ABS-CBNNews Online (with SC rules Arroyo-Neri talks on NBN are secret ) and GMANews.tv (with It’s 9 vs 6: SC favors Neri’s plea vs ZTE probe – sources ) out scooped Inquirer.net on the Supreme Court’s decision on the Neri case. The GMANews.tv report boils down the case as follows:
Neri, who filed the suit in his capacity as former director of the National Economic Development Authority, claimed that the three questions posed to him during his first and only Senate appearance last year were privileged communications covered by the principle of executive privilege and which can only be divulged during an executive session.
The three questions are whether the President followed up the NBN-ZTE project with Neri; whether he was told by the President to prioritize the NBN-ZTE project; and whether the President told him to go ahead with the project after learning of the massive bribe offer.
Neri’s invocation of executive privilege on these questions had prompted senators to cite him for contempt. The Senate also issued an arrest warrant against Neri after he refused to attend the inquiry into the NBN-ZTE deal.
Inquirer.net’s report, SC: Neri can invoke executive privilege, summarizes the decision as follows:
Commission on Higher Education chairman Romulo Neri can invoke executive privilege and cannot be compelled to answer three questions the Senate feels is crucial to getting to the bottom of the scandal-tainted national broadband network (NBN) deal, the Supreme Court has ruled.
Voting 6-9, the justices also ruled that the Senate cannot cite Neri or anyone in contempt because the rules of procedure of the 14th Congress had not been published, Supreme Court spokesman Jose Midas Marquez said.
The breakdown (according ABS-CBNNews’s report), the ponente and the voting was as follows:
The majority ruling was penned by SC Associate Justice Teresita de Castro.
She was supported in her decision by Associate Justices Renato Corona, Minita Chico-Nazario, Presbitero Velasco, Antonio Nachura, Dante Tinga, Arturo Brion, Leonardo Quisumbing, and Ruben Reyes.
The six who dissented were: Chief Justice Reynato Puno; Associate Justices Antonio Carpio, Adolfo Azcuna, Conchita Carpio-Morales, Alicia Martinez, Consuelo Ynares-Santiago.
Associate Justice Ynares-Santiago was actually on leave during today’s deliberations, but she left her dissenting vote.
It’s interesting to note that the the ponente wasn’t Justice Velasco, as originally reported; and that the freshly-appointed Justice, Brion, voted -and in favor of the government. In his blog, lawyer Teddy Te, Vincula, has something to say about the voting:
There is an unsurprising lack of shame in Brion voting on a petition where he did not participate and where popular sentiment held that his appointment was precisely to forestall the effects of a Velasco inhibition. There is also an uncharacteristic lack of delicadeza in De Castro writing for the majority, where her appointment was clearly seen as a reward for convicting Estrada.
This vote, coming on the heels of the 10-4 vote in the Chavez decision, shows just how much headway the Gloria appointees are making in controlling the court. If she lasts until 2010, Gloria Arroyo would have appointed all but one of the Justices (Puno is the exception; but since she appointed Puno Chief Justice, technically she could be considered to have appointed all the Justices).
How’s that for separation of powers? Checks and balances, anyone?
Both parts of the decision, are possibly highly controversial. The reasons why can be gleaned from the March 10 column Fr. Joaquin Bernas wrote, Anatomy of a rejected compromise,
But from the way the Puno Court has been waging a campaign for the protection of rights through the writ of habeas corpus, the writ of amparo and the writ of habeas data, I should not see the Court as being willing to be an instrument for the enfeeblement of democratic institutions.
What then do I hope to see?
I hope to see witnesses coming forward when summoned as witnesses and answering questions asked and, where proper, claiming that the President has instructed them to claim executive privilege.
I hope to see such witnesses being required to elucidate on what privilege they are claiming and submitting such claim for judgment by the Court, if need be, in chambers.
I am confident that the Court will be able to examine the claims presented before it and sift what is truly privileged and what is an attempt to hide wrongdoing.
Among the roles of the judiciary is the exercise of the power of judicial review. The power is a two-edged sword. It can either legitimize or exorcise. Thus in the current controversy the Court will either legitimize the power of the Senate to compel a witness who refuses to heed a subpoena and in the process rebuff Neri and his superior’s resistance to the Senate; or it will legitimize Neri’s refusal to testify and in the process clip the power of the Senate to compel defiant witnesses.
