THEY STILL KEEP COMING TO COURT

When reports came out that like the Senate and the House of Representatives, the Judiciary has its own version of “Napoles,” a name or a word which is now synonymous with unmitigated corruption in the highest level of government, a chorus of views criticizing the judiciary and the justice system flowed from opinion writers and columnists.

The court magistrates once again found themselves pilloried by generalized and sweeping accusations of corruption which lack hard and solid facts to back them up. At most these are perceptions. I’m not saying the judiciary is clean and the judges are all saints. They are not. Time and again we see the efforts of the Supreme Court to clean up the ranks by the dismissal of corrupt and undesirable judges and even justices.

Human vulnerability to corruption is not the monopoly of government officials let alone the judges. We need to be cautious that in our desire to ventilate pressing public issues, we do not debase the institutions upon which our democratic society rests.

The judicial branch is known to be the weakest of the three major branches of government. The Judiciary does not have the power of the purse, a power exclusively the domain of the legislative branch. Neither does the judicial branch hold the power of the sword, a power exclusively held by the President, who exercises executive functions.

The judiciary is known to be a passive institution for it acts only when an actual case or controversy is brought before it. It serves as an Impartial Arbiter, constitutionally empowered to interpret the constitution and the laws and checks the excesses of the exercise of power by the political branches of government under its inherent power of judicial review.

They say the courts are beholden to no one but the constitution and the law.

Appointments to the judiciary is basically a political act of the President who is the appointing authority. The Judicial and Bar Council recommends to the President who ultimately appoints the judges and the justices. The vetting process in the selection by the JBC follows a reasonably high standard. It is, however, inevitable that political considerations, other than merit, is a factor in the appointment of judges, since the appointing authority holds a political office.

In terms of budget, to insure the independence of the judiciary, the constitution gives it fiscal autonomy. This is well and good as a matter of principle but the reality is that as an institution the judicial branch depends upon the good graces of the legislative branch in the appropriation of its budget. Records would show that the Judiciary has the lowest budget allocation compared to the other branches and agencies of the government. The Supreme Court has to suffer the uncomfortable situation of sending its representative to attend the congressional budget hearings to justify or even plead to the politicians for its budgetary needs. This is another issue which puts the judiciary in a weak position in the interplay of governmental power.

The judiciary has no pork barrel, PDAF, or DAF, unlike the Senate and the House of Representatives. There is hardly any opportunity to steal or divert government funds. In this sense the Napoles racket might not be able to thrive in the judicial halls. The Napoles technique, however, could work its way in the fixing, wheeling and dealing game. But this is nothing new. Fixers thrive everywhere even in basket ball games. And who says no judge couldn’t be swayed to play games.

The point is the number of very good judges and justices far outweigh the misfits. Despite the perceived weakness and vulnerability of the courts they still remain the last bastion of justice. My only consolation as a member of the judiciary is that people still trust our courts of law. They keep coming to court because they know they will be heard, and granted relief in the enforcement of their rights and redress of wrong. I fear the day when they would no longer resort to the courts. That would be a dreadful thing to imagine.

The above enlightening piece is authored by the Honorable Judge Ray Alan Drilon of Bacolod City. Reprinted with permission.

Can the US trust the new Iranian president?

One of the first actions of President Rohani was to free some political detainees, and
publicly claiming that Iran has no intention to have possession of nuclear weapons.In fact the news reports came out saying Rohani is willing to close down the uranium refining sites in Natanz, Isfahan and Fordo.

This only means that Rohani is seeing the effects of economic sanctions in his country which were imposed by the US and Europe as a punitive act against Iran's nuclear ambition.

The U.S. should not let its guard down. It is Iran who is feeling the economic pinch and all her future actions will be based on easing the burden on her people, but its nuclear program is still running!
It is an oppurtunity for the U.S. to impose demands on normalizing relations between the U.S. and Iran.
Iran wants normalcy more than the U.S. and Israel. It is a golden opportunity fraught with dangers, the world never know and may not know the current state and extent of Iran's nuclear power development program.

