Looking for a chief justice | Inquirer Opinion

Looking for a chief justice | Inquirer Opinion

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The JBC, however, is also weighed down by being suspected of lacking independence. This suspicion arises from the composition of the body. The JBC is composed of the “Chief Justice as ex officio Chairman, the Secretary of Justice, and a representative of the Congress as ex officio Members, a representative of the Integrated Bar, a professor of law, a retired Member of the Supreme Court, and a representative of the private sector.” The last four are called regular members. They are appointed by the incumbent president with the consent of the Commission on Appointments. Of the seven members of the JBC, therefore, the president has a hand in the choice of five. It is therefore not difficult to imagine how the president can have a great influence on the formation of the exclusive list prepared by the JBC, from which the president must choose who to appoint to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court itself can also have a strong influence on who will be chosen as justice.  This factor had a great bearing in the saga of former Chief Justice Renato Corona.

It will be recalled that the position of chief justice was vacated within two months from the presidential election, when Chief Justice Reynato Puno reached retirement age. In Article VII of the Constitution, which contains the extent and limits of presidential power, there is a provision which prohibits the president from making permanent appointments to vacancies during those two months except to executive positions when urgently needed.

In 1998 the Supreme Court had ruled that the president may not make appointments to the judiciary during the prohibited period. But in 2010 the Court ruled that the prohibition did not apply to appointments to the Supreme Court because Article VIII required that Supreme Court vacancies had to be filled within 90 days—as if the Court would not be able to survive without a chief justice! And to think that the next president would still have had 45 days to satisfy the 90-day requirement! Looking back, former Chief Justice Corona probably rues that Supreme Court decision.

The Supreme Court at any particular time is sometimes referred to by the name of the current chief justice. In 2010 we had the Puno Court, but it was suspected of being in fact an Arroyo Court, thanks to the appointing system which had allowed Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to fill the Court with her own people. During the period when the controversy about the president’s appointing authority was being debated in media, the gut feel of many was that the majority members of the Court would vote the way they ultimately did. Thus the decision did not come as a surprise. But it developed into a 2012 tragedy from which we should learn valuable lessons.

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