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Tuesday, November 04, 2003
Editorials: Court employees’ gripes
It is good that court employees did not go on mass leave yesterday to supposedly dramatize their complaints on the manner the Judiciary Development Fund (JDF) is being spent. (Or was there really a mass leave plan?)
While it is their right to rage against their reportedly dwindling cost of living allowance and air their fears that they will be getting scraps when increase in the salaries of judges will be taken from the JDF, the timing for the mass leave would have been off.
Consider that the clash between the House of Representatives—or at least those pushing to have Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. impeached—and those opposing it in the Supreme Court will probably intensify this week.
Thus, a mass leave, while headline grabbing, would not necessarily lead to a quick solution of the court employees’ gripes, with the Supreme Court attending to more pressing matters like the constitutionality of the Davide impeachment complaint.
Besides, there is the danger of the court employees being caught in the middle of the pro and anti-Davide partisans and being run aground because of it. Or to put it in another way, there is the possibility the issues they are raising will be politicized.
Indeed, while the court employees may want their demands to be tackled separately from the impeachment issue, they could not also brush aside the perception they are playing into the hands of the pro-impeachment members of the House.
Even now, there are already insinuations that some people are manipulating the court employees or at the very least egging them to protest in order to weaken the position of Davide, who is being accused of misusing the JDF.
The better option for the court employees, therefore, is to hold their horses until the crisis arising from Davide’s impeachment will already have been resolved. After that, they can proceed with their protest, this time in a more sober and less-politicized setting.
Looking the wrong way
The point is not new but it pays to read the reiteration of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) of the argument that House members who want to impeach Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. were looking the wrong way on government fund misuse.
A PCIJ special report written by Tess B. Bacalla and published by Sun.Star Cebu starting yesterday, noted that, “while Congress continues to assert its power to examine disbursements from the Supreme Court’s Judiciary Development Fund, both Houses have not demanded a similar scrutiny on the way local governments have been spending public money.”
Or one may even hasten to add that there has been no scrutiny on the way Congress’ Countryside Development Fund is being spent.
Anyway, PCIJ special reports, while not necessarily easy reading because of its length, always enlighten readers because of its depth. It would be interesting to find out what important things the House members overlooked in their eagerness to get Davide’s scalp.
(November 4, 2003 issue)
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