Muslims beware of CJ nemesis

Bencyrus Ellorin

IMPEACHMENT is a legal remedy to remove constitutionally protected officials. Among them the President, Vice President, Justices of the Supreme Court, the Ombudsman and commissioners of other constitutional bodies. These are important constitutional positions that under normal circumstances should be left to function unhampered. Impeachment is an extraordinary remedy.

That is why it is important to scrutinize the motives of every impeachment complaint. Scrutiny indubitable includes a check on the background, the state of mind of the complainant.

Lawyer Lorenzo “Larry” Gadon, the complainant in the Sereno impeachment which the House Justice Committee ruled as sufficient in form and substance, is not an obscure personality. But I am afraid, for the wrong reasons.

He was identified with the administration of the then president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. In the 2016 elections, he was one of the lesser known candidates for senator under the Kilusang Bagong Lipunan (KBL).

He was guest at GMA’s Senatorial Interviews on March 29, 2016 where he gave earthshaking answers that could either cause spine-chilling feelings or on violent laughter fits. (URL for this interview is the following: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iow3qDaMgt8.)

Among his plans if elected senator: he wants to revise history, declare Ninoy Aquino a fake hero and remove his face from the P500 bill and most of all, remove the Jabidah Massacre from the history books. The Jabidah Massacre on March 18, 1968 claimed the lives of Moro soldiers, purportedly trained to invade Sabah, a territory in held by Malaysia claimed by the Philippines. This is one of the key grievances resulting in Prof. Nur Misuari to rebel against government, giving birth to the Moro National Liberation Front.

But hold on to your seats, this Gadon wants the Bangasamoro people erased from the face of the earth. He said he would personally appeal to Moro rebels to lay down their arms several times. And if he fails, he would lead soldiers in killing them, their children.

“Papatayin ko silang lahat. Susunogin ko yung mga bahay nila, papatayin ko pati mga ipis at daga… Kailangan burahin ang lahi nila,” Gadon said on national TV.

This person should be a dangerous man, and our Muslim brothers should beware.

There is no doubt the present occupant of Malacanang is consolidating powers to himself by tinkering with contitutional bodies whose main function is to provide checks and balances.

He had first endeared himself to the Philippine National Police and the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and has been ruthless to the opposition even if he has dismantled the former ruling party, the Liberal Party. First to go to jail was Sen. Leila de Lima who did not only go through intense personal vilification before being hauled off to jail.

The president also does not mince words against constitutional bodies whose mandate is to provide checks and balances. Checks and balances are needed in our republican and democratic system so that there will no concentration of too much power to any of the branches of government. When the Chief Justice became critical of the president, in a visit here in Camp Evangelista last year, Mr. Duterte threatened to declare Martial Law and abolish the Supreme Court. Although he later on placed Mindanao under military rule for an entirely different reason. But if it proves something, the president is all too willing exercise all powers within his reach. This could be good, but it becomes bad if it destroys institutions created by the Constitution to maintain checks and balances.

Next in the crosshairs of the president was the Ombudsman when it came out with a report which sort off affirmed an election expose by Sen. Antonio Trillanes that then-mayor Duterte has billions in the banks as opposed to his campaign projection he comes from a poor family, and that he himself is a poor man.

But the president’s sight on the Chief Justice may not have been removed after all. Since expressing disdain for Chief Justice Lourdes Sereno, the head of the co-equal branch of government, the judiciary was a marked person.

It is surreal, the House of Repesentatives is entertaining the complaint of someone who may have a problem in the head.