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"The people should support the decision by the
Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice Reynato Puno, to investigate
corrupt men in the judiciary. Hoodlums in robes—these are the men
who sell their power to the highest bidder. They should be unmasked.
Many Filipinos know there is
corruption in the judiciary. But they are difficult to ferret out
because corrupt judges deal only with their close friends in the
profession—law school classmates—or relatives. If there are a
few judges (or fiscals) caught receiving money in exchange for a
favorable decision on a case, it is only because of indiscretion.
We look forward to the
investigation of the 12 members of the Court of Appeals based in
Cebu—the so-called Dirty Dozen—who have been suspected of
selling temporary restraining orders (TROs). By the way, TROs have a
price because it provides relief to a client—he or she can buy
time enough to fix a case.
With the Supreme Court at the
head of the investigation body, we should not expect a whitewash on
the case. No less than the Chief Justice has showed interest in the
problem of the Dirty Dozen.
The Court’s decision to press
the investigation is supported by leaders of Cebu, including Rep.
Antonio Cuenco. He said: “For all we know, the alleged sale of
TROs by 12 CA justices dubbed the Dirty Dozen may just be the tip of
the iceberg. This cleansing process is long overdue. Let the ax fall
on the hoodlums in robes.”
Solving water and energy
problems
We always love to scare
ourselves. The latest evidence of this is the headlines about the
potential crisis in the supply of water and energy. The best way to
solve these problems is to call for a meeting of LEDAC which
coordinates the work of the Palace and the legislators.
Sen. Chiz Escudero has an
input on what he calls the looming energy crisis. He said that this
problem needs to be addressed immediately to “abate falling into
the pitfalls of the same problem in the early 90s where the country
resorted to the so-called power purchase adjustment [PPA].”
“PPAs proved to be grossly
disadvantageous to the people and the government. The price is
always more than what is right and is needed, and up until now we
are still paying for it. If we do not heed to the urgency of this
matter, we might be falling into the same trap again.”
Escudero wants Senate to
immediately constitute the Committee on Energy amid the alleged
imminent power crisis. “We are not here to implicate anyone but if
someone out there is responsible for this trouble, we will not
hesitate to run after their heads.” By the way, negotiations are
still ongoing on who will head the several committees in the Senate.
The senator said the Committee on
Energy needs to get down to work to look closely into the root cause
of this problem and immediately identify stopgap measures. “We
would like to know what went wrong. Was it something that could have
been avoided? Was it artificially created?”
Artificially created? Coming from
a senator, that should be intriguing. We should go to the bottom of
this—whether there are interests involved in this looming
shortage. Baka may kumikita na diyan?
Don’t postpone barangay
polls
There is a report from the House
that Speaker Jose de Venecia had asked the Comelec to postpone the
elections for the barangay officials and also those in the
Sangguniang Kabataan (SK). The elections have been set for this
coming October. The reasons advanced by de Venecia are not valid.
BRIEF NOTES. It looks like Sen.
Antonio Trillanes is in for a long legal battle to be a functioning
senator. The Makati RTC judge has ruled that he could not be given
preferential treatment, despite the 11 million votes he got in the
last polls… It is unfortunate that Pimentel and Zubiri families
are now fighting in the field of politics. Coming from Mindanao,
Senator Nene Pimentel and Governor Joe Zubiri are close personal
friends.
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