De Castro: Respect SC decisions
MANILA — Chief Justice Teresita De Castro, in her first message to the Supreme Court employees as head of the Judiciary, stressed that the high court "should be left alone to decide for ourselves."
She said that the Judiciary demands respect from its coequal branches of government.
"The other members of the co-equal branches should understand that the decision reached by the justices of the SC must be respected. We should be left alone to decide on the fate of this institution without interference," De Castro also said.
De Castro was among the Supreme Court justices that testified at the House of Representatives in hearings into an impeachment complaint against Maria Lourdes Sereno, who has since been ousted through a separate but related quo warranto petition filed by Solicitor General Jose Calida.
“People outside would like to judge us by what they see or hear from afar but it is us, the justices and officials of the Court, who know what is happening inside the Supreme Court and we should be left alone,” added the chief justice. From red to black to blue The SC on Monday was decked in blue, as The STAR earlier reported that employees initiated the call to wear blue to show the return of “peace” in the Judiciary.
During the height of the ouster moves against Sereno, the SC employees held “Red Mondays” and “Black Fridays” to show their support for the bids to remove her from office.
President Rodrigo Duterte appointed De Castro as the new chief justice in a decision that the Palace said was based on seniority.
The quo warranto petition that led to Sereno's removal from office reaped criticism from many sectors for being “unconstitutional.” Some lawmakers, who said the correct way to remove a sitting chief justice is through impeachment, said that it weakened the SC's independence as an institution