WHAT happened to Sen. Frank Drilon happens to the best of us, at one time or other.

Watching a basketball game and seeing our favorite team getting routed, we want to enter the court and play with the team. 

This is exactly what happened to Drilon at the impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato Corona last week.

To empathize with Drilon better, put yourself in his (rubber) shoes.

You are a lawyer, one of the best in the country, probably in the same league as Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile and retired Justice Serafin Cuevas, head of Corona’s defense panel.

Like Drilon, you are a top-ranking leader of the Liberal Party, which is behind President Aquino’s juggernaut to impeach Corona.  As a top party leader, you are expected to be loyal and support the party and Mr. Aquino.  Loyalty is a virtue.

Like Drilon, you see the House prosecutors behaving like law students and throwing away their case against Corona.  What do you do?

Into the fray

Throwing caution to the wind, you forget that you are a referee and should be impartial and objective.  In your mind, you have to save the amateurish prosecutors.     

Your instincts as a lawyer get the better of you.  You join the fray and save the day for your team.

This happens to the best of us.  The difference is we are not senator-judges.  Drilon is.

Sen. Francisco Tatad, watching from the gallery where I was seated, could not help himself and confronted Drilon for his breach of judicial ethics.  The faceoff was recorded by television cameras.

Now there is an uproar for Drilon to inhibit himself from the trial as a senator-judge because he has shown his true colors.

“Wala naman standard na nakalagay sa aming rules (of impeachment). Nakalagay lang all that is required of the judges is to observe political neutrality. Ibig sabihin ‘di p’wedeng mangibabaw ang affiliation sa isang political party doon sa aming proceedings,” Drilon told the People’s Journal

Lacierda for the defense

It was a passable explanation until the political color slipped from under.  Malacañang when it defended Drilon against his critics.

Presidential Spokesperson Edwin Lacierda told Palace reporters that under the rules of the Senate, the impeachment court cannot compel someone to inhibit himself.

“The decision to inhibit oneself is personal,” Lacierda said.

He said Drilon was not covering for the prosecutors. “Walang kakulangan ang prosecution.”

Two prosecutors described as a desperate move the call of the defense panel for Drilon to inhibit himself from the impeachment trial for allegedly helping the prosecution.

Lead prosecutor Rep. Niel Tupas Jr. and Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares said the defense move was part of the delaying tactics and an attempt to divert the attention of the people from the real issue of non-disclosure by Corona of his SALN.

Worst SALN violators

Meanwhile, the Philippine Couincil for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) published a report that the Office of the President and members of the House of Representatives were the worst violators of the SALN law requiring all public officials to disclose their SALN.  PCIJ listed 185 of the 188 House impeachers as violators of the law.

House Speaker Sonny Belmonte asked the public to focus on Corona’s SALN.  Lacierda said they were not on trial here.

“The move to seek Drilon’s inhibition is a desperate act from the defense,” Tupas said.

The prosecution group defended and lauded Drilon for “cross examining” the witnesses, the People’s Journal reported.

‘Not like buying meat’

In a radio intercview, Enrile advised the senator-judges to be careful in framing their questrions lest they be suspected of bias.  

Stressing the need for impartiality in trying Corona, Enrile said: “My God, you are dealing with the interest of a fellow human being.  You are going to dishonor him.  You are going to take his high position in government... This is not like buying meat in the market.”

In a newspaper column, Fr. Ranhilio Aquino reminded the senator-judges that any judgment that they would make should be based solely on evidence and the law.

He said: “I am therefore disturbed by suggestions that in deciding, the senators must be sensitive to popular sentiment. Stripped of the verbiage, the suggestion seems to be that senators should judge as popular sentiment would have them judge. 

‘Prepared script’

“If that is so, my question remains: Why go through the motions of a trial at all? Public sentiment is obviously against the Chief Justice. If the nation then is not to be treated to a long-running, expensive production of high drama with an already prepared script, then (the impeachment trial) must be an honest-to-goodness trial.”

Fr. Aquino, a lawyer, warned that strict adherence to the Rule of Law prevents abuses by the state or by any citizen. He said: “Under the Rule of Law, a State is answerable to the law, as is any citizen. The State has to be controlled through institutional techniques especially designed to render possible the exercise of power and render its abuse impossible,” Fr. Aquino said.

“When agents of the State believe themselves empowered to act in any which way against any citizen, ex-President or ex-peace-loving, law-abiding Filipino, that is exactly when the problem of control becomes urgent.”