THE Integrated Bar of the Philippines, the national organization of lawyers in the country, has nominated Acting Chief Justice Antonio Carpio to the Chief Justice post, saying he is the most qualified to lead the judiciary.
In a statement on Tuesday, June 26, IBP president Abdiel Dan Elijah Fajardo announced that the IBP through its Board of Governors has endorsed the automatic nomination of Carpio to the Chief Justice post.
"We are faced with the reality that the Supreme Court itself has set into motion the appointment of Chief Justice vice Ma. Lourdes P. A. Sereno," the statement reads.
"We thus support the return to, and the recognition of the wisdom, of the long-standing tradition of seniority in the appointment to the highest office of the judiciary, the Supreme Court Chief Justice," it added.
The IBP believes that Carpio, being the most senior associate justice, is "the most qualified to lead the Supreme Court and the entire Philippine judiciary."
Carpio is one of the five most senior justices who are automatically nominated to the Chief Justice post.
Aside from him, also automatically nominated are Associate Justices Presbitero Velasco Jr., Teresita Leonardo-de Castro, Diosdado Peralta and Lucas Bersamin.
The nominees have yet to decide whether they will accept or decline the automatic nomination.
Carpio, who was among the six justices who voted against the ouster of Sereno earlier expressed his refusal to be nominated, saying he does not want to benefit from Sereno's ouster through a quo warranto, which he is against.
Meanwhile, the IBP is among the parties that tried to intervene in the quo warranto case against Sereno.
The said association urged the SC to dismiss the petition filed by the Office of the Solicitor General saying that removing Sereno through a quo warranto demolishes the rule of law which lawyers sworn to uphold. (SunStar Philippines)