COA chief nominated for SC post

MANILA, Philippines - Commission on Audit Chairman Grace Pulido-Tan has been nominated for the seat in the Supreme Court (SC) to be vacated by Associate Justice Roberto Abad, who retires on May 22.

University of the Philippines Women Lawyers Circle president Fides Cordero-Tan nominated Tan, who was key in government’s prosecution of three senators in the pork barrel scam by providing damning COA reports used by probers in filing plunder charges before the Ombudsman.

The COA chair is a lawyer, certified public accountant and former commissioner of the Presidential Commission on Good Government. She also previously served at the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Bureau of Customs.

Tan left government service in 2005 to return to private practice and teach tax law at the UP College of Law.

She had also been nominated for chief justice of the SC in 2012, but she turned it down. This time, she submitted to the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) a conformity to her nomination for the post of associate justice.

The COA, in its website, described Tan as a multidisciplinary expert in law and accounting, finance, management and governance, which she acquired in her 30 years of professional work as private law and accounting practitioner, government official, and international consultant.

Tan is among seven new nominees received by the JBC.

The others are COA commissioner Rowena Guanzon, Court of Appeals Associate Justices Nina Antonio-Valenzuela, Apolinario Bruselas, Stephen Cruz and Jose Reyes Jr., and De La Salle University law dean Jose Manuel Diokno.

The STAR earlier reported eight nominations initially received by the seven-member council: CA Presiding Justice Andres Reyes Jr. and Associate Justices Ramon Paul Hernando, Rosmari Carandang and Noel Tijam; Sandiganbayan Associate Justices Ma. Cristina Cornejo and Rafael Lagos; Quezon City RTC Judge Reynaldo Daway; and Solicitor General Francis Jardeleza.

So far, the JBC has received 15 nominations. It will accept applications and nominations by mail as long as they were sent within the deadline last Tuesday.

The JBC secretariat said the deadline for submission of nominations would no longer be extended.

The Constitution requires candidates for the position of associate justice of the high court to be natural born citizen, at least 40 years of age; and with 15 years or more of experience as a judge of a lower court or engaged in the practice of law in the country. The magistrate must also be “a person of proven competence, integrity, probity, and independence.”

The new justice will be the fifth appointment to the 15-member high court by President Aquino. – With Marvin Sy