What Noynoy wants, Noynoy gets from so-called constitutional and independent offices, now including the Judicial and Bar Council, that said yes to Noynoy’s call for the JBC to allow a replacement of Justice Chief Leila de Lima in the JBC selection panel for the chief justice position.
The reason given by Noynoy, through his Executive Secretary, Paquito Ochoa Jr., is that his representative and alter ego in the JBC is the Justice chief,  and with her excluded, the executive branch will have no vote in the JBC.
Noy’s staunch ally and member of the JBC, Sen. Chiz Escudero, also pointed out that the Supreme Court (SC), in its ruling, provided for an alternate member-chairman of the JBC, since the senior members who should have been taking over the seat, had to inhibit themselves, being automatic nominees for the CJ post.
He said that if the SC must have its representative, it is only logical that the President should also have his representative in the JBC selection panel.
“The Supreme Court (decision on a petition seeking to disqualify an acting CJ from heading and presiding over the selection panel) stated that it prefers a wide representation, as justification for the entry of Associate Justice Diosdado Peralta as presiding officer with voting rights.
In letter to the JBC dated July 13,  Ochoa said Aquino hopes the council will allow him to appoint a substitute for De Lima as his representative in the selection of the new CJ.
“The secretary of justice is the sole alter ego and representative of the President in the council and her absence would do away with the equal representation of the executive, legislative and the judiciary in the council intended by the Constitution,” the letter stated.
The JBC naturally obeyed and granted Noynoy’s wish.
But there really is no need to get De Lima’s replacement in that JBC panel and on the reason given by Malacañang.
The truth is, the JBC members — a majority of them — are all either Noynoy’s allies or his appointees.
The JBC is composed of the SC chief justice as ex-officio chairman, with the secretary of justice, and the chairmen of the House and Senate justice committees as ex-officio members. The other four regular members come from the Integrated Bar of the Philippines, the academe, the private sector, and a retired member of the high court.
The Justice chief’s vote is Noynoy’s, even if it is her replacement. The two representatives of Congress are his, too. His other appointees are the representative of the academe, a lawyer from the private sector and even the retired member of the SC.
Doing the math, Noy has at least five votes right there — which is the majority, in an eight-panel membership.
Rep. Niel Tupas and Escudero are Noy’s allies, so are his other appointees in the JBC, which is the reason such a JBC can hardly be expected to be an independent and impartial entity, and why it has become more of a political body than a judicial body.
If, as claimed in the reason given by Malacañang that the executive should also not be denied representation in the JBC due to the inhibition of the Justice chief, and cites the decision made by the SC, that was an entirely different case, with the petitioner questioning the convening of the JBC with an acting CJ, as the Charter clearly states that the JBC must be headed by the CJ and not an acting CJ.
The extended decision of the SC, digging up and banking on an old 1948 Republic Act known as the Judiciary Act was merely a justification for a hometown SC decision, to “legitimize” the convening of the council despite the absence of a CJ, and ensure that one of the justices presides over the selection panel.
That the SC used an old law to legitimize its action can be gleaned from the fact that there was no JBC at the time the judiciary act was passed, since this was passed into law in 1948 — and logically, an old law cannot possibly have foreseen the establishment of the JBC. What the Judicial Act justifies is how succession comes about within the High Court, not the JBC.
That old law pertained mainly to who should take over as acting CJ in case of a vacancy occurring in the high seat, not on which justice should take over in presiding over the JBC.
But Noynoy will always get what he wants — as he virtually controls almost every so-called democratic institutions which he has prostituted, and which allowed him to prostitute them to the hilt.