Further reading:

1. spiegel: Rohani willing to decommision nuclear site

2. cnn:Iran's president calls for 'constructive' dialogue, end to 'unhealthy' rivalries

3.
Iran releases prominent political dissidents

Syria's Assad ignore U.N. findings about use of poison gas.

Assad is a crafty politician and is a survivor. Recently, he has denied that his governement forces were behind the chemical attack on Ghouta where rebels were concentrated resulting in more than a thousand deaths, including hundreds of innocent children among the fatalities.

The official U.N. investigation report has painted a clear and convincing evidence that only the Syrian government were capable of of launching the chemical attack based on the analysis of the type of rockets, the composition of the sarin agent and the trajectory of the missiles. Yet, Assad caught red-handed has manufactured its own report to be submitted to Russia, a member of the Security Council with veto powers that rebels were to blame based on the launched position of the rockets as observed by Russian satellite!

It is high time that Europe and the U.S. band together to punish Syria, but with Obama hesitant and tactfully spreading blame by "consulting" the U.S. Congress, the chance of a concerted effort is near zero. We hope that future developments will finaly bring the downfall of Syrias Assad, sharing possibly the tragic end Libya's Mummar Kaddafy.

We also hope that terrorists will not have a part is a future Syrian government.

Further reading:

VOA news: Assad denies link to chemical attack, vows to give up arsenal

Yahoo News: Asssad denies forces conducted chemical attack

Gigi Reyes birthday bash celebrated in Youtube.

I saw this video in my FB notifications. This has been described previously in newspapers. It is about the office of Senator Enrile celebrating the 50th birthday of a Gigi Reyes.

Obama turns chicken, gives Russia, Iran and Hezbollah reasons to crow about

In the news, Obama asks permission alone, without any support from the Dept. of Defense, from Congress for military action against the regime in Syria. Although our post's title may be harsh on Obama, it is a reflection that his hands are tied. You see, Obama will act only if he is backed by the UN Security Council and the US Cogress. In fact, let us not forget he was voted by Americans to get out of foreign wars and interventions.

So we can compare Obama with Reagan who is already secure in American history as a strong leader.But although we can say both are products of their age, let us not forget that Obama is the president of the United States. He could indeed order a military strike on his own, a gamble with political rewards and terrible losses if it goes awry.Whatever, let us give time for Obama who is on his last term.

Syria's Assad will not achieve stability for his country. He has proven himself a butcher of his own country. He can fool a lot of people, but not all the time. We hope he will have the decency to step down or face the wrath of the ordinary Syrian people.

Further reading:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324009304579047542466837078.html

A prophet is not honored in his own country! Panfilo Lacson haunting speech against pork in 2003!

Speech delivered by Senator Pamfilo Lacson in the Senate in 2003!

Mr. President, I rise today on a question of personal and collective privilege.

Last week, we passed the Senate version of the General Appropriations Bill of 2003. No less than the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and principal sponsor of the bill aptly described the 2003 budget as “bare-bones”, thus appealing to his colleagues to contribute their share to arrest the projected budget deficit which our economic managers expect to hit the PhP300B mark by year-end.

I now answer the call.

I call for the scrapping of a very corrupt and corrupting system in our political institutions. All I ask are a few minutes of your precious time - and of your mind.

We now must move to abolish the pork barrel system. We must see its end during our watch without need to mourn its loss. It is a virus of corruption that must die.

And, there is no better hall on this space on earth to make it happen than the Senate - expectedly, a place of men and women with mature age, with honor, with dignity, with integrity. Further, there is no better time to declare its end than now - when the country’s budget deficit is at an alarmingly uncontrollable pace. For the past year, it was PhP213B. Of course, we do not believe the numbers.

One thing, I may say is apodictic. It is still counting. There is nothing in the pork barrel system that gives us pride. There

Voice from the past:

Ping urged pork abolition is only everything that makes us hide in shame.

