MANILA, Philippines — The Supreme Court (SC) has moved to revise court rules in a bid to expedite judicial processes as one of the key judicial reform programs of Chief Justice Lucas Bersamin.
He announced the creation of the committee during his speech before the University of Santo Tomas community last week.
“The Revised Rules of Court will make the judicial system responsive to the public need for quick dispensation of justice,” Bersamin vowed, admitting that the current rules “still contain provisions that institutionalize delays.”
He named Associate Justice Diosdado Peralta, third most senior magistrate of the court, as its working chair.
Peralta vowed to come up with the revised rules in civil procedure by the third quarter of 2019.
The senior magistrate, who has been shortlisted for the chief justice position twice last year after the ouster of former chief justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno, said the revisions would “simplify rules in civil procedure, including amending the rules on evidence, pleadings and reglementary period.”
“All pleadings must be evidentiary in nature, and there must be faster service of summons,” he said.
The other members of the committee are SC Associate Justices Francis Jardeleza, Alfredo Benjamin Caguioa, and Alexander Gesmundo; Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra; Philippine Judicial Academy chancellor Adolfo Azcuna and vice chancellor Romeo Callejo and law professors Francis Ed Lim, Tranquil Salvador III and Amador Tolentino Jr.