A unique cycle of life in the Court: The healing
(Part II)
After the Court’s Quo Warranto ruling that vacated the Chief Justice position, the President appointed three Chief Justices in quick succession who all retired as compulsory retirement age successively overtook them.
From hindsight, the President made a very good call as the new appointees’ seniority in the Judiciary and in the Court, their experiences, and their track record of harmonious relationships, gave them the ascendancy to lead and lift the pall of disquiet that had descended on the Court. Effectively, these Chief Justices provided a new beginning for the Court after its days of rage and disquiet. The whole Court, on the other hand, seemed parched for the harmony that the new Chief Justices amply provided.
The opportunity for a new Chief Justice who would last long enough for long term changes came with the President’s fourth appointee, Chief Justice Alexander G. Gesmundo, who was installed in office on April 5, 2021 and who would not retire until Nov. 5, 2026. The new Chief Justice is himself an old hand in government (20 years with the Office of the Solicitor General, 1985-2005) and in the Judiciary (as a senior member of the Sandiganbayan, 2005-2017) before he came to the Court in 2017. Watchful observers say that he has consistently displayed the work ethics required by Court leadership and has in abundance the emotional maturity of his immediate three predecessors.
From the beginning, long term strategic planning preoccupied the new Chief Justice and he undertook this while maintaining his guard against Covid-19. Thus, among his first efforts was the crafting of a new plan – the Strategic Plans for Judicial Innovations (SPJI) for the Court and the Judiciary.
To quote the Chief Justice himself: “The SPJI is the High Court’s plan of action to address institutional challenges using four guiding principles: The Judiciary’s delivery of justice will be (1) timely and fair, (2) transparent and accountable, (3) equal and inclusive, and (4) technology adaptive. Steered by these guiding principles, the Court targets three major outcomes: Efficiency, Innovation, and Access.”
As discussed on May 5, 2023 in this column, among the plans the Court prioritized, was its rules on ethics for members of the bar who are officers of the court. Soon to follow are the rules of conduct for the whole judiciary – the Court itself and the lower courts. In less subtle terms, this is an approach to preempt a long nagging Philippine problem – graft and corruption.
In a purposive move to turn crisis into opportunity, the Court also worked on its computerization efforts and in introducing video conferencing in the trial of cases to ensure that Covid would not hamper its dispute resolution efforts. These twin moves target the problems of delay that have long bedeviled the judiciary’s case resolution efforts.
Computerization efforts, interestingly, did not only target lower-level staff members who regularly use their computers in supporting tasks, but also higher judicial officials on the expectation that they themselves would use their computers and other gadgets to communicate, research, and undertake their assigned judicial work.
Video conferencing for the trial of cases was formally launched and institutionalized on Jan. 16, 2021 through the Court directive outlining the guidelines on the conduct of video conferencing. For the first time in its 119 – year history, the Philippine judiciary blazed a new trail by allowing remote testimony from parties situated even in different parts of the nation and the globe.
Continuing support was provided, among others, through knowledge sharing sessions on information and communications technology (ICT). Among the ICT topics discussed in one such session in June 2021 were modern workplace collaboration, Philippine Judiciary 365, multi-factor authentication, password management, and tips on how to improve cyber hygiene. Hand in hand with these efforts, the Court continued its computer acquisition and upgrading programs.
With these technology-driven innovations and with the continuation of court hearings despite the pandemic, the Court successfully weathered the Covid-19 crisis without reneging on its constitutional tasks. It did this by seizing the Covid-19 work slack as an opportunity to study, plan and implement basic housekeeping chores that the judiciary would use for a long time to come.
In this way, the Supreme Court found a way to integrate itself into the cycle of successes in Philippine history.
(The author was a former Justice of the Philippine Supreme Court and of the Court of Appeals. In the Executive Branch, he served as undersecretary and later, secretary, of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE). For a time, he was Foreign Affairs undersecretary; chancellor of the Philippine Judicial Academy (Philja), and a partner at the Siguion Reyna, Montecillo & Ongsiako Law Offices. He taught law at the Ateneo de Manila University, the University of Asia and the Pacific, and was dean of the San Sebastian College of Law. He still teaches law at the San Pablo Colleges in San Pablo City where he currently resides. art.brion.spc@gmail.com)