Tele-novelas beat impeach drama

The Senate impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato Corona is now on its fourth week. Since it first convened last January 16, there have been more or less 20 witnesses presented by the prosecution. To date, the prosecution panel has submitted documents marked as evidence now numbering at sextuple, many of which were also adopted as evidence by the defense panel.

In the spirit of Valentine’s Day and the 88th birthday of Senate president Juan Ponce Enrile, all agreed to suspend the impeachment proceedings as early as 4:40 in the afternoon yesterday.

It was Enrile’s fellow octogenarian, former justice Serafin Cuevas, as head of the defense panel, who called for a “cessation of hostilities” befitting the occasion. Enrile gladly obliged when no one posed any objection for early suspension of the impeachment trial. “Thank you, peace be with you,” Enrile said as he banged the gavel to signal the end of the impeachment trial yesterday.

Actually, the impeachment trial went into extended session as they went past eight in the evening last Monday. This was after the senator-judges first went into closed-door caucus on the issue of whether or not they will obey the temporary restraining order (TRO) of the Supreme Court (SC) against lifting the confidentiality clause on the alleged dollar deposit accounts of Corona at PSBank.

The impeachment trial last Monday actually dragged on at the start when indignant senators stood up one after the other to berate the defense panel. The defense lawyers got an earful from the senators for decrying in media the alleged Palace extra-judicial persuasion upon the senator-judges to defy the TRO.

Enrile announced the results on the voting: 13 senator-judges against ten agreed to respect and obey the TRO of the High Court.

Enrile, who has demonstrated throughout the impeachment trial his cold neutrality, impressed upon that all he respects the authority of the High Court to determine whether or not the Senate “abused its discretion” in conducting Corona’s impeachment proceedings.

At the same time , Enrile assumed full responsibility for the issuance of the subpoena based on alleged “fake” official documents submitted by the prosecution on the purported dollar deposits of Corona at PSBank.

The tenure of the veteran lawmaker as Senate president is reportedly under renewed ouster threats emanating from the ranks of Liberal Party (LP) partymates of President Aquino. Drilon, who once served as Senate president in the previous Congress, is reportedly being pushed to wrest the Senate helm from Enrile.

But obviously the pro-administration ranks at the Senate still have no swing votes, going by the latest voting at the Senate on this TRO issue before the impeachment court. At least half of the Senate plus one, or thirteen votes, is necessary to carry out any coup plot against Enrile, or to oust any sitting Senate president for that matter.

Likewise, the Aquino administration is also hard-pressed to carry out the Palace-instigated impeachment against Corona. They need the mandated two-thirds vote, or 16 Senators, to convict Corona.

Those who voted to respect the TRO were Enrile; Senate president pro tempore Jinggoy Estrada; Senate majority leader Vicente Sotto III; Senators Joker Arroyo, Miriam Defensor-Santiago, Manuel Villar, Ralph Recto, Francis Escudero, Aquilino Pimentel III, Loren Legarda, Gregorio Honasan, Ramon “Bong” Revilla, and, Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

Those who voted to defy the TRO were namely, Senators Franklin Drilon, Sergio Osmeña III, Edgardo Angara, Panfilo “Ping” Lacson, Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan, Antonio Trillanes, Lito Lapid, Teofisto Guingona III, and siblings Alan Peter and Pia Cayetano.

Enrile revealed they reached a decision after almost four hours of closed-door caucus from 11 a.m. to about 3 p.m. He said each member explained his or his position before the vote was taken.

If that was the case, how come more than ten Senators stood up last Monday just to defend again their respective votes on the same issue? They even spoke more than the two-minute rule they imposed upon themselves how long each would talk and ask questions..

Some of the Senators have admitted the impeachment trial is taking that long because of the media mileage they get out of the live telecast by media of the proceedings.

But here’s a hard truth for these politicians who want to squeeze every second of their TV/radio exposure on the on-going impeachment trial: There is barely one percent audience share that they get from Monday to Thursday during the televised impeach trial.

This we learned from GMA-7 chairman and chief executive officer Felipe Gozon who was our guest in Tuesday Club breakfast gathering at EDSA Shangri-la in Mandaluyong City. Gozon informed us their network’s tele-novela dramas airing during the same hours of the impeachment trial have higher audience rating — from ten to 15 percent before the early evening news of GMA-7. There is more than 30 percent audience share for those drama shows aired after the early evening news, he cited.

And for a reality check, the impeachment trial is only televised in the free-TV (UHF Channel) of GMA-7 at Channel 11 and it’s not covered live on Channel 7 or by its rival network ABS-CBN Channel 2. The impeach trial is covered live only at the ANC Channel cable of ABS-CBN — for obvious reasons.

Gozon explained GMA-7 tele-novelas give them more advertising revenues than the impeachment trial which many people do not even understand with all its legalese. More important, he pointed out, is the fact that the Filipino people could not relate with the impeachment trial which would not give them food on the table.

So when the senator-judges resume the trial today for its 18th session, they are still stuck in Articles 2 and 3 of the eight-point Articles of Impeachment. How long will this go on, we can only wait and see.