Like French Kings Part 2

"Sinister forces" are trying to wreck the institution... NOT!

When a big-time corruption scandal blows up on the face of a high-ranking official of a government agency, the style usually adopted by the high official is to get his colleagues to close ranks and attribute all criticisms and exposés as a “sinister” plot to destroy the institution.

This was the stand adopted by Supreme Court Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr., when being investigated by members of the House of Representatives on the anomalous disbursements of the Judiciary Development Fund (JDF), which led to the move to impeach Davide.

He spoke then of the “dark and sinister forces” out to destroy the institution that is the judiciary, even it was only he who was being investigated for the illegal disbursal of the JDF, where funds allocated for the rank-and-file in the judiciary went elsewhere, with hundreds of millions going missing. And yet Davide has the nerve to speak about the need of eliminating corruption in government, and even has the chutzpah to claim that the rule of law must be upheld — he who broke the law and the Constitution which he has sworn to uphold! And hey, he even now urges whistleblowers to come forward. But when it came to blowing the whistle on him, this was a “sinister force?”

The elite, as well as the high court justices, virtually backing up institutionalized corruption in the judiciary by backing up Davide, killed the process of impeachment by coming up with a hometown decision that protected Davide's, and their hide.

The question that should be asked today is whether, by helping to cover up the massive corruption practiced through the illegal disbursal of the JDF funds, the institution has been “saved.”

Evidently, it was Davide and his justices who were “saved,” not the institution of the Supreme Court, because to this day, the great majority of the Filipino people no longer repose their trust and faith in the high court or the entire judiciary, for that matter, in obtaining true justice as they have become political prostitutes.

Similarly, the corruption scandal which erupted from the discovery of a former military comptroller, Maj. Gen. Carlos Garcia, funneling military funds into his bank accounts is now being slammed as an affront to the military institution. It was, however, a discovery that led to more corruption practices in the military, linking past and present chiefs of staff and all their J staff.

Now, they, like Davide and his justices before them, scream that the institution is being destroyed and that the enemies of the state are being given by elected officials the ammunition to crush the institution.

That's pure crap. All they want, as Davide and his court wanted then, was to cover up their crime.

It is their hide they want to protect, and keep on protecting, by bringing up this claim of “saving” the institution.

Ironically, they said nothing about saving the institution of the presidency and the civilian Commander-in-Chief, or even of breach of the chain of command, of the military and police engaging in political partisanship and getting out of the barracks, of the Constitution and democracy itself when they pilloried then President Joseph Estrada on mere allegations of corruption and plunder; they said nothing about upholding the law, or even of granting Estrada his right to due process and even gloried at his being convicted by publicity on mere allegations which charges are now being proved to be fabricated.

Yet these are the same people who now cry foul over allegations of corruption in the disbursal of the JDF funds and other anomalies in the budget of the judiciary, handled by Davide, and charges of corruption leveled against the military generals and their accomplices, claiming that the institutions must be saved.

And there was Gloria Arroyo, telling the senators and congressmen to go easy on the generals, just as she did, for the high court justices — yet she vows to clean up the corruption mess in these institutions when she, at the same time, asks for the officials concerned to go easy on them?

It is precisely because Gloria and her allies have been too easy on the military and her generals that they have become much too arrogant and powerful.

Would a mere chief of staff, or a mere department secretary be so arrogant and rude before a congressional panel and tell them they can't touch him, or his mother, or even inquire into his yet to be explained assets, and showing his contempt of members of Congress if he did not think himself so powerful and beyond the pale of the law?

All this talk about the need for toned down political rhetoric to “save” the institution is pure manure.

It is not the institutions that they seek to save, but their corrupt ways and the ill-gotten wealth to be protected.

For how can these generals, as well as the high court justices, expect to save their institutions, since they themselves destroyed them.

Related article here.