Culpable violation

The Sandiganbayan, often obscured by the preeminence of the Supreme Court, has the limelight to itself this time, thanks to the plunder cases filed before it against three senators and several others implicated in the P10 billion PDAF scam.

But there is another thing about the Sandiganbayan that has not attracted as much attention despite the fact that its implications are far more substantive and wide-ranging than the admittedly more sensational PDAF controversy.

This has something to do with Noynoy's possible violation of the Constitution, an impeachable offense, through his willful disregard of a list of nominees submitted to him by the Judicial and Bar Council from which he is to pick his chosen appointee to fill up an existing vacancy in the Sandiganbayan.

The vacancy occurred in October last year when Noynoy appointed then associate justice Amparo Cabotaje Tang as presiding justice. It is now been eight months since the vacancy occurred but Noynoy did not take any steps to fill it up until only last June 20 when he appointed Maria Theresa Dolores Gomez Estoesta.

Under the Constitution, the president has 90 days from the date a vacancy occurs in the Supreme Court to appoint a replacement, or in the case of the Court of Appeals, the Sandiganbayan, and the trial courts, 90 days from the date the JBC submits to him a short list of nominees to fill a vacancy.

According to lawyer Jose Mejia, a regular member of the JBC representing the academe, the JBC submitted to Noynoy its short list of nominees last February 28yet but until now no appointment has been made to fill up the Sandiganbayan vacancy.

Based on the constitutional provision, Noynoy is already way past the 90-day period -- counting from February 28 -- within which to make his appointment. The suspicion is that Noynoy does not like anyone in the list the JBC submitted.

But making the list is not his call to make. That is the mandate of the JBC in accordance with the Constitution. What the Constitution allows the president is only to make his choice from among the names in the JBC list.

Noynoy is not known to go along with something he doesn't like. What Noynoy wants he gets and never mind if he has to cut corners or spends indecent amounts of money to make sure he does, as was clearly the case in the Corona impeachment trial.

It would, therefore, not come as a surprise if Noynoy eventually prevails in his face-off with the JBC, which has written him a "gentle reminder" about the list it has submitted since way back February 28. If Noynoy does not like anyone in that JBC list, who do you think will blink? Certainly not Noynoy.

Besides, Noynoy is sure no impeachment will likely prosper and proceed from a House of Representatives that he plays in the palm of his hand, especially at this time when, with elections still way off in 2016, he is far from being a lameduck president.

Since the Supreme Court struck down PDAF, congressmen have become more than ever dependent on Noynoy, more so now that he has learned the magic trick taught him by Butch Abad of how to convert savings from the different departments into presidential pork, euphemistically called DAP or Development Acceleration Program.

Long before the PDAF scam broke, there already was the DAP, which Noynoy used to make sure Corona is removed by vote in the Senate sitting as impeachment court. While the Supreme Court had been swift to strike down the PDAF, it has been a while since the DAP came into question but so far no word yet from the court.

While nobody would dare question how the Supreme Court takes its time, the fact remains that an adverse decision on the DAP can expose Noynoy to a charge of culpable violation of the Constitution far more serious than his disregard of the JBC list way past the deadline for him to make an appointment.

His constitutional violation of the 90-day provision with regard to the JBC list can be remedied by ante-dating it. But Noynoy did not ante-date the appointment of Estoesta. He made the appointment on June 20, way past the deadline given him. It is as if he has thumbed his nose at the Constitution.