Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano is one of the few senators whose views on many public issues I have learned to respect so highly. But his behavior on the second day of the hearing of the impeachment case against Chief Justice Renato Corona has disappointed me no end, indeed! I am referring to his sudden manifestation of frontal disagreement with the ruling of Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile, as chair of the impeachment court, denying the motion of the prosecution to subpoena the Chief Justice, his wife and several members of his family, to appear as witnesses during the hearing. Whether or not Enrile’s ruling was legally right, or legally wrong, was certainly beside the point. The point is Cayetano’s manifestation of disagreement was common-sensically unexpected, inexcusable and out of place.
Why? Well, firstly, the prosecution’s motion was submitted to the impeachment court as early as Jan. 12, or four days before the scheduled start of the hearing. As such, any right-thinking person will refuse to believe that the motion had not been subjected to a prior caucus among the senator-judges, in which their respective opinions were surely first heard and objectively tackled. Secondly, the ruling, as read, was long enough to have comprehensively covered all the pros and cons—which, in turn, must have necessarily become moot and irrelevant, as far as each individual senator-judge was concerned, soon after the ruling had been formalized. In other words, at least for the purpose of that particular ruling, there need not be any undue surprises when it was finally read on Jan. 17, such as that which had quite unfortunately come from Cayetano.
By the way, wasn’t Cayetano present in the caucus? Most presumably yes. But even if he was absent, methinks his behavior in the hearing was totally unacceptable. The more unacceptable—as a matter of fact, monumentally pathetic—it became when he kept strongly opposing Enrile even after the prosecution had eventually manifested its virtual submission to the ruling. For a while, one might have wondered if Cayetano knew he was a senator-judge, or a lawyer for the prosecution! At any rate, looking at the senators who raised their hands for or against the ruling when Enrile had finally decided that the house be divided openly, some spectators could have developed—rightly or wrongly, yet very prematurely—a rough rundown of who would ultimately vote for Corona’s acquittal or conviction. On the other hand, if Cayetano’s behavior was not a sign of political grandstanding—he is due for reelection next year—I do not know what is!
—RUDY L. CORONEL,
rudycoronel2004@yahoo.com