The Senate had occasion in 1950 to detain an uncooperative witness in Arnault v. Nazareno. But in that case Arnault was already before the Senate.
The Neri case now is different. The Senate already had him the first time, but they let him go, and Neri now is saying “Catch me, if you can.” Will the Court help the Senate?
Apparently not. In his blog, Philippine Commentary was predicting a decision in favor of Neri, but doesn’t mince words as to the implications of such a decision:
I cannot imagine a more compleat and disastrous demolition of the Separtion of Powers and a curtailment of the Public’s Very Right to Know what their government is doing than this 9-6 decision of the Supreme Court. We are now under an effective Dictatorship of Judicial and Executive Privilege in which the principle of Checks and Balances is no more.
Philippine Commentary supports new legislation patterned after American whistleblower laws, for the following reasons as he explained iin a previous entry.
The decision hasn’t been published on line, yet, so it remains to be seen whether it will go down as one of those decisions that maintain “a color of constitutionality” but which ends up placing the high court in disrepute. For now, The Mount Balatucan Monitor may be premature but not necessarily wrong.
It all hinges on whether the Supremes have enabled executive privilege to help cover up crimes, something that past jurisprudence was held to forbid (see my columns, A color of constitutionality and It’s how you play the game). Up to today, it was a given that the ultimate veto on executive privilege was that in matters involving crimes, executive privilege couldn’t be invoked.
It will be interesting to see what the Supreme Court’s arguments in its decision will be. I understand that the decision is over 100 pages! Anyway, Phoenix Eyrie, Reloaded finds it interesting.
Here is the decision and the dissenting opinions: Index of G.R. No. 180643, Romulo L. Neri Vs. Senate Committee, et al.
Meanwhile, an indication of where public opinion lies, is Arroyo trust, approval ratings down while Opposition senators top latest Pulse Asia survey.
I truly admire Chief Justice Reynato Puno for his independence of mind.
But is sad to note that the supreme court is now packed with Gloria’s loyalists(including recently appointed Arturo Brion).
Expect the 9-6 split on major SC decisions involving the Pidals.
Since those three questions of fact cannot be answered by either a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’, then that means that Gloria Arroyo can no longer claim to be innocent of wrongdoing when it comes to NBN/ZTE.
As i said a week ago, there is nothing inherent within the system of courts (of law) that keeps it from being used to perpetuate an injustice.
http://www.quezon.ph/1731/the-aesthetics-of-redemption/#comment-768211
It all boils down to the the system’s internal code of ethics and whether that code is being practiced.
well. i guess it’s all over now.
It is still up to Neri. He can choose to talk.
i know. and well, we know his track record on that matter.
9-6… my goodness when will it end… yes lets weep…
So the vote went along party lines.
It will be good to know this: if Justice Carpio’s former law firm (Villaraza & Cruz) is out of favor with Malacanang, which firm are the palace lawyers consulting?
Oh well, it gives us more reason to go out into the parliament of the streets.
Archdiocese of the SC. Now, the Hierarchy is complete.
Men in diaphanous skirts. But without the funny hats.
Anyone who read Senate v. Ermita and not the Inquirer editorials praising it for being “so finely balanced” they could’ve seen this coming. After 80 pages of zigzagging through US and RP jurisprudence, cherry picking from both sides of the question, the SC ruled unequivocally there and in the case of Gudani, that the Supreme Court would decide any case of Executive Privilege vs. Power of Oversight and Inquiry of the Congress. That is what Neri took advantage of. Then of course Senate v. Ermita basically perfected and replaced EO464 and Memo Circular 108 as THE statement of what Executive (and Judicial) Privilege are: hehe, GMA’s own Sections 1 and 2a of EO464 which they upheld!
So as it stands what we have is Judicial Review as the deciding power whenever Congress asks a question and the Executive won’t answer. That is a non self-executing solution in which Judicial Privilege become Lord and Master of the Govt. Remember they adopted the conclusions of USA v. Nixon that Executive Privilege does not cover criminal evidence in a trial, i.e. it proclaims Judicial Privilege to be superior or prior to Executive Privilege.
