Loud in lieu of sound arguments

I request the reader for a prayer for the eternal repose of Frankie "Ka Kiko" Evangelista, who shall be sorely missed.

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Too often is President Gloria Arroyo accused these days of packing the Supreme Court and Comelec with her appointees. Even the supposedly most learned of lawyer-senators make it look like she’s doing something abusive, if not downright illegal.

Perhaps it’s because the lawyer-senators are with the opposition and in the midst of an election campaign. Still, being on the other side during a contentious period does not mean liberty to distort the truth. For instance, the truth that it is a President’s constitutional duty, to begin with, to fill up immediately any vacancy in the SC or Comelec. Or, the truth that failure to do so is dereliction of duty, which could lead to a President’s impeachment for culpable violation of the Constitution.

In the SC a vacancy must be filled up within 90 days. But a President may appoint a justice only from at least three nominees of the Judicial and Bar Council. In the Comelec there is no deadline to fill up a vacancy. Still, it is understood to be immediate, so that the constitutional commission can function properly. The Constitution bars appointment of a member in a temporary or acting capacity. Such appointment is subject to approval by the Commission on Appointments, composed of majority and minority senators and congressmen. If the appointment is made when Congress is in recess, it shall be valid until disapproved by the CA.

In effect, the JBC and CA are constitutional checks and balances to a President’s power of appointment. Even JBC members are subject to CA consent. The learned lawyer-senators of the opposition know it. Just that, they prefer to obfuscate rather than educate in times of election campaigns.

Perhaps it would be more appropriate for complainers to say that President Arroyo is packing the SC and Comelec with her gofers. But then, that leaves to be proven. In the case of the SC, applicants are screened by the JBC, composed of the Chief Justice as ex officio chairman, the justice secretary and a representative from Congress as ex officio members, along with a member of the Integrated Bar, a professor of law, a retired justice and a representative of the private sector. The JBC members, to repeat, are subject to consent of the CA, the majority of which may not always come from a President’s party. The screening makes it difficult for applicants to land in the JBC’s short list. But it is always easy for sour grapes to question the credentials of the emerging nominees. More so in this campaign, when loudness substitutes for soundness of words.

In the Comelec’s case, the two recent vacancies were filled up while Congress was in recess. A learned lawyer-senator of the opposition cried that one of the two replacements was involved in vote padding-shaving as regional director in Mindanao. To this day, though, he has shown no proof of his allegation, something strange for a lawyer and former law dean. But as a reelection candidate, he probably sees, in this season of anything goes, an opportunity for publicity mileage through sensational accusations. But what if the shoe were on the other foot? What if the accused commissioner were to now say, likewise with no proof, that the lawyer-senator is not yet 35 years old and thus ineligible to run for the Senate? The lawyer-senator might relish the back-handed compliment. But he certainly would not want to be disqualified on mere unsubstantiated allegation.

A President, exercising statesmanship, may consult the opposition on nominees for Comelec vacancies. But it is not required by the Charter. And it may not work, especially if the opposition insists on a partisan.

President Arroyo now has eight appointees in the 15-member SC, and five of the seven election commissioners. Critics make it sound like a sin, despite the constitutional duty to fill up vacancies as they come. The implication is that a President’s appointees to a constitutional body follow only her bidding and not the law.

That’s neither here nor there. The lawyer-senators of the opposition, if ever appointed to the SC, should be expected to rise above party loyalty and decide cases based on law and reason. Did not Joseph Estrada’s own SC appointees vote with the other justices, 13-0, that he had resigned on Jan. 20, 2001 and thus made then-Vice President Arroyo’s rise to President constitutional?

Before the Comelec vacancies occured on Feb. 2, Arroyo had named only three of the seven members. The other four were 1998-1999 nominees of Estrada. Following the reasoning of the learned lawyer-senators of the opposition, the majority of four would remain loyal to their appointing, albeit jailed, master. Yet all seven members ruled, contrary to their own guidelines, that both Fernando Poe Jr. and Panfilo Lacson could run for the same post under the same party. That was contrary to what Estrada had wanted, which is, that only Poe should be the official party candidate.

After two weeks a division of the Comelec, composed of two Estrada and one Arroyo appointee, dismissed the petition to disqualify Poe for not being a natural-born Filipino. The lawyer-senators of the opposition were jubilant. One week later two of the four Estrada appointees retired, leaving the Comelec with a temporary majority of three Arroyo appointees against Estrada’s remaining two. Without waiting for the two replacements, all five ruled en banc to uphold the division’s earlier decision. The lawyer-senators of the opposition jumped higher for joy. But now that the case has been raised to the SC where, they cry, Arroyo has eight appointees, they are threatening to go on a rampage in case of an adverse ruling.

Come to think of it, had Estrada not resigned in 2001, he would have filled up the eight SC vacancies that occured under Arroyo. Including his first two appointees, this would have packed the SC with ten Estrada gofers, following the line of his allied lawyer-senators. Moreover, he would have filled up the first three and the next two Comelec vacancies that occured under Arroyo, making all seven commissioners his gofers.

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Catch Sapol ni Jarius Bondoc, Saturdays at 8 a.m., on DWIZ (882-AM).

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E-mail: jariusbondoc@workmail.com