THERE IS NO REASON TO THINK THAT THE QUESTIONS Justice Antonio Carpio asked during the Supreme Court hearing on the controversial GRP-MILF agreement reflect anything more than the justice’s own line of thinking. Even the questions and comments of Justice Adolf Azcuna—particularly, that “on its face (the MOA) is patently illegal under our present laws”—are nothing more than his opinion. As the executive department so adores telling the nation, everything is a numbers game. And never has the administration enjoyed superiority in numbers in the high court, as it does now.

Which is not to cast aspersions on the integrity of the Supreme Court as an institution, or on the individual members of the court. However, lawyers and laymen alike read a lot into how justices express and comport themselves during hearings, and for every scathing Carpio there is a placid and obliging Corona.

For Justice Renato Corona, the whole hearing was much ado about nothing—because, devoid of signatures, the MOA, legally speaking, does not exist. This seems to us the most productive approach to the whole issue of the MOA, from an administration point of view. When asked to produce the controversial document, President Macapagal-Arroyo’s lawyers invoked executive privilege. When the House of Representatives did the same thing last week, the executive department invoked the same thing. This is, of course, a risky approach to take; for if forced to reveal the document—and not just to the public, but in a court of law and, officially, before the legislature—the President becomes culpable for its contents.

On the other hand, to insist that it really doesn’t matter what the document contains because the document has no legal standing, and thus cannot be judged one way or another by the Supreme Court, means the President will get her way without anyone establishing culpability, one way or another. And considering that the current composition of the majority in the Court has been borne out by case after case since the Senate was thwarted on the question of Romulo Neri, it is not unreasonable to expect the numbers to hold firm in this case.

There is a pattern of executive thinking with regard to other state institutions—and the public—that has long been obvious. If someone argues something is black, insist it is white; if he proves it is black, then say you never said white, but actually meant grey. And if that fails, then argue that black is the new white or vice versa. Confusing? That is the point. The administration will do to the courts, Congress, and the public as it has done in the case of failed senatorial aspirant Prospero Pichay.

The Palace announced he would be OWWA chief. A public ruckus ensued. The Palace said no, he wouldn’t be OWWA chief but, maybe, Customs commissioner. Another ruckus. The Palace then said he would not be appointed to anything, and the noise died down. Then the Palace releases an official letter a month later, referring to “Administrator Pichay,” and there we have it. The first news seems to have been right all along, but when the headlines proved damaging, it was sidelined until a more auspicious time.

But the nation doesn’t have the luxury of time with regard to the controversial GRP-MILF deal. The League of Provinces came out with full-page ads yesterday, emphatically appealing to the Supreme Court to settle the question of the agreement’s legality. It also appealed to the chief executive to renegotiate the agreement, and while doing so, to avoid the secretiveness that surrounded the negotiations and has triggered national unease and even outrage.

The language of the provincial leaders was, however, tactful and respectful of an executive who holds their fiscal wellbeing in her hands. Congress, seething with unrest over the agreement but salivating over prospects of constitutional amendments, is in the same canine-like position: it can snarl, but it cannot bite the hand that feeds it. In a sense, both are sending a signal to the Supreme Court: its members are beyond the long arm of Malacañang, unless, like the Supreme Court during martial law, the justices are so craven as to actually fear for their jobs.