"x x x.
It took the Supreme Court three years – five, if you count from the date when the original petition was filed – to uphold President Aquino’s Executive Order No. 2, which withdrew midnight appointments made by his predecessor Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Among the midnight appointees – named by GMA in May 2010 when Benigno Simeon Aquino III was already known to be the president-elect – was Renato Corona. The explanation given was that the vacancy for chief justice could not wait for the handover of power to be filled. Later that same year (they can be quick when they want to), the Supreme Court (SC) under Corona upheld his appointment, ruling that the judiciary was not covered by the election ban on permanent appointments.
We all know what happened afterwards: President Aquino, seeing Corona as a GMA loyalist who would be a major roadblock along the tuwid na daan, persuaded congressional allies to impeach the chief justice. Corona, through foot-in-mouth disease, sealed his own downfall when he faced the Senate impeachment court. Senators later reaped the rewards of Corona’s conviction, in the form of the Disbursement Acceleration Program.
Five of the appointees challenged EO 2 before the SC in 2010. The tribunal remanded the case to the Court of Appeals, which upheld EO 2 in September 2012. The case was then returned to the SC.
The petitioners may still seek a reconsideration of the SC ruling, so the case can drag on for another three years.
If the nation’s highest court takes years to resolve such an important issue, we can’t expect lower courts to perform any better.
x x x."
