TIMES OPINION BY EFREN DANAO: BLUE RIBBON MADE AN ILL-ADVISED MOVE
MANILA, MARCH 8, 2011 (MANILA TIMES) By Efren L. Danao - THE Senate blue-ribbon committee was ill-advised in pursuing its inquiry into the alleged culpability of Ombudsman Mer-ceditas Gutierrez in the plea bargaining agreement with former military comptroller Maj/Gen. Carlos Garcia. The committee, headed by Sen. TG Guingona, made matters worse by coming out with a partial committee report last Thursday.
Guingona and members of the blue-ribbon know that Gutierrez is facing an impeachment complaint before the House. Since the House is certain to transmit the Articles of Impeachment against her to the Senate, prudence dictated that the soon-to-be senator-judges should take their hands off the issue against her.
Had the likes of former Sen. Pong Biazon, now a congressman representing Muntinlupa, headed the blue-ribbon, I'm sure the inquiry would have been suspended. I remember that when Senator Biazon was chairman of the Senate Committee on Defense, he led the inquiry into the alleged involvement of military men in the Hello Garci controversy. He went at the probe with gusto. All military officers linked to the scandal were summoned; the military intelligence officer who bugged the phone of then Comelec Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano and taped his conversation with then President Arroyo was given Senate protection.
Biazon could have soaked himself with the publicity generated by his inquiry but he is of a different breed. When he learned that the Hello Garci scandal was alleged as one of the impeachable offenses committed by Mrs. Arroyo, he stopped all proceedings. This meant goodbye to the full coverage by radio, television, and newspapers of the Senate inquiry. He had no regrets, however. I remember him as even smiling when he told Senate reporters that his committee was suspending its inquiry.
Biazon is no lawyer, but his sense of propriety is probably higher than those of some lawyer-senators. He said that the impeachment case might reach the Senate and he did not want to prejudge the issue. He was, and still is, a member of the Liberal Party. He was then with the opposition. He could have used the inquiry as a potent weapon against the Arroyo administration. Yet, he desisted. No wonder, he remains high in the esteem of the public.
He ploughed back into the inquiry soon after the House Committee on Justice junked the impeachment complaint against Mrs. Arroyo.
Why couldn't the Senate blue-ribbon committee headed by Senator Guingona do the same? It could have suspended the hearing while the impeachment complaint against Gutierrez was pending before the House. After all, the committee members will have all the time in the world to look into all the details of the complaint when the Articles of Impeachment reach the chamber. At least, this would made the senators look more fair. The Senate blue-ribbon committee, unfortunately, failed to rise to the yardstick set by Biazon and other worthy senators.
'Height of betrayal of public trust?' Nobody is sure that the plea bargain agreement entered into by government prosecutors and former military comptroller M/Gen. Carlos Garcia would form part of any Articles of Impeachment still to be prepared by the House. This may not matter for the blue-ribbon report has already concluded that the Ombudsman had been betraying public trust in several other cases, which could conceivably include cases already cited in the impeachment complaints. Thus, the partial report said: "… the Ombudsman has made it a habit not only to sit on cases, thereby delaying them, but also ignoring the presence of the grounds with which to file cases."
It described the alleged delays in the resolution of cases as "the height of betrayal of public trust."
There, you have it. Even if an impeachment trial is held in the Senate against the Ombudsman, Guingona need not attend it to form a conclusion. He need not read and study the pieces of evidence to be submitted by the House prosecution panel. After all, he is already convinced that Gutierrez had committed the impeachable offense of "betrayal of public trust."
This said, I'm consoled by the statements of Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile that the Senate will conduct a fair trial. Let's hear it from JPE: "When I handle a case here involving the fortune, the rights and the well being of anyone, I have no friends. I have no enemies. I clear my mind of all biases and partialities. I will decide the case if I have to decide it on the basis of clear and convincing evidence."
JPE gives proper perspective to the nature of the impeachment against the Ombudsman: "Impeachment trial is a judicial function of the Senate although they say it is political. When you are elected, it becomes a political issue but we are dealing here with appointees, with people who have not gained their jobs from the electorate. We have to look at it with more circumspection."
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Chief News Editor: Sol Jose Vanzi
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