The Aquino administrations’ high profile campaign on “good governance and less corruption” was unmasked as lacking in substance and performance by Global Integrity, a worldwide monitoring and rating outfit based in Washington D.C.
The latest report of Global Integrity gave the Philippines a “very weak” overall rating of 57, which is down from the “moderate” score of 71 in 2008.
The downgraded ranking validates the previous finding of the Hong Kong-based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy, Ltd. (PERC) that the Philippines’ corruption rating worsened to 8.9 from 8.25 in a scale of one to 10 in a survey covering the period from November 2010 to February 2011.
The “good news website” proposed by Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda to reverse President Aquino’s dwindling performance ratings will either be an empty page for dearth of heart-warming stories or a perjured page of conjured “good news”.
The trial by publicity and conviction through campus speeches being waged by President Aquino for the ouster of Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez directly influence and demean the discretion and judgment of Senators who are inveigled to act like Pontius Pilates to subject their decision to the vagaries of public opinion.
By actively, publicly and incessantly campaigning for the impeachment of the Ombudsman, President Aquino has violated the Constitution which exclusively reserves to and vests on Congress the power to impeach and convict impeachable officials.
Under Article XI of the Constitution, the “House of Representatives shall have the exclusive power to initiate all cases of impeachment” [Section 3 (1)], while the “Senate shall have the sole power to try and decide all cases of impeachment” [Section 3 (6)].
The President has no constitutional role in impeachment proceedings. In fact, under Section 19 of Article VII the President is expressly prohibited from granting reprieves, commutations and pardons in cases of impeachment.
The President has invaded the exclusive prerogative of the House of Representatives when he marshaled the forces of his Liberal Party to impeach the Ombudsman.
The continuing campaign of the President to oust the Ombudsman infringes on the sole power of the Senate to adjudicate the impeachment case against the respondent Ombudsman.
Galvanizing public opinion for the conviction of the Ombudsman intrudes on the constitutional authority of Senators to solely judge the culpability or lack of culpability of the Ombudsman.
The President must desist from culpable violation of the Constitution in his merciless penchant to oust the Ombudsman.
President Aquino fully deserves congratulations for his unequivocal endorsement of the enactment of the reproductive health and responsible parenthood bill (House Bill No. 4244) as the “correct and conscientious thing to do” during the graduation rites of the University of the Philippines on Palm Sunday.
The President’s statement that his steadfast commitment to the controversial measure is at the risk of excommunication is yet his strongest declaration against the Catholic hierarchy’s opposition to the measure.
The resolute and courageous stance of the President is a magna cum laude statement which he could elevate to summa cum laude status by categorically certifying to Congress the bill as a priority measure.
The allied advocacies for reproductive health and responsible parenthood have the following common salient features:
1) Freedom of informed choice;
2) No demographic or population target is espoused;
3) Poverty reduction or alleviation is a principal agenda;
4) Voluntary family planning based on freedom of informed choice is promoted;
5) All kinds of family planning methods from the natural to the artificial which are legal, medically safe and effective are made accessible to acceptors; and
6) Abortion remains to be prohibited and penalized.
Only Malacanang’s braggadocio and repeated breast-beatings have escalated, while President Aquino’s trust and approval ratings and some of the country’s economic indicators ominously plunged.
The post-election euphoria has not only begun to vanish, but the Aquino administration’s lackadaisical performance and anemic implementation of its ballyhooed socio-economic agenda have started to surface.
Following in the heels of Aquino’s five percentage point decline in performance and trust scores nationwide, are the following adverse ratings of major economic indicators:
1. The recent ASEAN business survey showed that majority of foreign investors would refuse to invest in the Philippines;
2. The Philippines’ corruption rating worsened to 8.9 from 8.25 in a scale of one to 10 in a survey covering the period from November 2010 to February 2011 which was conducted by the Hong Kong-based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy, Ltd. (PERC);
3. The National Statistics Office (NSO) reported that the unemployment rate hit 7.4 percent in January 2011 even before thousands of displaced Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) returned as a result of the ongoing crises in the Middle East and Northern Africa, while Aquino’s disapproval rating on “creation of more jobs” went up from 11 percent to 19 percent; and
4. The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas reported that the Filipino consumer confidence index for the first quarter of 2011 went down to -23.1 percent from -8.5 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010 as the Aquino administration fails to address the spiralling of prices of fuel and basic commodities.
The President’s disapproval rating on “controlling inflation” ballooned to 31 percent from 21 percent and on “reducing poverty” to 26 percent from 18 percent.
These poor economic indicators cannot just be swept under the braggadocio rug.
Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III wants to make senators approximate Pontius Pilate by allowing public opinion to influence the outcome of the impeachment trial of respondent Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez
A senator sitting as a judge in the impeachment court must make his own judgment based on his personal appreciation of the evidence and the law irrespective of the temper and whim of public opinion.
Otherwise, the Senate’s power as an impeachment court would be eroded and avoided if the ombudsman’s culpability can be partly determined in an opinion poll.
However, the constitution categorically mandates that “The Senate shall have the sole power to try and decide all cases of impeachment” after the senators have first taken an “oath or affirmation.”
The senators cannot share their constitutional authority and responsibility with anyone, not even with the people through the variables of public opinion.
“Washing one’s hands” is a pathetic evasion of a sublime duty.
