The Philippine judiciary, the best system that money can buy

The Philippines has the best justice system that money can buy, according to Jose Almonte, national security adviser during President Cory Aquino’s term. It is not even a question of having good and pricey lawyers. It is about direct transactions with the judges or justices who can be depended upon to justify their decisions even if it means turning logical cartwheels and relying on technicalities.

Joseph “Erap” Estrada called the members of the judicial system “hoodlums in robes.” He coined the term back in 1993 when he was vice-president and head of the Presidential Anti-Crime Commission (PACC). He alleged that 80% of the cases filed in court by the PACC were dismissed summarily by corrupt judges.

In a strange turn of events, the members of the Supreme Court unanimously considered Erap “constructively resigned” as president of the Philippines on Jan. 20, 2001 solely on the basis of an entry in Executive Secretary Edgardo Angara’s diary that Erap had left Malacañang without indicating he was coming back. As if to avoid being dubbed by Erap as the “supreme hoodlums in robe,” the Supreme Court justices wore barong Tagalog instead of their traditional robes when they convened to declare the Office of the President vacant.

Corruption, influence peddling, and case-fixing in the judiciary have been acknowledged by practicing lawyers as the reality since the postwar years. Lawyers speak of judges with “open back door” — the point of entry to the judge’s chambers. The implication is that a favorable decision can be obtained not by a skillful presentation of the case before the judge in the open court but by enticements offered to the judge in their chambers or retiring room at the back of the court. Court decisions and temporary restraining orders have long been known to be for sale, earning for the judicial branch of the Philippine government the dubious reputation of being the best judiciary money can buy.

Because many had made similar accusations, the Supreme Court was prodded to conduct an investigation of “corruption in the judiciary.” But no evidence of judicial malfeasance was found, and the allegations were declared as pure gossip.

But in 2013, the Supreme Court confirmed the reported influence-peddling of one Arlene Lerma, who was said to have paid for court decisions favoring her clients. She was also said to have funded the campaigns of certain candidates for president of the Philippine Judges Association and gifting them expensive items and plane tickets for trips abroad.

In 2014, The Supreme Court dismissed Sandiganbayan Associate Justice Gregory Ong after he was found guilty of “gross misconduct, dishonesty, and impropriety” for acquitting pork barrel fund scam queen Janet Lim Napoles in a malversation case involving the sale in 1998 of 500 Kevlar helmets to the Philippine Marines. An investigation revealed that Ong visited Napoles at her office on two occasions after participating in the Kevlar helmet case.

The investigation into corruption in the judicial branch of the government is long overdue.

People wonder if corrupt public officials charged with plunder or amassing millions gained acquittals by sharing their enormous loot with the Sandiganbayan justices.

In April 2001, Jinggoy Estrada, along with his father Joseph, was accused of plunder for pocketing P183 million in kickbacks from his Priority Development Assistance Fund or PDAF, the discretionary funds for lawmakers which were corrupted using bogus nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) owned by Janet Lim Napoles. The projects turned out to be fake. But Jinggoy was acquitted of plunder by the Sandiganbayan Fifth Division because the verified transactions only amounted to P9.875 million, which is way lower than the threshold of P50 million to convict someone of plunder.

The Sandiganbayan Special Fifth Division granted Estrada’s motion for reconsideration, “there is reasonable doubt as to the presence of the second element — or the fact of receiving the bribe by the accused Estrada — as there is no proof of his actual receipt thereof.”

In 2014, Juan Ponce Enrile, the former Senate president, was charged with plunder for allegedly amassing P172.8 million in kickbacks or commissions from his pork barrel from 2004 to 2010. In October 2024, the Sandiganbayan dropped the plunder case, saying the prosecution submitted insufficient evidence and failed to show that the kickbacks he allegedly received from his pork barrel when he was a senator reached the minimum P50-million threshold for the crime. It noted that none of the prosecution witnesses testified that they handed the alleged pork barrel kickbacks directly to the accused.

Also in 2014, the Office of the Ombudsman filed a graft case against Senator Bong Revilla for allegedly getting “kickbacks” amounting to more than P200 million, by allegedly diverting his PDAF to the NGOs of Napoles, in exchange, supposedly, for a 50% kickback from the projects.

Revilla was acquitted of plunder but was required to return to the government P124.5 million in civil liability. However, he has yet to return the required amount that he was asked to give back before his acquittal. Why he was released from jail before complying with all the Court’s conditions, the Court did not explain.

He was acquitted in December 2018 after the Sandiganbayan First Division found no single direct evidence to establish he received the rebate, commission, or kickback from his PDAF projects, and that circumstantial evidence was not enough to prove his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

In 2016, The Office of the Ombudsman filed multiple charges of graft, malversation, and violations of banking regulations against Prospero Pichay in relation to the Express Savings Bank, Inc. acquisition. According to then-Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales, the government “effectively lost at least P80,003,070.51” in the acquisition. The Sandiganbayan said the conspiracy angle was “only bare and unfounded allegation by the Ombudsman.”

In July 2016, former Vice-President Jejomar “Jojo” Binay, Sr. and his son, former Makati Mayor Junjun, were charged with graft, malversation, and falsification of public documents for overpricing the P2.2 billion construction of the Makati City Hall Parking Building. But in August this year, the Sandiganbayan cleared them of criminal charges. The antigraft court’s Third Division said the prosecution failed to prove their guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

In 2016, Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales ordered the dismissal from service of Senator Joel Villanueva after finding him guilty of grave misconduct, serious dishonesty, and conduct prejudicial to the interest of service over his alleged involvement in a P10-million pork barrel scam as the congressional representative of CIBAC party-list. Ironically, CIBAC stands for Citizens’ Battle Against Corruption.

The senator was charged before the Sandiganbayan for two counts of violation of Section 3(e) of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act or Republic Act No. 3019, one count each for malversation of public funds and malversation through falsification of public documents. The charges were based on the supposed irregularities that the Ombudsman found regarding the utilization of the P10-M PDAF allocation that the Department of Budget and Management released on June 10, 2008 for the implementation of agri-based livelihood projects in various congressional districts in Region XI.

Villanueva said he would leave it to Senate President Koko Pimentel to act on the Ombudsman’s order. However, the Senate did not implement the dismissal order issued by the Office of the Ombudsman against Villanueva because the Office lacks jurisdiction over members of Congress.

In contrast is the case of Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada, who served as the president and chief executive officer of the government-controlled Philippine Forest Corp. under the Department of Environment and Natural Resources from 2007 to 2008. An electronics engineer, he also served as a technical consultant to former socioeconomic planning secretary Romulo Neri on the Philippine national broadband project in 2007.

Lozada is best known for being the whistleblower behind the botched $329-million (P17-billion) National Broadband Network (NBN) deal with Chinese telecommunications giant ZTE, from 2007. He testified in the Senate hearings that First Gentleman Mike Arroyo, Comelec Chair Benjamin Abalos, and other Cabinet officials had accepted bribes from ZTE. His exposé led to one of the biggest scandals that hit President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s administration.

Lozada was charged with two counts of graft, and his brother Orlando with one, by the Office of the Ombudsman over the grant of leasehold rights over a 6.59-hectare piece of public land to his brother and a private firm linked to him under a program of PhilForest, when he was still president and CEO of the government corporation. The sole complainant was Lozada’s successor as president of PhilForest.

The Sandiganbayan’s 4th Division found them guilty of violating the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and sentenced them to six to 10 years in prison. They surrendered to the NBI after their appeal with the Supreme Court was denied.

How curious.

Oscar P. Lagman, Jr. has been a keen observer of Philippine politics since the mid-1950s.