CHIEF Justice Ma. Lourdes Sereno of the Supreme Court is at loggerheads with Court Administrator Jose Midas Marquez over the issue on the implementation of the judicial affidavit rule.

Sereno refuted a circular issued by Marquez ordering all justices of appellate courts, judges in trial courts and officials of judicial bodies to defer the implementation of Administrative Matter No. 12-8-8-SC or the so-called judicial affidavit rule, which was supposed to take effect on January 1.

However, the court’s Public Information Office on Wednesday issued a statement, saying that Sereno has directed that the request for the deferment of the implementation of the rule be included in the agenda of the Supreme Court’s en banc session next Tuesday.

The contradiction is that in the circular of Marquez, the implementation of the judicial affidavit rule is currently suspended, while on the part of Sereno, the request for suspension is still for deliberation of the court en banc.

The Prosecutors’ League of the Philippines (PLP) asked the High Tribunal to defer the implementation of the rule for at least a year in criminal cases.

Associate Justice Roberto Abad was said to have been the one who ordered the suspension of the application of the affidavit from January 1, 2013 to January 1, 2014, in response to the letter sent by the PLP.

Abad reportedly met with a number of prosecutors from the Department of Justice. He, along with Associate Justices Diosdado Peralta and Lucas Bersamin, also met with officers of the prosecutors’ league on December 21 to discuss the latter’s concerns regarding the rule.

Under the Judicial Affidavit Rule, when a party (whether plaintiff or defendant) questions his own witness, he no longer needs to place the witness on the stand. The party or his lawyer merely submits the written sworn statement or the judicial affidavit of his witness in a question-and-answer format.

The rule, which was approved unanimously in September, also requires each party to the case to attach all his documentary evidence to the judicial affidavit, which in turn, must be submitted at least five days before the pre-trial or preliminary conference of the case.

The new rule was seen to reduce time for presenting the testimonies of witnesses by about two-thirds, following a pilot test in Quezon City courts.

Court insiders said that there has been “bad blood” between Sereno and Marquez, who is tagged as an ally of former chief justice Renato Corona, whom Sereno replaced.