Noy’s puppy dog in the SC

FRONTLINE

By Ninez Cacho-Olivares

So who says Noynoy’s Chief Justice, Lourdes Sereno, is independent of the Malacañang tenant along with her claims of being an impartial chief justice?

Her latest move, that of her issuing, on her own, a temporary restraining order (TRO), without this being confirmed by, at the very least, the majority of the associate justices, while stopping the Commission on Elections (Comelec) en banc from unseating Imus Cavite Mayor Emmanuel Maliksi, is proof positive that she jumps when her master in Malacañang orders her to do so.

In the Comelec en banc, with a vote of 4 to 2, Maliksi was unseated by Chairman Sixto Brillantes, Elias Yusoph, Rene Sarmiento and Armando Velasco due to alleged election fraud.

Commissioners Lucenito Tagle and Christian Robert Lim did not take part.

Maliksi, as most Philippine political observers know, is aligned with Noynoy and his Liberal Party (LP). As a matter of record, some weeks back, Noynoy, in a mass LP swearing in of recruits in Cavite, enthusiastically endorsed Ireno Maliksi for the gubernatorial post in that province. The Maliksis are identified with Noynoy and the LP.

It is also of record that Sereno, as an associate justice virtually screamed at then Chief Justice (CJ) Renato Corona and the associate justices who voted along with him for issuing a TRO against the Department of Justice (DoJ) on its hold departure order (HDO) against Gloria Arroyo and her spouse, Mike, insisting that a TRO should not be issued immediately, and that matters should first be deliberated by the justices, then even going further by disclosing, in her dissenting opinion, the details of what can be termed as private and confidential deliberations — clearly for the use of Noynoy and his attack dog, Justice Chief Leila de Lima, to destroy Corona.

Yet now, she, on her own, and without even giving her associate justices, especially senior associate justice Antonio Carpio, the courtesy of discussing the issuance of a TRO, does that to which she herself had objected, when she was a junior associate justice. And to think that the TRO against the DoJ in the case of the HDO on Gloria was not the sole action of Corona but the action of the majority of justices in the Supreme Court (SC).

Also, in the case of the petitions for a stoppage of the Cybercrime law from being enforced, she also reportedly refused to issue a TRO on the 15 cases involving the same case, claiming that there was a lack of justices to decide whether to grant a TRO. Yet she issues a TRO on her own?

In this case of Maliksi, she moved fast and alone, issuing a TRO on her own.

How then can she explain this turnaround?

There can only be one reason: Noynoy and the LP leaders wanted the Comelec order to unseat the Imus mayor, Emmanuel Maliksi, stopped by the high court, and as she could not get the justices to go along with her, she issued the TRO on her own — as ordered by the Malacañang tenant.

Independent and impartial, Sereno claims she is?

Under the rules of SC, Sereno, as chief justice, does have the authority to issue a TRO on her own but it should also be confirmed by the SC en ban on its next regular meeting.

But if that TRO was so important to be issued, why then did not Sereno bring this up last Tuesday when the high court had a TRO? Why claim that not all the justices were around?

The answer probably is that she wouldn’t have gotten the numbers from the justices to issue that TRO.

Also, in the Maliksi case, this issue went into a regular en banc session but Sereno opted to issue the TRO solely and even without the recommendation from the ponente, Justice Carpio.

The Maliksi case had already been assigned to Carpio.

Carpio who was assigned to make a draft decision on the case did not make any recommendation for a TRO. However on Oct.11, the Tribune report said, Sereno issued a TRO on her own against the Comelec and in favor of Maliksi, effective immediately.

There can hardly be any doubt that Sereno has become the judicial puppy dog of Noynoy given her inexplicable solo move. And that, dear Watson, is the reason Noynoy appointed her to the top SC post. Elementary, really.