Now the Philippine Supreme Court has completed the attainment of supreme power, since Neri v. Senate is a decision never even made by SCOTUS–it rules that Judicial Review or Judicial Privilege as it were is also superior to the Power of Inquiry in aid of Legislation and that of oversight of administration.
We are living in a Judicial dictatorship in which Congress is the footstool of both the President and the 15 impeachable unelected Judges whose privilege is truly 15 times greater than anybody else’s.
This exact same thing already happened in the US, when Teddy Roosevelt and Wm Howard Taft both passed EOs just like EO464. SCOTUS also upheld those! So in 1912 the US Congress passed the first comprehensive whistleblower law, which in effect turned the whole federal bureaucracy, including the military, into protected watchdogs who can go to Congress and divulge what they know of wrong doing in their jobs. Even janitors! Of course, you cannot just make wild accusations. You are still subject to Congress rules, laws on libel, perjury etc. But you cannot be prevented from being asked questions or volunteering answers, maybe in executive session. Then and only then may the Executive assert privilege, but the Congress may not be prevented from getting information in aid not only of legislation but OVERSIGHT.
When I said in April 2006 that SCORP had anti-Solomonically “cut the Baby in half” this is what I meant: SCORP claims that Congress has an enforcweable right to information only in aid of legislation. What the Americans make crystal clear in such documents as the US CONGRESSIONAL OVERSIGHT MANUAL is that OVERSIGHT is part of legislation, because legislation is MAKING NEW LAWS and REMAKING OLD LAWS. Oversight is the necessary ingredient to the “remaking old laws” part of it.
So damn the Anti-Solomons, (as in Anti-Christs) on SCORP.
They’ve cut the “BABY” called the Congress’ Power of Inquiry in two. That is how they’ve murdered the Public’s Right to Know, which is really ONLY Congress’s right to know as part of their legislative share of the Separation of powers. Media only has Freedom of Speech and Press, WITHOUT processes to enforce.
Oops come to think of it that is what SCORP has done, reduced the Honorable Senate to well…the Philippine Daily Innuendo!
One last thing: I hope this will finally dispel the incredible idolatry of people towards the Supreme Court. I hope the Mass Media now shine their bright lights into the vast dark corners of Padre Faura where lurk crimes and coverups of dastardly crimes, quietly but lucratively executed. Remember that every justiciable case of the highest value and controversy passes through there with nary a mention or attention from the Press. But I believe that ZTE/NBN are nothing compared to all the subrosa cases they’ve decided in favor of the highest bidder.
If we think Executive Privilege is bad, the Supreme Court even forbade Newsbreak last year from looking at the PUblic Log book of the Court to find out who gave some judge 10 million in giftwrapped package.
Why weep?? That’s silly! Burn Padre Faura down with withering exposures and investigative reporting or bear your chains in abashed silence forever grovelling as mental slaves of those blackrobed shysters forever!
Welcome back to the fold of the traditional conservatives, DJB. Does that mean youre not a neocon anymore? 😉
Oh my Lord. From where can we expect relief now?
The next steps are obvious: Congress constitutes itself into a Constituent Assembly. The Senate brings the question of whether the House and Senate vote jointly or separately before the SC, and the SC rules they vote jointly. The parliamentary system is speedily enacted.
Mike, there’s always the “I Will Wait for 2010” movement.
Hmm, are we out of good Supreme Court candidates?
Remember Davide at the impeachment proceedings? He started sessions with a prayer (the overtly Catholic “Jubilee Song” sung with gusto by Loren Legarda”)….
inquirer.net
ooop sorry about that.
Let’s hear now from the respect-the-institution crowd.
Imagine this scenario:
Senator: State your position and functions in your office and your working relationship with the President.
Government official: I invoke executive privilege Your
Honor!
Senator: WHATT?
GO: You have any problem Your Honor, go to the SC… basta I invoke executive privilege… if the SC says it’s not good invocation, I might appeal or if I’m in the mood, I might answer… but today I am invoking executive privilege…
ricelander,
It is the balance among institutions that is important. It’s like a Machine with three parts. The decision is the culmination of Edsa Dos which started the demolition of the Senate as the supreme court of public accountability. Now it doesn’t even have the right of regularity to ask questions.
