'Movement 188' formed vs CJ

MANILA, Philippines - Lawmakers who supported the impeachment of Chief Justice Renato Corona yesterday formed a group called “Movement 188” to help push his conviction by the Senate impeachment court.

“Our resolution is neither an attack on the justices nor on the judiciary itself. We have resorted to this constitutional process precisely to strengthen our judicial system by ridding it of the malignancy that has corrupted the very essence of equality and fairness in the High Court,” the group said in a statement yesterday.

Comprising the newly formed group led by Eastern Samar Rep. Ben Evardone, An Waray party-list Rep. Florencio Noel, Compostela Valley Rep. Maricar Apsay, Laguna Rep. Dan Fernandez, Biliran Rep. Roger Espina, Misamis Occidental Rep. Leo Loreto Ocampos, and Negros Occidental Rep. Albee Benitez, are the 188 lawmakers who signed the Articles of Impeachment last December.

The lawmakers maintained they signed the impeachment resolution “freely and resolutely, on the strength of our collective conviction that the ouster of the Chief Justice through the legal remedy provided in the Constitution will clear one major roadblock in the ‘daang matuwid’ reform agenda of the Aquino administration.”

In the statement, the group described the top magistrate’s defense lawyers as already panicking over the release of his statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN).

Members of the Movement 188 believed that last week’s trial bared “the evidence the prosecution panel showed that he (Corona) lied, owned ill-gotten wealth and is no longer morally fit to serve the high tribunal.”

“The diversionary moves by the Corona camp and its allies at the end of Week One of the trial show that they are already running scared and hell-bent on preventing the whole truth from coming out, more so now that the House prosecutors are set to present more authentic documents and more reliable witnesses on the second week,” the group said.

The Movement 188 added that the scare ploys include an urgent motion to inhibit certain senator-judges from the trial, and a temporary restraining order to stop the Senate from proceeding with the trial.

“The slew of evidence presented and testimonies made during the Thursday session were only the tip of the iceberg as our House prosecutor-colleagues present more authentic witnesses and official documents to establish that the Chief Justice committed perjury in his annual SALN declarations, which proves betrayal of public trust and warrants immediate eviction from the High Court and permanent disqualification from holding public office,” the group added.

Corona’s annual SALN declarations during his incumbency as member and, later, as head of the Supreme Court, were surrendered last Thursday by the tribunal’s clerk of court Enriqueta Vidal after much resistance from the defense panel.

The group also said the documents showed that Corona’s declared net worth had mysteriously jumped from P14 million in 2002 to P22 million in 2010, which was not commensurate with his combined legal income as a public servant over that eight-year period.

The documents presented by registrars Randy Rutaquio, Carlo Alcantara and Sedfrey Garcia of Taguig, Quezon and Marikina cities bared, meanwhile, that Corona had not accurately declared in his SALNs a host of properties belonging to him or members of his family - condominium units and parking lots at the Bellagio Tower, McKinley Hill and Bonifacio Ridge, all in Global City in Taguig; and condos or other assets at La Vista Subdivision, Katipunan Avenue, One Burgundy and other parts of Quezon and Marikina cities.

“This explains all the diversionary ploys and scare tactics that the Corona camp and its allies have been resorting to this early in the trial to delay the proceedings and prevent the whole truth from coming out,” the Movement 188 said.

The impeachment complaint signatories noted that no less than Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, whose adept and impartial handling of the trial’s first week was recognized by both the prosecution and defense, has denied the charge that certain senator-jurors have been lawyering for either group.