i Report Issue No. 3 2005 - Philippine Center for Investigative ...

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HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN? In 1998, Gloria Arroyo, shown here with running mate Jose de Venecia (left), ran for vice president with the endorsement of the incumbent, Fidel V. Ramos, who rescued the embattled Gloria when she faced the worst crisis of her presidency in July. SOS System under Stress SHEILA S. CORONEL Gloriagate has put all our institutions under scrutiny, perhaps more scrutiny than they can w i t h s t a n d . C e r t a i n l y more scrutiny than they had been subjected to in the past. Since the scandal over jueteng broke out in May and the “Hello Garci” tapes were made public in June, the spotlight has been on the presidency. Accusations of bribery and election fraud have soiled the integrity of the president and of the office she holds. While Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has put up a valiant effort to fend off these accusations and has tenaciously hung on to power despite the odds, her credibility has been damaged severely, putting her continued stay in office in great doubt. For now, her biggest ally is not really, as some assume, former president Fidel Ramos. It is public cynicism. Ramos should of course get the credit (or the blame) for rescuing President Arroyo on July 8, when her government was shaken by the resignations of eight Cabinet members who also asked that she leave. Malacañang insiders say that in the late afternoon of the same day, Arroyo came very close to resignation. But the truth is that she remains in office not just because Ramos rushed to the presidential palace with his rescue remedy of charter change. She is there largely because the public is skeptical of everyone else who aspires to replace her. There is a sense among many Filipinos that our politics is so damaged, removing Arroyo will not make much of a difference. Gloria Arroyo is therefore president not by virtue of the public trust. On the contrary, the opinion polls show her trust rating dropping as the crisis drags. She remains in Malacañang largely because there is a dearth of public enthusiasm for the alternatives to her presidency, whether it is Vice President Noli de Castro, people power, or a revolutionary government run by either the Left or the Right. As some analysts have astutely pointed out, the crisis of the Arroyo presidency also exposed a much deeper malaise: a vacuum in political leadership that leaves many Filipinos in a bind—dissatisfied with the president they have, but equally antsy about those who hope to succeed her. We are at the moment not so much in an impasse, but in the painful process of forging a consensus about the president and her future. The anti-Gloria forces in both Congress and outside are hopeful that the impeachment, with its menu of scandal and more scandal, will lead toward a broad public agreement that the president is guilty as charged. They think that as more witnesses emerge from the woodwork, attesting to bribery and electoral fraud, the public—especially the politicized and influential sectors that make up the Edsa constituency—will arrive at the moral certainty that the president is culpable, thereby compelling Congress to convict her, and failing that, setting off an Edsa 4 that will force her ouster. At the same time, the president’s supporters are hoping that the impeachment will acquit her, thereby restoring trust in the presidency and allowing her to serve out the remaining fourand-a-half years of her term. They are keeping various other options open, including charter change, which, if successful, would divert the energies of legislators from impeachment and if needed, pave the way for a graceful exit for the president. The outcome can go either way. The president may fall. But she can also survive, if not till the end of her term, at least a bruising impeachment trial that will lead to her acquittal and eventual, if premature, exit from power. Whatever the outcome, the crucial question is whether our institutions can survive the journey. Can they live up to the expectations of most Filipinos—a credible process that holds a sitting president accountable, and if it takes place at all, a process of constitutional change that is 20 PHILIPPINE CENTER FOR INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM I REPORT
C H A R T E R C H A N G E driven not so much by narrow and short-term interests but the bigger, longer-term interests of the nation? The burden now is on Congress. Whatever the result of the impeachment, the key question for both Houses is whether they can rise above partisan and pecuniary interests and the temptation to play up to the gallery in order resolve the issues linked to alleged presidential wrongdoing in a manner acceptable to the majority of the people. Otherwise, this latest episode could result, if not in an outburst of people power, then with the already tattered credibility of Congress in shriveled shreds. Without a credible impeachment process, other sectors—the military, the Catholic Church, and the middle class—may once again be forced to resolve the impasse through extraconstitutional means. More than the fate of the presidency, therefore, what is at stake in the current crisis is the credibility—and the future—of democratic institutions, and of democracy itself. DAMAGED CONGRESS The problem begins with Congress. Since the fall of Marcos in 1986, the history of that body has been far from stellar. Instead, the legislature has been a disappointment on many counts, including in its ability to hold other institutions to account. Indeed, the outcomes of previous impeachment processes initiated by the House raise serious doubts about congressional independence and efficacy. In 2002, the compromised Ombudsman Aniano Desierto was let off the hook twice by the House justice committee. The first time involved a complaint alleging that Desierto received a bagful of cash from a banker and real-estate developer who had a pending case in his office. The businessman wrote the justice committee denying the charge. The committee promptly threw out the complaint as “sufficient in form but not in substance” and refused to take in any more evidence from the complainants. The second complaint, alleging that the Ombudsman bungled its investigation of the multimillion-peso tax credit scam, was dismissed on the ground that no complaint could be filed against an official within the same year. Thanks once more to the justice committee, Commission on Elections commissioner Luzviminda Tancangco, whose many lapses are blamed for the ill-starred modernization of elections, also survived impeachment in 2002, despite compelling evidence showing she approved an overpriced and questionable voter-registration contract. In both these cases, the House was judged by civil-society groups and the media as acting in a scandalously self-serving way. It was accused of clearing powerful officials who were well connected to the leadership of the legislature. The acquittals also got legislators into the good graces of powerful executive officials, one of them charged with investigating graft cases (of which congressmen have many); the other, with running and adjudicating elections (in which legislators regularly and enthusiastically take part). Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr., meanwhile, was publicly seen as the victim of a congressional lynch mob that put together a questionable impeachment complaint in 2003, accusing him of anomalies in the use of the Judiciary Development Fund. The charges against Davide were viewed not so much as part of an earnest desire to hold the highest court to account, but as an attempt of the faction aligned with beer magnate Eduardo Cojuangco Jr. to pressure the high tribunal to rule in Cojuangco’s favor in the long-running coconut levy cases. Earlier in 2003, Davide and seven other justices had already been the subject of an impeachment complaint, which questioned the constitutionality of their action in swearing in Arroyo as president in the heat of Edsa 2. That complaint was dismissed by the justice committee. Within weeks, the committee began hearing another impeachment complaint against Davide, even if it was the second filed against the chief magistrate in the same year. The impeachment was allowed to prosper, with the tacit approval of House Speaker Jose de Venecia. In just over a week, the complaint already had over 80 signatures, more than enough to forward it to the Senate for an impeachment trial. President Arroyo kept mum on the issue for some time; only after protests from business, Church, and civil society groups, did she speak out, urging the House to drop the complaint and to instead form a body to investigate the charges. The impasse was broken by the Supreme Court, which ruled the complaint unconstitutional because of the one-year prohibition. The House soon followed with a resolution to dismiss the impeachment complaint. The resolution was signed by the majority of congressmen led by de Venecia, who sensed that public opinion was turning against Congress. Then of course there was Estrada’s aborted impeachment trial in 2001, when public outrage over what it deemed was the Senate’s partiality toward the then president spilled out into the streets and catalyzed People Power 2. This time, the blame was heaped on the Senate, rather than on the House. ARE HER DAYS NUMBERED? Anti-Arroyo protesters say the president has to go or she will be ousted. Several pro-Estrada senators were accused of receiving payoffs in the tens of millions of pesos to ensure the president’s acquittal. Given all these, the skepticism about Congress’ capacity to carry out an impeachment process that will produce a just result is understandable. The track record is simply not there. The first obstacle Congress faces is its own past. A STRING OF FAILURES The legislature’s other failures are also to blame. Congress fails in terms of efficiency: the 12 th Congress, which ended its term in 2004, passed all of four laws and could not even pass the national budget, forcing it to reenact the old one. Most days, there isn’t even a quorum in the House, making it difficult to deliberate on laws and other pending business. The slow burn of the impeachment complaint in the House committee of justice is not unusual: the normal pace of Congress is glacial. Congress also fails in terms of costs: Congress gets more expensive every year, even as it passes fewer laws. Already, Economic Planning Secretary Romulo Neri says that the stupendous sum of P6.4 billion may be set aside for the expenses of Congress if it is convened as a constituent body to amend the constitution. More importantly, Congress fails in terms of representation. If there needs to be proof that the Philippines is an oligarchy, one only has to look at the composition of the legislature. As the PCIJ book The Rulemakers: How the Wealthy and Well-Born Dominate Congress shows, nearly all the members of both Houses are millionaires; most are also part of political families whose members have held public office for two or more generations. Through the years, legislators have tended to stay longer in office, despite term limits, making it difficult for new entrants, especially those who do not come from political families, to get into Congress. In the House, two of every three congressmen are part of political clans. In the Senate, the average assets of members is growing every term, with an increase by P27 million between 1998, when the 11 th Senate assumed power, and 2001, when the 12 th Senate took over. Congress likewise fails in terms of accountability: accounting and auditing rules are honored more in the breach in both Houses, as shown in The Rulemakers. Moreover, through the years, PHILIPPINE CENTER FOR INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM I REPORT 21
Page 1: i REPORT July-September 2005 P75 Ph
Page 4 and 5: SHEILA S. CORONEL NO TWO presidents
Page 6 and 7: Tobacco, the country’s biggest ci
Page 8 and 9: THE TWO FACES OF GMA. Aides say tha
Page 10 and 11: likewise rebutted Zuce’s charges.
Page 12: T H E C A M P A I G N Presidential
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Page 17 and 18: C A M P A I G N F U N D S On March
Page 19 and 20: T H E V I C E P R E S I D E N T WHO
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Page 26 and 27: LIGHTS, CAMERA, IMPEACHMENT! ALECKS
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Page 32 and 33: TWO AT EDSA ‘When the wheels of h
Page 34 and 35: FOCUS ON FILIPINO YOUTH DEFYING THE
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Page 39 and 40: T H E L O S T G E N E R A T I O N K
Page 41 and 42: T H E L O S T G E N E R A T I O N s
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Page 64: GRASSROOTS GAME Jueteng has deep ro

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