Fidelity to commitment

A commitment is a sacred covenant. This, Supreme Court Justice Consuelo Ynares-Santiago knows too well.

 Tita Elo, as my family fondly calls her, was recently honored with a commemorative program marking her esteemed retirement. Her illustrious career spanned three decades of outstanding judiciary service to the Filipino people. A visible sign of how deeply she was loved by many was shown when all seats were taken in the elegant Session Hall of the Supreme Court in Padre Faura, Manila despite a warning of an impending super typhoon expected to hit the metropolis on that same evening. It was a privilege to be there as she received highest praises from her colleagues at the Supreme Court.

Tita Elo is an integral part of the highest court yet exemplified the greatest humility as she thanked all the people whose cases she handled through out the years she served the judiciary. She will always be grateful to the people who shared their lives, their stories, their travails and triumphs with her.

Her secret to living a successful, joyful and colorful life filled with meaningful achievements can be found in her “fidelity to commitment.”

“Many have asked me, ‘What have those many years of service at the Supreme Court taught you?’ Often I am tempted to give motherhood statements such as the majesty of the law or the finiteness of human wisdom. But at the end of the day, the most important learning has been this: That one must understand, accept and exercise utmost fidelity to our highest commitments, to our sacred covenants,” she said.

She values commitment as her guiding force in life. To her, life without commitment is unimaginable.

“My first teacher on the lesson of commitment was my late great father Casimiro Ynares Sr. As a public servant he was commitment personified,” Tita Elo said.

The understanding of true commitment did not come to her as an easy lesson in life. Her sister Carmelita Roca shared: “Elo was number three among nine children. She dreamed of being a History professor. She is good at remembering dates, details and events. However, our father decided that she could serve the community better if she became a lawyer.”

To Tita Elo, it was an important lesson in commitment. Born and raised to respect filial piety, she acceded to her father’s wishes. The assent was not without pain and inner struggle for it bound her to a pledge which required the sacrifice of her own personal dream. So she never looked back to a career foregone. There was a commitment to live by and to live for.

Looking back at her winding trail, Tita Elo rates her top three most satisfying moments as the following. First when she passed the Bar examinations. Second when she married her one and only boyfriend of five years Francisco “Tito” Santiago in January 1965 and third when she was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1999.

“Tito was more than a husband, he was my best friend. Out of his strong commitment he gifted me with a wonderful marriage and with the encouragement to pursue my own commitment to the legal profession and the judiciary. He was no longer with me on the day I was sworn in as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. But during the more than one decade of my service in this institution, I had always drawn strength from the inspiration of his sense of passionate commitment which was his lasting gift to me.”

Aside from fidelity to duty, Tita Elo’s commitment to her family is impeccable. If excellence in motherhood can be personified, there’s no way for it but to take form and be called Consuelo Ynares Santiago, a committed mother. Her four children — Chinky, a lawyer; doctors Jonas and Gina and marketing specialist Jenny — have inherited this same value from their mom and treat it like their precious family jewel.

“In all the big and small challenges I have encountered in my life, Mom has always been behind me,” said Chinky, a managing partner of the Santiago Cruz & Sarte Law Office. She graduated from the UP College of Law. She then proceeded to Georgetown University where she obtained her Master of Laws in International Legal Studies with distinction in 2007.

“She made me feel that whatever I do with my life, wherever I go, the family home will always welcome me,” added Jonas, the director of the Positron Emission Tomography Center and chairman of Nuclear Medicine at St. Luke’s Medical Center.

For Gina, the chair of Credentialing and Privileging Committee of the Department of OB GYN at Medical City, her mother is the emulsifier of her dreams. She said, “She helps make my dreams come true. She has been there to support me in my professional and personal life. I can always count on her to give me sweetheart deals and pay-her-when-able type of loans.”

For her part, Jenny, the marketing communications head of Meralco, happily recounted: “My mom is responsible for keeping us grounded to reality. My late dad, topnotch lawyer Tito Santiago, was of the firm belief that all his children are the prettiest, the brightest among all the children in the world. After my dad’s statement my mom would always say, ‘Anak, hindi masyado.’ Can you imagine how insufferable we would be if my mom and dad thought we were the best among the rest and we believed them?”

Gina added: “She was a working mom with four kids and yet the house ran smoothly, food was prepared on time every single day, our clothes were clean, our things complete. She has become a model of some sort because it is so hard to do what she did and I have only one daughter, Cessie.”

Cessie is so committed to her grandma that at the program, she played the lead role by anchoring a touching video presentation at the reception which made us all teary eyed as she poured so much love, wit and humor into the family production. From Cessie’s own eyes, she shared how her “Mamita never has a bad hair day” because she is also committed to her beauty regimen that she always looks good. Cessie also said that her “Mamita is a texting maverick who always keeps in touch with her loved ones. She also said that her “Mamita is a true and loving friend.”

“Thank you Chinky, Jonas, Gina and Jenny for understanding also the genuine and deeper meaning of commitment. Thank you for filling in for your dad, and making sure that my strength and my passion for public service never waned. And thank you my beloved apo Cessie for the many joys that lightened the burden of my commitments,” she said in her speech.

Tita Elo is a committed public servant, mother and friend. Wherever she went, she left the place more beautiful than when she found it.

To this, my siblings and I can highly attest to. Our late parents were such close friends of the Santiagos. When our late mother was diagnosed with cancer, Tita Elo was the very first to visit her in the hospital. Despite her own pain of losing her husband, she was always there to cheer up my dad and all of us when we couldn’t handle our own pain. After both our parents passed away, she took her role as godmother seriously as her commitment to our parents and constantly took time out to shepherd us through life as we picked up the pieces of our lives as orphans.

Contrary to what one might think that retirement means disengaging from one’s commitments, Tita Elo said that she was ready to take on new ones. She added that her job at the Supreme Court has certainly prepared her for “this next chapter.”

“Life without commitments is certainly unimaginable. At the end of the day, a public servant never really retires. She merely looks for new opportunities to serve,” Tita Elo said at the end of her speech.

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