Political Process is More Transparent Than Judicial Process

Impeachment is a political process mainly because party-mates will vote along party lines. This is the habiliment of democracy. Majority controls the business of the day, minority voice is heard for the record, but it does not carry the business for the day. We should not lose our equilibrium because some Senators have already prejudged Merci and therefore they should inhibit from sitting in the impeachment body. The process itself is political and therefore, it will be resolved in accordance with party agenda.

Merci, from my recollection did not argue that politics is ruinous to public interest when the then GMA-controlled house botched her impeachment last year. But it is “politically-motivated” now when the same political institution had changed its make-up and voted for her impeachment. It is rather lame or self-righteous to claim that the old majority party, can rise above-partisan politics simply because it would not remove her from office, but the members of the house now suddenly  turned into rabid “militias” with marching order from their ringleader to scalp her when they decided to to impeach her.

Political vitality is about the ability of the majority party to implement its agenda and for the minority party to coalesce with it or to effectively fiscalize it. The day we hope that the minority party can run rough-shod on the agenda of the majority is the day where republican government shall cease to exist.

In consonance with the observation that impeachment is a “political process”, the prosecutor-judge dichotomy we hold dear in our judicial system does not apply in this process. A Senator can take the position of the prosecutor and at the same time a judge. In the impeachment, it is possible that a solon wears two hats.

When the Senate through its Blue Ribbon Committee conducted a hearing on the Garcia-Ombudsman plea bargain and arrived at a conclusion that that Merci had betrayed her office in that deal, and therefore, she should be impeached for that perceived offense, the Senate wears the hat of the prosecutor. After the House had filed the impeachment, members of the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee, can sit as  judges for that impeachment. There is nothing anomalous in this situation. It would be more anomalous if after recommending that Merci should be removed from office, the same Senators voted against it when they sit as  judges or rather abstained from voting for it when the floor calls for them to vote.

If Merci perceives that she is being persecuted by the majority party, her relief is not with Congress or the Court, but the public. She can hold press conference everyday and vent her venomous fury to destroy the reputation of every people who were voting for her impeachment hoping that during the next election, these “militias” would be voted out of office. This is another reason why I said, the process is political because her recourse is to the sovereign people and not with any of the existing institutions. But the way Merci fights her battle only highlights her concept of a public office as her entitlement and her private preserve. If some sectors of the society doubt her merit for the office, she can always resign and look at the injury to the public that this turmoil can generate far exceeding her own private injury. The more she fights for her office, the more she is perceived to be incompetent. If she believes in the concept that you cannot put a good woman down, she should be ready to leave the office anytime and make her fortune somewhere else. Or the office her fortune already which she could not afford to lose now?

Political process is more transparent and Merci should opt for it rather than argue for judicial process and settle the issue before a court where most of the time, decisions are made at cloistered and creepy chambers of judges of which the public have lesser access.

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