Arroyo can appoint next Chief Justice—SC

Source: Daily Inquirer
By Tetch Torres
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 11:12:00 03/17/2010

Filed Under: Judiciary (system of justice), Government, Politics

MANILA, Philippines – (UPDATE 2) Voting 9-1-3, the Supreme Court ruled that President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo could appoint the next Chief Justice, a spokesman for the high tribunal said Wednesday.

Lawyer Midas Marquez made the announcement in a press conference at past 11 a.m. at the Supreme Court division hearing room in Manila.

Quoting the decision penned by Associate Justice Lucas Bersamin, Marquez said vacancies in the Supreme Court – the 14 Associate Justices and the Chief Justice – were not covered by the appointment ban under Section 15 Article VII of the 1987 Constitution.

He said that the high court asked the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) to submit a shortlist of nominees to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on or before Chief Justice Reynato Puno’s retirement on May 17.

Aside from Bersamin, the justices who voted for allowing Arroyo to name the next Chief were: Associate Justices Jose Perez, Martin Villarama, Roberto Abad, Arturo Brion, Diosdado Peralta, Mariano del Castillo, Teresita Leonardo de Castro, and Jose Mendoza.

But Brion, Peralta, Del Castillo, and Mendoza disagreed with Bersamin and the four others that the entire Judiciary was exempted from the appointment ban and clarified that only appointments to the Supreme Court were exempted.

Associate Justice Conchita Carpio-Morales was the lone dissenter.

Those who inhibited themselves from voting were Chief Justice Puno, and Associate Justices Renato Corona and Antonio Carpio.

Associate Justices Antonio Eduardo Nachura and Presbitero Velasco voted to dismiss all petitions filed for and against the appointment issue, citing that these are “premature.”

Marquez said the appointment ban under Article VII of the Constitution that prevented the President or Acting President from making appointments “two months immediately before the next presidential elections” to avoid prejudicing public service and endangering public safety did not apply to the judiciary.

The judiciary is covered under Article VIII, which does not mention any appointment ban, and which specifically under Section 9, gives the President “the authority to appoint, within 90 days, any member of the Judiciary based on the list which will be submitted by the Judicial and Bar Council,” said Marquez.

The JBC is in the process of screening the nominees for the Chief Justice post.

Marquez said the JBC has yet to determine if a public interview would be conducted and what to do with those who accepted the nomination with conditions.

Carpio and Morales said, in separate letters to the JBC that they would accept the nominations to the Chief Justice post only if the next president would make the appointment.

Other nominees are Associate Justices Corona, De Castro, and Brion; and Sandiganbayan Associate Justice Edilberto Sandoval.
With a report from Donna Pazzibugan, Inquirer