Take this literally: when it comes to holding those 31 impeachable officers judicially accountable, the institution that is supreme is the Senate. The supreme court has NO jurisdiction in ALL cases of impeachment. NONE. But now they’ve castrated the Senate and House, since they’ve now practically given the Executive the mechanism for hiding any crime by claiming executive privilege.
Folks, this is a dark, dark day for Constitutionalism and Justice. Joma should rejoice. With the country run by a Judicial Mafia, national security takes a back seat to executive and judicial security.
From their initial reactions, the Senators obviously don’t even know what just hit them. Pusillanimous pussycats!
Mike is right, with nine in her pocket SCORP and the Hiouse could ramrod Chacha through and make Gloria their Queen beyond 2010.
@DJB
Sir, what makes you think that dinosaur/leech Joma will be any different were he to run our country! Joma should not be in the same paragraph with the word ‘justice’
Just a mention of that man’s name makes me boil with red rage. (To think I’m a bit leftie.)
If he is half as honorable as he claims, Chief Justice Puno could resign to demonstrate just how transcendental the issue really is. But if amparo was anaesthesia for the body politic, habeas data now looks like laughing gas. I don’t think we can even maintain the semblance of a democratic government. We are now living under a Dictatorship that is only awaiting formalization in chacha. SCORP has sent out a message to all litigants and contending parties, you have to PAY even more now for victory in your cases before SCORP . And even in the cases where they don’t, what losing side will believe they weren’t paid off or politically pressured to rule in a certain way?
Good God! In other countries where that has happened, the losers just shoot the judges dead. This is a prediction, not a hope!
Maybe jhay, Abe and DJB have a point that the next people surge should be against the Padre Faura gates,
What are the odds that Ping Lacson’s Whistleblower Bill gets moved up for discussion?
Now, still, some thing about 9 to 6 (versus 8 to 7) that says that the writers of the 1987 Constitution did intend it to be this way. Is there anything in the English or Tagalog version of the 1987 constitution that has been completely ignored? Even Fr. Bernas seems to suggest that co-ercion by the Senate can’t do it, the reliance has to be on willing witnesses.
Heheheh!
Welcome back to the fold of the traditional conservatives, DJB. Does that mean youre not a neocon anymore?
Good question well put Jeg!
at least hindi kunwaring “8-7” ang decision katulad ng dating “controversial decisions”. hehe.
The last several weeks I was hanging on to the possibility that the Church and the Supreme Court would not turn its back on the people. They did.
That does it. Every conceivable legal and constitutional avenue has been blocked.
Only one avenue left.
At the rate all these intellects are openly promoting dishonesty and surging….
A strong sense of hopelessness just might lead to the emergence of VIGILANTE JUSTICE……….
It was predictable and I expected nothing else. When it comes to ruling that favours whoever in Power , the SC can twist and turn the Charter and even Screw it to perfection and it is the Institution that needs the either the Radical Reform ahead of anything else or just just simply abolish it..Its decisions make the mockery of the otherwise salvageable vibrant Democracy.
To: Jun Lozada
Your friend, R. Neri has friends in high places.
First, the illegal occupants of the People’s Palace.
And now, most if not all of the appointees of the Supreme Court.
And you? While frustrating, do not despair!
Take solace knowing your friends are WE, The Filipino People!
We will shield you and we will NEVER kidnap if an intent to maim you permanently!
You and Cory will be in our thoughts & prayers!
To Phil Cruz: Two avenues left. One of them is OFW-ism, never to return.
Actually, another avenue is partitioning. Cebu seems to like how it is being run, anyway, so an independent Cebu is an avenue.
Another is grin-and-bear-it-then-2010, but this time (like it was not true the first time) to elect only those with integrity. Of course, this (another round of elections) is attractive only when you disagree with vic of Canada, who in an earlier thread had suggested — that Filipinos in the Philippines seem to be endemically predisposed to corruption when faced with opportunity to loot for the betterment of immediate family and the clan. If vic is correct, then vetting and analyzing past actions provide no guarantee. Honasan or Trillanes-the-coup guys just as likely for thievery as Mar Roxas (the issue becomes who will be a thug).
