On balance

On purely legal grounds, defense has had the advantage. It’s not merely because defense can always hire de campanilla lawyers, former chief justices and justices most of all. Serafin Cuevas used to be a former Supreme Court justice himself and knows the law, at least academically, inside and out. He has taught the subject for years now, twitting the prosecution at one point last Thursday by saying some of his students hadn’t been listening in class.

By contrast, congressmen, however they are also lawyers, have not been practicing their legal pitches, they have been practicing their campaign ones. Certainly, they have not set foot in court in a long time and done any trials. Defense had the overwhelming legal advantage during Joseph Estrada’s impeachment trial, defense has the overwhelming legal advantage in this, Renato Corona’s, impeachment trial.

But it’s so this time also because prosecution keeps dropping the ball. Two particular occasions stand out. One was when they began with Article 2 rather than Article 1 without apprising the impeachment court of their plan, which wasn’t a blunder in itself until they answered the court’s objections by saying they weren’t prepared for Article 1. When they could always have said that though they had prepared for all the articles of impeachment, they preferred to start with Article 2 because it laid the premise for their case. Naturally they were widely panned for it, though a great deal of the panning was out of context. The general impression was that the Boy Scouts, who were laging handa, could have done a better job.

Two was when they formulated Article 2 in this wise: “The respondent is likewise suspected and accused of having accumulated ill-gotten wealth.” This time around, it wasn’t just Cuevas who objected to it, though his own objection made sense: “Allegation of suspicion does not suffice in the rules of pleadings.” Alan Peter Cayetano put it this way: “I’m trying to figure out what the prosecution is charging the Chief Justice with.” How hard could it have been to say, “Corona falsified his assets in his tax forms to hide ill-gotten wealth”?

On all other grounds, prosecution has the advantage but needs to pursue it more sharply. Prosecution did score a major point in the submission, and admission, of Corona’s statements of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALNs.) Cuevas of course has objected to any discussion of hidden wealth or corruption on the ground that it is not expressly specified in Article 2. Common sense however, which is a huge part of this, the trial playing out to the public, must tell you that the point of presenting Corona’s SALNs is precisely to show that it is proof of hidden wealth. To go alone by the properties Corona has declared, which are grossly undervalued, he deserves to be impeached.

Corona himself implicitly acknowledges how the thing cannot be swept under the rug with a legal broom by going around arguing his case before the public. Before the impeachment, he told a radio station that he had nothing to hide, if people could find the houses that prosecution alleges are his, they are welcome to them. A thing that could tempt homeless Filipinos to join in the hunt. Just as well, only lately, he texted reporters: “If I got all my assets through illegal means, will I be careless/stupid enough to put [these] in my name, [or those of] my wife [and] my children?” He misses the point. Of course he got his assets legally, it was how he got the means to get those assets that is not.

An Arroyo ally who refused to be identified told the Inquirer that Corona’s SALNs by themselves mean nothing. All government officials, he said, undervalue their properties, including the 188 congressmen who signed Corona’s impeachment. Three things are wrong with that argument. One is that not everyone makes out a condo unit in Bellagio to be a house in Ermita. Two is that if the congressmen undervalue their assets, then by all means run after them too. The argument is just a variation of the bishops’ favorite defense of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo after she stole the vote: Everyone cheats anyway. And three is that not everyone is a chief justice. Chief justices are supposed to act wisely, not miserably.

Cuevas might object to any discussion of these things in the name of the law, but in the end that won’t help defense, that will help prosecution. It gives the impression that Corona does have something to hide. The general sentiment is already one of impatience. The senators have expressed it, the public has expressed it: The trial is taking too long, bogged down by Cuevas’ unceasing legal filibustering.

Ping Lacson may very well have captured the public sentiment when he said that after seeing defense pose one legal obstacle after another, he could see why justice was so hard to get in this country. “Now I understand why poor litigants seek justice outside the courtroom, either by [taking] the law in their own hands to settle the score against a rich and powerful respondent, or turn to the New People’s Army.”

Cuevas may not know it, but it’s not just Corona who’s on trial here. He is too. The whole concept of law as having nothing to do with justice, as being a means to get around reason and common sense, is too. You look at the impeachment trial and the first thing you think is “Thank God it is being televised, thank God we are witnesses to it.” If Cuevas and company can do what they are doing right before our eyes, think of what they can do beyond them. Think of what they have done in their courts, think of what Corona has done in his court. Little wonder they can reopen cases they have ruled upon with finality three times. There are no limits to the miracles you can perform there.

On balance, well, despite the harang, truth will out. The world is watching, and will guarantee it.