Sect

The things that emanate from Edwin Lacierda’s mouth get stranger by the day, especially since he seems to have designated himself spokesman for the prosecution panel and a combatant in the day-to-day tit-for-tat accompanying the impeachment trial.

Recently, he denounced the Supreme Court restraining order on the subject of foreign currency deposits. He railed against the camp of the Chief Justice, conveniently omitting the important fact that this was a decision responding to the petition of PSBank. The petition of the defense panel is still under consideration by the Court. It was raffled off to a justice who is inhibiting himself.

PSBank, for its part, filed the petition not because they want to conceal the Corona account. They need the Court’s guidance on the matter considering the strict provisions of the law covering foreign currency deposits. It is a petition filed on behalf of the entire banking industry, considering the vehemence with which some prosecutor-judges opt to disregard a law that is in full force and effect.

Lacierda likewise arrogantly claimed on television that they “had the numbers” presumably to convict the Chief Justice. If that was true, he offends the senators allied with the Palace who are trying (rather vainly) to keep up appearances of a fair trial. If that was true, there would be no need for all the hustling Palace operatives have been doing to apply pressure on the Senate and bring the weight of all the government agencies to bear down on the beleaguered Chief Justice.

To be fair to the senators, Lacierda was probably being his usual reckless self, equating with the final vote on conviction the majority vote in caucus to ignore bank secrecy laws and subpoena the Corona accounts. One is not the other, as any clear thinking person would readily comprehend.

Also, some in that caucus majority might have voted simply to humor the Palace operatives who invested so much hope in the bank account being the clincher in an impeachment case that seems to be running out of both evidence and witnesses. Since any misstatement of the SALN carries no penalty under existing regulations, the Palace operatives seem bent on convicting Corona for something he was not charged with in the faulty articles of impeachment brought before the Senate.

If Corona is convicted for something he was not charged with, that will be such a glaring miscarriage of justice. It will be a parody of the regime of law that is supposed to protect every Filipino citizen. Our Senate will be recorded in history as a kangaroo court.

Even if the premise for doing so might be faulty, the Palace seems so obsessed with Corona’s dollar account that even President Aquino joined the chorus of hecklers attempting to cajole the Chief Justice into allowing everyone a free peek into his personal finances. This has degenerated into a very Filipino game of dasalan at tuksuhan. That might be cute, but it does not conform to the formal procedures that constitute the substance of the rule of law.

 Over the past few days, Lacierda’s mouth leads him into even greater trouble.

Last Thursday, 8,000 people demonstrated before the Supreme Court denouncing the underhanded efforts applied by the administration to oust the Chief Justice. By contrast, a paltry group of less than a hundred stragglers from the Black and White Movement carried the administration propaganda line in the vicinity of the Senate.

Asked about the great disparity between the two demonstrations, Lacierda mentioned that the much larger group was mobilized by the Iglesia ni Cristo (INC). Pressed about why the influential religious sect would mobilize support for the Chief Justice, Lacierda said it was up to the INC to make the explanation.

He should have thought this through first — although in the case of Lacierda, this might be a big ask.

The crowd that massed before the Supreme Court brought nothing that might identify them with a particular sect. The INC never announced they were involved with this demonstration. It was only Lacierda who said this was something mounted by the INC — then he wants the INC to dignify his hearsay. He expects too much.

By attributing a demonstration to a routinely inscrutable sect, Lacierda opens to public scrutiny a great number of disturbing questions the administration might not want to deal with at this time. There are many things in our politics that are traditionally left unsaid. There are many things undertaken only with utmost discretion.

 By dragging a strictly hierarchical and very discrete religious sect into the messy and mundane matters surrounding the impeachment, Lacierda opens the door to many political complications he does not seem to fully understand. He might have caused an unwanted rift — or deepened it — by talking so haphazardly about it.

 It is easy to imagine the leadership of the INC, although they are immensely less talkative than Lacierda, must have been piqued by the Palace spokesman’s indiscreet mouth. It is easy to imagine that those in the Palace with a better appreciation of the ways of our politics are now doing frantic damage control, trying to assuage hurt feelings.

 Common sense ought to have dictated that Palace functionaries not pick up unnecessary squabbles with the INC — especially since this was the sect that delivered much of the swing vote that enabled Aquino to win over Estrada. But that is common sense; we talk here of Lacierda.

After dispensing hearsay about the INC in the preceding days, Lacierda quickly changed his tune Sunday night after the Corona defense team revealed a plan to, well, basically bribe the senators. Lacierda denounced the revelation as hearsay.