Inappealable—US constitution

The legal drama is over. The verdict has been delivered. The people have rejoiced. And Renato Corona is no longer a chief justice and now is back to being a private citizen. Twenty-three senator-judges in flowing Black Nazarene-inspired robes eloquently spoke for or against Corona, as millions of Filipinos were riveted on their TV screens, watching how each of them would decide the fate of the Chief Justice of the land. Twenty of them voted in conscience while three voted in flesh.

Remarkably enough, we, the people, mustered more than the required number of votes to dethrone Corona as the chief magistrate of the nation.

He was exposed to own a total asset worth P300 million (condominiums and properties, and dollar and peso bank deposits). How and where did he get all this money? There is no way he could have earned or amassed such vast wealth from government employment.

Whether it was by divine will or accident, we must applaud his lead lawyer, Justice Serafin Cuevas, for doing a good job for the people, by presenting two major witnesses for the defense, who turned out to be the star witnesses for the prosecution. The two witnesses blew the lid of the Pandora’s box wide open. Their testimonies became the very foundation of the “guilty” verdict that Filipinos wanted.

Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales’ well-documented testimony about Corona’s hidden wealth, as well as Corona’s own revelation and admission that he has more than P80 million, apart from his $2.4 million in bank deposits, which he did not declare in his statements of assets, liabilities and net worth, hammered the final nail in his coffin.

We must cheer the prosecution, the defense, the witnesses, the Filipino people, and most laudably Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile (for being sharp as a lawyer and for ably presiding over the impeachment court with the dexterity of a Mozart conducting a thousand-piece symphony orchestra).

Any talk about appealing the decision is rubbish. There is no such thing. It is true that impeachment is a nascent experience in our nation’s political life, but the law clearly says that the “sole authority” to try impeachment cases rests with the Senate as the court and trier. And an impeachment trial, being “sui generis,” which means constituting a class unique, peculiar and “of its own,” the decision of the impeachment court, being the special tribunal assigned by law for this sole purpose, is final and executory.

This is based on Article 1, Section 3 of the US constitution, which our own Constitution literally copied.

—MANUEL BIASON, Esq.,

mannybiason@verizon.net