It should not matter anymore under what name the system sounds. Be it the Countrywide Development Fund, or the Congressional Initiative Allocation, or the Priority Development Assistance Fund. It is, and will remain to be a fund of compulsive corruption.

The name itself traces its origin to the pre-civil war days in the United States when, in periodic fits of generosity, white masters would give their black slaves salted pork in barrels. More often than not, the eagerness of the slaves would result in ugly shoving and rushing to grab more pork than the others. The more pork one could grab for himself, the more triumphant he would appear than the others who were meek and reluctant.

We may not realize it, but the Filipino people would sometimes see us behave like slaves rushing to the pork barrel. A critic has a worse description - that of swines rushing to get more slabs than they can consume.

Mr. President, our countrymen expect to see every peso of their taxes wisely spent on every project. They become profoundly disillusioned everytime they are robbed of it.

Let me say now what they hate to hear. But they must hear what we have been afraid to say.

Under the pork barrel system, only less than half of the taxpayers’ money actually goes to the programs of work. More than half habitually goes to the pockets of corruption. Occasionally, depending on the insatiability of the corrupt, a shameful twenty percent of the fund is left to finance the project. Holy mackerel.

We can pretend all day not to know. But the Filipino people have never been stupid not to see through such pretense.

Let me give the breakdown. It is nasty.

• 2% goes to the Commission on Audit as S.O.P.

• 10% is given to the district engineer and other officials of the Department of Public Works and Highways.

• 2% is passed on to the Barangay Chairman.

• 14% goes to the contractor - 10% in profit and 4% as value-added tax, thank God!

• 5-10%, if the Mayor or Governor so demands.

• And - hold your breath - 20% of project cost is earmarked for the legislator who identifies the project.

Shares sometimes vary depending on greed.

Even the billboards that advertise the proponents of infrastructure projects are overpriced.

Legislators who allocate funds for the purchase of medicines and other pharmaceutical products, as well as school supplies get bigger take. By how much, Mr. President? Some suppliers say, it is, “from here to eternity.”

In a book published in 1998 by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, entitled, “Pork and Other Perks,” the author wrote about vivid accounts of actual pay-offs involving legislators. Thus, a pay-off usually takes place inside the office of legislators. The more sophisticated ones prefer hotel rooms and restaurants. Sulo Hotel in Quezon City is said to be a favorite.

“Pork barrel” every year runs to billions of pesos. I hate to say it. The people hate to hear it. But they lose billions of pesos anyway. They lose these billions to the many deep pockets of corruption.

Mr. President, my esteemed colleagues, there is no saying here that every senator or congressman is corrupt. It is only to say that we have all become suspect. The public has every basis and right to suspect. And we seem not to mind anymore.

Mr. President, those with clear conscience among us do not need to rage. They only need to help those without it.

In this regard, may I take this opportunity to thank the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and some of our colleagues who have expressed support to this advocacy.

One colleague, Senator Joke Arroyo has done something truly admirable: he had not allocated a single centavo from his “pork barrel” allocation for the past year. However, I cannot help but wonder how his PhP200M pork was realigned since it was part and parcel of the 2002 GAA. That is the reason why I want my allocation this year deducted from the proposed 2003 GAA. I have an unsolicited advice to the distinguished gentleman from Makati and the Bicol region - why not slash the 2003 national budget by PhP211M more?

To all of us in this august chamber, maybe we can help alleviate the burgeoning budget deficit by waiving our 2003 pork barrel fund allocations. We can actually do our share, no matter how small, in balancing the budget by doing just that. With twenty-three senators, at PhP211M each, four billion, eight hundred fifty-three million (PhP4.853B) will automatically be deducted from the 2003 national budget.

The Speaker of the House, Jose de Venecia, can equally display his statesmanship by doing the same in the lower house. With more than 200 congressmen, at PhP65M each, that would be another PhP13B at least. Let us be the first to sacrifice for the sake of tiding us over a financial nightmare. I, therefore, call on the Senate and the House of Representatives to voluntarily give up the pork.

Mr. President, it is a simple choice between self-respect and self-aggrandizement.

