Why naming the next Philippine chief justice is a big deal

Why naming the next chief justice is a big deal


The rigmarole on whether President Arroyo can appoint Chief Justice Reynato Puno’s successor when he retires this May 17 underscores the crucial role of the head of the judiciary in the life of the nation.

If President Arroyo names Puno’s successor, that chief justice and his court will have plenty of problems in their hands. Legal and constitutional questions that might arise from three possible events related to the May 10 presidential elections.

The possibilities are: One, there won’t be an elected president proclaimed by noon of June 30, when Arroyo’s term ends; two, Arroyo might just extend her term as holdover president because of the first; and three, she might be elected speaker of the House of Representatives and the speaker being No. 4 in the line of succession, she could take over as acting president, in the absence of a duly elected president, vice president, and Senate president (there will only be 12 incumbent senators after June 30 and 12 is a minority in a chamber of 24 senators).
Why won’t there be an elected president? Well, one reason is that this Comelec under Chairman Jose Melo is one of the most inexperienced poll bodies ever assembled. It has very little experience in managing an election, either manual or automated. Two, we are trying automation for the first time and doing it 100 percent and nationwide, and we expect it to be perfect, right away – an impossibility, considering that both cellular phone and electricity coverage is not 100 percent nationwide. ATM, the most pervasive computer, is not even nationwide. Some 500 towns have no bank branches.
The United States has been computerizing its elections for the past 60 years and still, they are at 80 percent level.
As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told students in Manila in her recent visit, “based on our own experience, there will be some bumps in the road. When we moved toward automation, we had some problems…There could be some dry runs, not of a full election, but trying out the technology, making sure you know how it works, educating voters about it.”
Do we know how the Comelec automation works? No. Have voters been educated? No. Is Comelec up to the job? No.
Yet, automation must deliver 100 percent. Why? Because the presidential elections as this column predicted earlier, will be very, very tight. The latest Pulse Asia survey shows Senators Noynoy Aquino and Manny Villar in a tie, a dead heat, four months before May 10. In 1992, the presidency was won by Fidel Ramos by just four percent. In 2004, the presidency was won by Gloria Arroyo by just 3.5 percent.
So if the Comelec counting machines are able to count only 95 percent of the votes, that will be unacceptable. There won’t be an elected president, because the remaining five percent will decide the winner. Since there is no winner, there is no president. And since there is no president, President Arroyo could just conceivably stay on as holdover president. That’s infinitely better than having a General Tyrant Power or Sgt. Do Little taking over in a military dictatorship.

This may explain perhaps all those two-page spread ads of President Arroyo, making a litany of her achievements, and her recent accessibility to media. She is telling the people, “I am okay – as president”, after June 30.

Proof of difficulties is the Comelec’s endlessly postponing the printing of ballots. Unlike in past elections when the ballot was generic, that is applicable to almost every LGU, ballots this time will be customized by district, town, city, and province. The ballots for the first district of Manila, for instance, will be different from the ballots of the second district, third, fourth and so on, because there are different sets of candidates for each district. That kind of ballot takes time to print and is very difficult to deliver into every nook and cranny of the country – on time.

We come now to the Supreme Court chief justice, the new one. Arroyo’s takeover will be brought before the high court.

But then by that time, Arroyo would have appointed all 14 justices and the chief justice – 15-0. It takes only a majority vote, or eight, to get a favorable ruling for Mrs. Arroyo taking over as president, acting or whatever.
Relatedly, as speaker, Mrs. Arroyo could proceed to convert the House into a constituent assembly by itself since there is no majority in the Senate. That constituent assembly could bring about a parliamentary system with her as prime minister.



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