The Corona impeachment: A year after

It’s been a year since the 23 Senators removed a sitting Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in the person of Renato Corona. But what has this nation learned from that divisive event in our nation’s history? For one, the Filipino still elected into office many public officials whom we know still dare to flaunt their wealth, taken from monies while they were in power, despite the fact that they were not totally honest in their Statement of Assets, Liabilities & Net Worth (SALN). That’s money they got from taxpayers. Clearly the sovereign will of the people did not show up in the vote… rather it was the sovereign will of the Comelec that surfaced.

In my book, the moment CJ Corona was impeached by the House of Representatives in lightning quick fashion, I already had a hunch that CJ Corona’s case was doomed from the start. The rest was mere “palabas” or a reality show courtesy of national TV networks that showed the impeachment trial like it was just another Filipino telenovela.

But today, the sequel to this telenovela continues with the case of the wife of Sen. Lito Lapid who was arrested in the US for money laundering and now, even Sen. Loren Legarda herself is under hot water because of the revelation that she had an expensive New York condo… which some people even suggested that she undervalued. How did she gain so much wealth?

Yet, Sen. Legarda was still reelected as Senator…. So the question is, can we say that the Filipino people have forgiven her for this issue or perhaps the news about this case did not trickle down to the masses? Whatever it is, Sen. Legarda’s New York condo is a clear proof of Sen. Miriam Santiago’s essay in Tagalog, “Masarap talaga maging Senador.”

Indeed our legislators earn (or steal) millions of pesos because of our stupid system called pork barrel, which has different names but the same pork. I dare say that if we remove the pork barrel, the 2016 Presidential elections will have new names and players and if you believe it…it would mean the end of political dynasties that breed on the pork barrel.

Finally the impeachment of CJ Corona also proves that the Philippine Constitution badly needs changes for political and social reforms. Reforms can only happen if we call for Charter changes (Cha-cha). But we all know that for as long as President Aquino is President, we cannot see any such reforms in the last three years of his presidency.

Among the reforms that I’ve lined up aside from the extinction of the pork barrel is the total overhaul of the Comelec to break it apart and make it into separate and independent regional Commissions on Elections;  the Supreme Court Chief Justice to be chosen by the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) and the President’s signature to be just ministerial; that a separate and independent regional or state commission be created to verify the SALNs of public officers, where these so-called public servants would have to undergo scrutiny before this panel before they can take their oath of office.

Now that the dust has settled, the bottom line why CJ Corona was forcibly removed from office is simply an act of revenge by President Aquino for his role in the Supreme Court’s adjudicating the Hacienda Luisita in favor of the poor farmers, who until today have not yet gotten their own piece of land. Mind you, these are the people that P-Noy vowed to uplift with his “Kung Walang Corrupt, Walang Mahirap” election slogan. If these people are still poor it is due to the fact that corruption still reigns under the “Daang Matuwid”. Social injustice still reigns! It just makes you wonder what P-Noy would be saying in his State of the Nation (SONA) next month.

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It’s nearly three years into the Aquino Presidency and that front-page report in the Philippine STAR last Tuesday gives you an idea of how President Aquino has under-performed  when 4.6 million Filipino youths still cannot go to school during the opening of classes, not because they don’t want to go to school, but rather because the shortage of classrooms have only worsened under his watch.

Again we ask the President, whatever happened to all those promises that under Daan Matuwid this perennial problem would finally be solved under his regime? Surely by now, President Aquino knows that this problem can be solved with money. With the Legislature under the President’s pocket (which is why he impeached CJ Corona), I’m still scratching my head why millions of our Filipino kids cannot go to school.

By denying these children a chance to go to school, they have doomed these kids to either a life of crime or of finding jobs abroad as an overseas Filipino worker (OFW). I just saw thousands of them when we were in Hong Kong last Sunday. And while I took pity on our fellow Filipinos, I cannot say this for the Aquino regime, who has no heart for the poor Filipinos.

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