Averting crisis all up to GMA

Unavoidably Gloria Arroyo is being compared to Cory Aquino. The ironies are obvious. Arroyo came to power via democratic processes made available by the 1987 (Cory) Constitution. Yet she is subverting that Charter to prolong herself in power. Under Cory, institutions ruined by martial law strove to rebuild themselves: legislature, judiciary, military, civil service. Arroyo bribes Congress with pork, stuffs courts with loyalists, uses soldiers for personal instead of national security, and politicizes the bureaucracy.

The biggest difference is also evident. Cory is so well loved, as shown in the outpouring of grief at her wake and cortege to the cathedral. In polls, Arroyo is the most hated President since Marcos, likely to be booed if she lingers at today’s funeral.

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Will constitutional crisis arise from the Judicial-Bar Council’s refusal to name any more candidates for two Supreme Court vacancies? It need not. That is, if Malacañang meekly accepts the JBC stand, instead of again exploiting loopholes in the Constitution. But is humility a trait known in the corridors of drunken power?

The JBC already has nominated six replacements for Justices Alicia Austria Martinez and Dante Tinga, who retired April 30 and May 11. The Constitution requires at least three nominees per vacancy. The JBC has more than met the rule. It screened dozens of applicants, voted on nine “semi-finalists”, and yielded the top six. In effect, Gloria Arroyo has six names to choose from as Martinez’s successor, and from the remaining five Tinga’s.

For Cabinet Secretary Silvestre Bello to mutter that “usually the JBC submits five names and sometimes more” is to ignore reality. The JBC is trying to reform itself. It needs to live down a public image of being a mere rubberstamp for the President’s whispered choice of new justice. The eight members, five of them presidential appointees, must grow into the job as independents. So they now assert their constitutional role of gate keeping. As Chief Justice Reynato Puno, JBC head, replied to Executive Sec. Ed Ermita’s memo for additional candidates: “The decision whether to include three or more than three names in the shortlist of nominees exclusively belongs to the JBC.”

The JBC is aware too of the far-reaching consequences of its acts. It knows that by the time Arroyo steps down in June 2010, she would have appointed all 14 associate justices, and Puno as Chief Justice. So the JBC is being thorough in vetting, making it public to avoid suspicion that Arroyo is packing the highest tribunal with stooges. If in asking for more nominees Ermita said, “the President cannot be too careful” filling up vacancies, more so the JBC in ensuring the neutrality of nominees. The salience cannot be lost on the JBC. Arroyo expectedly will face charges for multibillion-peso scams and killings that taint her reign — and the Supreme Court may have to rule on the cases.

The JBC, morally bound to do right, must form this early a credible SC. For, any perceived injustice by the last repository of justice can incite civil unrest. Already, lawyers decried the SC ruling that executive privilege, in keeping presidential chats confidential, outweighs the duty to divulge crime. Heavily criticized too was loyalist-justices’ tight 8-7 voting that Malacañang’s ceding of territory and power to Moro separatists was illegal. Any more such decisions favoring, or almost, a reviled regime can break all trust in the SC and the system.

Malacañang may play blind to all this, but it risks losing the most in case of constitutional crisis. Earlier it had stretched the people’s patience thin with attempts to prolong Arroyo and allies in power. Of late, she and her men have been changing their tune. It could only be to make her last State of the Nation palatable, to comply with Barack Obama’s implied wish, and in deference to Cory Aquino’s death. But at least she has twice said she’ll step down with elections in 2010, and an aide has asked congressmen to stop the con-ass steamroller. It wasn’t that hard after all to be humble. Now if only they can stay that way.

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EKIT News: Spread the word to all alumni associations and school chapters. The Sigma Kappa Pi Fraternity will hold its 41st anniversary reunion on Sept. 1st, 6 p.m. to sawa, at the Moomba Bar & Resto on Mother Ignacia corner Roces Avenues, Quezon City. Registration fee: P500. For more details, send your e-mail to [email protected] or contact Atty. Carlo Castro (0918) 9423708.

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“Live for others and God will remember you eternally.” Shafts of Light, Fr. Guido Arguelles, SJ

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E-mail: [email protected]