EDITORIAL - Prerogatives

A necrological service of sorts is expected today. The ceremony, to be held on the grounds of the Cultural Center of the Philippines, will mourn the “death” of the National Artist Awards. The joke going around is that the two individuals whose selection for the awards raised howls of protest have asked to be excluded, and want their names to be submitted instead to the Judicial and Bar Council.

From the military and police to the diplomatic service and the judiciary, and now in the selection of national artists, controversy hounds presidential appointments, promotions and other choices. As the furor over the selection of the latest batch of national artists shows, the protests cannot be dismissed merely as sour grapes. The protests are coming not from individuals who have been bypassed, but from people who are familiar with the selection process and are protesting its violation.

CCP board members point out that the implementing rules and regulations for the National Artist Awards require the board to submit a list of nominees to the President “for confirmation, proclamation and conferral.” Nowhere does it say, the board members point out, that the President can strike anyone off the list and replace the nominee with someone of her choice who has not gone through the rigorous selection process.

This is what has happened in the latest batch, according to the protesters. Eminent composer, ethno-musicologist and music educator Ramon Santos was stricken off the list – a first in the awards process. President Arroyo also included four individuals who did not go through the selection process, among them filmmaker Carlo Caparas and Cecille Guidote Alvarez, who heads the National Commission for Culture and the Arts. The NCCA is part of the selection process and, like the CCP board, cannot nominate its members for the prestigious awards.

As in the controversy over the JBC nomination process for the Supreme Court, this one arises from an interpretation of executive privileges and prerogatives that has come to characterize this administration. Presidential prerogative is not absolute and must not be equated with presidential whim, and the nomination process cannot be used as a deodorant to indulge that whim.