Quid pro quo is standard practice in Philippine politics
Quid pro quo is a Latin phrase that literally means something for something. It is used very often in reference to an exchange of favors.
The phrase has been used frequently in the ongoing US House of Representatives’ impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump’s effort to pressure Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate former Vice-President Joe Biden in exchange for military aid. The reason Mr. Trump’s political opponents are looking into the possibility of impeaching him is because getting a foreign government involved in US domestic politics is a federal crime in the US.
Quid pro quo deals are normal in politics anywhere. In the Philippines, politics is often a game of quid pro quo. During the 2016 presidential elections, Mr. Duterte said there were grounds for former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s acquittal. He also repeatedly said he owed much to Mrs. Arroyo as she had made substantial contributions to his campaign funds.
Shortly after Mr. Duterte was elected president, the Supreme Court acquitted the former president of the charge of plunder. In an appreciation dinner held in her honor in July by her former colleagues in the House of Representatives, she attributed her acquittal to President Duterte. Addressing the President, Mrs. Arroyo said, “I thank you that when you became President, you provided the atmosphere in which the Court had the freedom to acquit me of the trumped-up charges by my successor and your predecessor.” That statement of gratitude strongly suggests a case of quid pro quo.
People associate Mrs. Arroyo with quid pro quo politics. Soon after Mrs. Arroyo assumed the presidency, the Ombudsman filed charges of plunder against Joseph Estrada, her immediate predecessor. A special division of the Sandiganbayan was created to try him. Sandiganbayan Justice Teresita de Castro was appointed chair of the special division. The special court found Mr. Estrada guilty of plunder and sentenced him to life imprisonment. After the trial, President Arroyo elevated Justice De Castro to the Supreme Court. That prompted Jinggoy Estrada, son of the former president, to claim that Justice De Castro’s promotion was a reward for her convicting his father. Many citizens saw it as a quid pro quo deal between President Arroyo and Sandiganbayan Justice De Castro.
In 2002 President Arroyo appointed her Chief-of-Staff Renato Corona to the Supreme Court and in 2010 named him Chief Justice. The latter appointment was in contravention of a provision in the Constitution barring the President from making appointments during her last two months in office. During his entire stint in the Supreme Court, Corona was perceived to have been partial and subservient to Mrs. Arroyo in cases involving her administration. The apparent partiality was one of the articles of impeachment submitted by the House of Representatives to the Senate. To many political pundits, it was another case of quid pro quo.
One other of Mrs. Arroyo’s appointees to the Supreme Court was Court of Appeals Justice Lucas Bersamin. In 2015, Justice Bersamin, to justify the grant of bail to Senator Juan Ponce Enrile, who was charged with a non-bailable offense of plunder, declared that “Bail for the provisional liberty of the accused, regardless of the crime charged, should be allowed independently of the merits of the charge, provided his continued incarceration is clearly shown to be injurious to his health or to endanger his life.”
I saw the ruling as Justice Bersamin’s way of providing justification for the grant of bail to Mrs. Arroyo who was also under arrest at the time for plunder but was detained in a hospital supposedly because of a life-threatening spinal disease. However, Mr. Duterte’s election rendered Justice Bersamin’s doctrine on bail extraneous as Mrs. Arroyo walked free sans legal rigmarole, thanks to the aforesaid atmosphere that Mr. Duterte provided.
Retired Supreme Court Chief Justice Artemio V. Panganiban once wrote in his Philippine Daily Inquirer column: “The sociological school of legal philosophy holds that to predict how a case would be decided (by the Supreme Court), one must consider the personality of the magistrate and the various stimuli attendant to a case per this formula: personality times stimuli equals decision (P x S = D). The personality of a magistrate includes intrinsic qualities like upbringing, education, relationships, etc. Stimuli refer to how he/she responds to externals like public opinion, peer pressure, religious leaders, medical condition, appointing authority, appointment sponsor, close friends, etc.”
That observation strongly suggests that justices of the Supreme Court sometimes decide not only on the basis of an objective interpretation of the law and the established facts but on personal considerations as well.
Could another Supreme Court decision be the quid and the selection of someone as the next Speaker of the House of Representatives be the quo? I have always wondered why the lightweight Lord Allan Velasco was a strong contender for the speakership in the 18th Congress. The speakership is a position of power and the person occupying it must be equal to the position. He or she must himself or herself be powerful lest he or she becomes expendable.
The speaker must be a person of gravitas. Before he aspires for the speakership, he should already be a person of achievements, have attained national recognition for his accomplishments, be a political giant and leader of a major political party, and have the staunch support of the president.
Many past speakers — from the Commonwealth years, through the post-World War II era, to the post-martial law period — were such men. Messrs. Sergio Osmena, Sr., Manuel A. Roxas, Jose Yulo, Eugenio Perez, Jose Laurel, Jr., and Ramon Mitra were political titans and leaders or stalwarts of their party before they were elected speaker. Messrs. Jose de Venecia and Manuel Villar were business tycoons befriended by the powers that be before they entered politics. They bankrolled the election campaigns of many congressmen before they sought the speakership.
Congressman Velasco is neither a political bigwig nor a business mogul. He was first elected representative of the lone district of Marinduque in 2010. He ran for re-election in 2013 but was defeated by Regina Ongsiako Reyes, daughter of the governor of the province, Carmencita Reyes. However, he was proclaimed the representative of Marinduque on Feb. 1, 2016 after the House Electoral Tribunal removed Regina Reyes from her seat in the House of Representatives for being an American citizen.
The fact is, the people of Marinduque preferred the scion of the political dynasty in the province of Marinduque over the son of retired Supreme Court justice Presbitero Velasco. If it were not for a technicality, Lord Allan Velasco would not even be in Congress. When PDP-Laban announced that it was nominating Lord Allan Velasco for the speakership, broadcast political commentators asked, “Who is he?”
Civil society groups’ call last week for the government to free Senator Leila de Lima from detention brought to mind the Supreme Court decision dismissing the senator’s petition to nullify her arrest on drug charges. Justice Presbitero Velasco penned the decision. Justice Antonio Carpio found Justice Velasco’s arguments inconsistent with those he (Velasco) used in many other cases. I discerned from Justice Carpio’s dissenting opinion that Justice Velasco performed legal contortions to keep De Lima, a vocal critic of President Duterte’s war on drugs, in jail.
That must have pleased the President who had said he wants Senator De Lima to “rot in jail.” Had the position of chief justice become vacant before Justice Velasco’s retirement, he would have been a strong candidate for the position. I wonder if son Lord Allan’s selection as Speaker-in-waiting was a consolation prize for retired Justice Presbitero Velasco — a case of quid pro quo.
Oscar P. Lagman, Jr. is a retired corporate executive, business consultant, and management professor. He has been a politicized citizen since his college days in the late 1950s.
