That Cebuanos are historically and fiercely independent-minded is a function of their sense of patriotism and acute political acumen. In the ongoing impeachment trial of the Chief Justice, the Cebu chapter of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) mirrored such intellectual sheen and independence when it fully supported the prosecution of the Chief Justice. Despite the possible retaliatory repercussions its posture might take on individual law practices, principle overwhelmed utility.
Defying default demagoguery, the stand was in direct contrast to that taken by the national association’s chief executive who unabashedly and quite defiantly supported the Chief Justice. Never mind the Aquino administration’s unconditional support for the IBP reflected in a P30-million subsidy for its Expanded Legal Aid Program in 2011 and another P30 million forthcoming this year.
The disunity is an eloquent commentary on the divisiveness that the impeachment issue inflicts not only on a perplexed public confused by the rules of evidence and other trial technicalities but also on legal practitioners—members of the Philippine Bar who speak the language and presumably know better.
As a comic aside to such seriously ideological, if not plainly utilitarian divisiveness, what appears as the lone stand of the IBP leadership against broad-based chapter membership positions across our archipelago debunks the very nature of the IBP’s “integrated” moniker. Dis-integrated might be more apt.
As an association of lawyers, the IBP seeks to remain apolitical and insulated from political vagaries. Within its organization, it monitors and upholds ethical practices within the profession and thus raises the bar, so to speak.
In Bohol the local IBP chapter allied itself with the Cebuano IBP chapter. Against disunity, there remains principled solidarity and we are heartened. Polled against a greater number, including those who are not lawyers, the lone stand of the IBP’s national leadership is getting lonelier as more are revealed in the trial justifying the charge to prosecute and eventually remove the Chief Justice from office.
Nothing divides and tears apart as bitterly as does a betrayal, especially where trust, more than just simply shared professions, is concerned. Trust is vested, sometimes even surrendered willingly. We placed our trust in our leaders and even more on those we leave to judge us, vesting vast and even supreme authorities.
As we revert quite briefly to the third of the eight Articles of Impeachment and proceed to the rest, from the third onward, betrayal of public trust attains increasing importance and becomes our focal point. After all, with Article II, we believed that questions surrounding the Chief Justice’s Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net worth (SALN) were not simply of the ministerial act of filing but, more important, of statements sworn as true. Never mind unexplained wealth or worse, ill-gotten wealth. We are concerned with elemental, albeit unspoken, truthfulness, which absence in the judiciary reeks of betrayal of trust.
Although technically “un-justiciable,” when charged against the Chief Justice, it attains the severity of “other high crimes” where the 1987 Constitution added “betrayal of public trust” under Article XI, Section 2 to a list of impeachable offenses.
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