Another is slugging-it-out (including impeachment-or-2010 and another round of elections) in the belief that Filipinos in the Philippines can self-govern and within Filipinos in the Philippines are citizens who can do better than the ones who had preceded them.
@UP n
“What are the odds that Ping Lacson’s Whistleblower Bill gets moved up for discussion?”
Nice. Oh the irony. 😀
Kelan pa nagkaroon ng matinong whistleblower si Ping Lacson???? 😀
But at least he is pushing such a bill…
DJB,
Now that the balance is destroyed, the Senate rendered oh so powerless, and was it lost on them?, I wonder now if they feel the pain of their castration, or are they in sedation yet. Tomorrow, if Villar is worth the leadership, we will know. What I know is Joker, otherwise known as Mr. Graftbuster, is rejoicing.
UPn, the one Possibility that could be of big help if the congress Right Now can get their acts together and draft a stronger Accountability Law (goggle the 2006 amendments to Federal Accountability Law) that will be the basis for the Government after GMA. Straightened the Foundations as strong as possible, from the Judiciary, to the Electoral Body, the Congress itself, and the Governments..two years is a plenty of time.
phil cruz, speak for yourself, man.
ricelander:
you’re really having fun with this development, eh? dammit, money and utang na loob are still the strongest forces in this godforsaken hellhole.
come on people, accept it. move on.
mukhang ang kasabihang walang natatalo sa eleksyon dito, nadadaya lang, eh gusto ding gamitin sa mga desisyon ng husgado (sigh)
i still stand by my position though. if we tear the institutions of this country down, if we take another shortcut…
we’ll be hitting the streets again in a few years, after money and utang na loob determine the next people who walk the halls of power.
wheee! move on. yahoo! i will wait till 2010. yay! blech.
@justice scalia
“come on people, accept it. move on.”
I suppose you have never worked in Quality Assurance or Quality Control?
nash: when quality assurance fails, then the fire sale follows (or as magdiwang said, huge bargains as blood flows in the streets).
The Marcos dynasty also started at a time of great global economic distress in the early 70’s. The effect of which the country has been formed today. That is when OFW labor exportation was initiated to save the economy.
The Supreme Court then did it’s part.
Fast forward to today and the Supreme Court has effectively given the go signal to the executive department to do as it pleases.
In the last few weeks we have seen the power of the state taking on and taking over Mr. Market and it’s main ally Mr. Margin ( “leverage” -fiat currency system based on the fractional reserve banking system)to announce to one and all that it will not allow deflationary expectations to take the U.S. economy (capital/labor and the government)to enter the gates of hell.
The U.S. economy had been selling their toxic financial wastes to the world and now the world has to participate in the ecological clean up. The world is in for interesting times. Next up will be currency intervention as the line will probably be drawn when the dollar crosses the $1.60 to the Euro level.
Let us all now have a coronation for the royal couple in the Palace.
I do not see anyone in the Senate who can now lead a struggle to restore a balance of power between the legislative and the executive.
The American Jihadist Bocobo should be congratulated for his incisive analysis of the state of almost absolute governmental power of the new dynasty that is probably going to flower in the Philippine Islands.
the supreme court has spoken. winners MUST win, losers must obey (and weep, if he/she wants to). let’s try to develop a habit of obedience, as Christ obeyed the Will of the Father to suffer and die on the cross.
the system works. let it be, until it’s changed properly.
I’m greatly disappointed but I must move on.
Moving on includes supporting dissenting actions.
The Congress is the repository of popular and participatory democracy. It is the living reality of the social contract.
It’s legislative/oversight functions cannot be separated similarly like politics/economics and fiscal/monetary policy. It is like a coin.
The Federal Reserve Chairman is bound by law and is required to report to the Congress on all his actions based on the broad mandate given the institution to preserve price stability and maintain growth in the United States. The world is bound to follow.
The Philippine scenario is one of a regressive nature. The entitlement society has now permeated the Supreme Court. Marcos intimidated the SC then. Most of the SC have turned themselves to whores.
nash,
“I suppose you have never worked in Quality Assurance or Quality Control?”
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