That is exactly my point. Those among us whose hands remain untainted and unsoiled by the fruits of corruption from the evil “pork” must now be insulated from the temptation it may bring upon us. How? Let’s try scrapping the “pork.” There is life without it!

We all know who we are and what we are on this issue. That is one thing we are all sure about. Mine are not speculations - I definitely have my own sources. The figures I brought out earlier are never a figment of my imagination.

If the “pork barrel” stinks, how much longer must we suffer the stench? I believe it is time to abolish it altogether.

Mr. President, we were elected by the Filipino people to make good laws for the common good and never to make gold under the “pork barrel” system. We are here to make laws, not to build roads and bridges.

We were voted into office to provide check and balance under the principle of separation of powers; and not to accept fat checks to enhance our bank account balance.

Former French President and Prime Minister, the late Jean-Raymond Pompidou, was correct. There is a whale of difference between a politician and a statesman. He said, “while a statesman places himself at the service of the nation, a politician places the nation at his own personal service.”

With the “pork barrel” system, we are all perceived as dirty, corrupt and greedy politicians. Without it, we can all become better statesmen and public servants.

Whenever our committees investigate anomalies in government, does it not occur to us how equally guilty they think the legislators could be?

Mr. President, pardon my asking.

There are all kinds of arguments to defend the “pork.” Its advocates invent new methods and formulas to make every legislator happy. Ironically, in the mind of every Filipino, they are all mad and madly corrupted by it.

I know that the pork barrel system has never been legally flawed. In fact, the Supreme Court has ruled on its constitutionality.

But the Supreme Court never ruled that scrapping the “pork barrel” system would be unconstitutional either.

I can only hope the Senate leadership will take a serious look at this proposal and not simply toss it to the dust heap of the Philippine Senate history.

I am sure to lose some friends and create more enemies in this 12th Congress. I am sure skeptics will taunt me and the cynics will mock me without end.

I remember BAYAN MUNA Party-list Representative Crispin Beltran, he who declared the lowest asset in the lower house at eighty-one thousand pesos, said in a media interview immediately after my position on the “pork barrel” issue first came out, and I quote, “mabuti pa si Lacson ay may ibang pinagkakakitaan na illegal. Paano naman kami na sa “pork barrel” lamang umaasa?” Realizing that what he said was an instant give-away, he paused and started to stutter. Another congressman commented that this representation would not need to make money from the “pork barrel” because supposedly, “I have a lot in some foreign banks.”

Mr. President, if this is my misfortune, so be it. It is not the one I cannot possibly learn to live with.

Mr. President, I derive no pleasure in telling what I have told. I am sure many colleagues derive no pleasure in hearing what they just heard. But the people surely hate what they already know about.

It is time to bring the “pork barrel” system down. Or, we all go down under.

We can surely live without “pork.” Certainly, there is life without it.

After his privileged speech, Senator Lacson was subjected to character assasination. In fact another senator showing envy? or spite? promises to expose Sen . Lacson's sins and his true sexuality!

We thank Sen. Lacson and others like Sen. Joker Arroyo for STEADFASTLY refusing to accept pork, and concentrated instead on their jobs as legislators.

Some senators allowed greed to get the better of them.

We thought senators are bright people, but the recent revelation by Conchita-Carpio Morales of the Ombudsman , Over 1 billion pesos for pork!, showed the following four senators gave or facilitated money to fraudulent NGOs.

According to the report, here are the senators with their reported amounts from PDAF to Napoles managed NGOs

• Senators Bong Revilla Jr. (P483.49 million)
  
• Juan Ponce Enrile (P332.7 million)
  
• Jinggoy Estrada (P262.575 million)
  
• Gringo Honasan (P14.55 million).
  

All senators, except Jinggoy Estrada, have affirmed their signatures on documents which disbursed their funds. If these people are Japanese leaders, most of them would have committed hara kiri for failing the people. These supposed leaders or politicians do not care about the country. They do not love the Filipino people. They only LOVE THEMSELVES. When will public anger rise higher to kick these false statesmen of the country?