked.

Escudero, who is a lawyer, posed another question: Can Poe’s lawyers, in case they appeal the dismissal of their client’s protest against Mrs. Arroyo with the Supreme Court, ask the justices to inhibit themselves since they were the ones who dismissed the protest? And who will hear the appeal?

"Huwag na ’yan, magulo ’yan (Let’s not consider that, it’s confusing)," Escudero quoted Susan Roces as telling them.

In a related development, two administration congressmen urged Poe’s supporters yesterday to abandon their street protest plan and to respect the Supreme Court decision throwing out the late actor’s protest against the President.

Majority Leader Prospero Nograles and Rep. Edwin Uy of Isabela said the planned protest actions "would only sow divisiveness among Filipinos at a time when the call is for us to unite so the country can overcome its financial difficulties."

They said Poe supporters should accept decisions of the high tribunal that are favorable and unfavorable to them.

"They should accept and respect the ruling effectively dismissing the challenge to the President’s election in the same way that they accepted and respected the earlier decision declaring FPJ to be a Filipino citizen and therefore qualified to run for president," they said.