Delayed but not denied

Diosdado Madarang Peralta is the 26th Chief Justice. He is the first Chief from the North in 40 years. The last Ilocano to head the Court was the venerable Fred Ruiz Castro in 1976. He is also the first CJ from UST in 20 years. Andres Narvasa (1998) was the last Thomasian before him.

The choice of CJ Peralta is an affirmation of the merit system. The idiom is rising through the ranks. He began his career as an assistant prosecutor in Laoag. At the time, this was the entry level position for lawyers who dreamt of a career in public service. Do your job well and you earn a promotion. For the Judiciary, it was the cursus honorum.

He did his job well. Outstanding Manila Prosecutor, outstanding Quezon City Regional Trial Court Judge, Sandiganbayan Justice, Sandiganbayan Presiding Justice, Supreme Court Associate Justice. The IBP commended him for his scholarly disposition of criminal cases. Before he joined the high court, he was a recipient of the SC award for judicial excellence.

He worked hard. The vaunted Northern ethic. The Chief is celebrated for his no nonsense management of his docket and expeditious disposal of cases. The Supreme Court itself acknowledges how he has conquered the monster case load he inherited (1,128) and trimmed it down to 300.

Judicial temperament … Through all this, he always has a ready smile. Like all Manongs, he will tell you who your relatives are. Men of the bench are expected to be grave and somber in aspect. To speak only through their opinions. The idiom is sober as a judge. Of our top five national officials, you’d think the Chief Justice the hardest to approach. The four others, after all, are politicians. But CJ “Dado” would fit right in with this company of public men. He takes the effort to put you at ease. Even our Congressmen and Senators were so relaxed in his presence at budget hearings as to josh him about his prospects on the Court.

Surely he is the most down to earth Chief Justice, even more than his good friend, outgoing CJ Lucas “Luke” Bersamin. These two besties have had parallel ascents to the top since their days in neighboring Salas at the QC RTC. More than any of their colleagues in recent history, this duo has made the Olympian Court more accessible.

The comfort in their skin derives from the fact that CJs Peralta and Bersamin are the first two Chiefs in more than 50 years to have risen up the judicial ladder. The last who started his career as a Judge was CJ Ricardo Paras (1951).

Coming from the ranks, he is intimately acquainted with the concerns of his department on the ground. As a former Presiding Justice of the Sandiganbayan, he’ll need no learning curve for leadership and management of the collegial high court. He has vowed to improve the Judiciary. He knows whereof he speaks.

Son of teachers. His father, CFI Judge Elviro Peralta was a former law school dean of Northwestern University. Mother Catalina was a public school teacher. From them, he gets his humility. He is no topnotcher, he remonstrates.

But CJ Peralta is definitely no lightweight. Even before his breakout performance on the bench, he has been a law professor, bar reviewer and examiner and is acknowledged universally as an authority on Criminal law.

LABAN! It was during the KBL vs Lakas ng Bayan wars of 1978 that I was first introduced to Nene Pimentel. This was the campaign for the 21 at-large seats in the Interim Batasang Pambansa (IBP) representing Metro Manila. The IBP was Martial Law’s first stab at restoring democratic institutions, society daring to dream that elections under an authoritarian regime could be free. These heroic 21 embraced the burden when most would not. To me, it was the cry of Balintawak of modern times.

The team was led by Captain Ninoy Aquino, in absentia, from his Fort Bonifacio detention digs. Ninoy was one of 4 ex-Senators, the others being Soc Rodrigo, Monching Mitra and Ernie Maceda. Nene Pimentel was one of several 1971 Constitutional Convention delegates in the lineup like Tito Guingona, Nap Rama, Juan T. David, Noli Santos and Ernie Rondon. The rest of the ragtag, motley team of brave souls included Neptali Gonzales, Alex Boncayao, Trining Herrera, Charito Planas, Anding Roces, Fely Cabigao, Chito Lucero, Primo de Leon, Jerry Barican, Tony Martinez and Ka Jimmy Ferrer. Our campaign manager was revered ex-Senator Lorenzo Tanada.

In the nightly hustings I learned the stories of these men and women standing up to the system. It was a crash course in courage. Just to come out and speak out was an act of defiance. Like Ka Nene, they needed to express for the people the rage that had built up inside them. You could sense the spirit in the populace. At first tentative, they had to be cajoled to approach our candidates who spoke by solitary lamp light. Often, only crates and rickety stages would bear their weight, their voices amplified by the crackling speaker of the bull horn. But their voices soared, buoyed by the awakening solidarity of the oppressed.

It was in the crucible of this makeshift classroom of democracy, as I memorized their spiels and studied them up close, that I was exposed to the undeniable courage, the stout conviction and the ardor of this humble man. Even after the 21-0 debacle, ultimately leading to the watershed noise barrage protest of 1978, I followed his career as he became Mayor of Cagayan de Oro and convenor of the Mindano Alliance.

His post Martial Law career is well documented. His life largely defined by passion that matched his conviction. We applaud his life of service to the law and to the nation. We count ourselves fortunate to have lived at a time when giants like Aquilino Pimentel Jr. walked the earth to fight for us.