FROM the very start, the House cavalry charge to impeach Chief Justice Renato Corona seemed doomed to fail.

Responding to the clarion call of President Aquino to reform the judiciary by targeting its chief magistrate, the House of Representatives approved the impeachment complaint from power point presentation to signing in a breakneck style reminiscent of Adolf Hitler’s “blitzkrieg” war strategy.

The President himself launched the lightning attacks with a string of well-publicized speeches seeking to shame Mr. Corona out of office.  The highlight of this opening salvo was delivered right in Mr. Corona’s face in a summit on the administration of justice attended by the cream of the country’s judicial branch.

Mistake No. 1

Many jurists were affronted by the President’s lack of judicial decorum and wanted to walk out, said Court Administrator Justice Midas Marquez  The in-your-face assault served to unify the legal community behind the underdog, and the Integrated Bar of the Philippines, the country’s official organization of lawyers, took out a series of full-page newspaper ads defending the judiciary, the Constitution, and the Rule of Law.

Like a herd of stampeding livestock, the House fast-tracked the approval of the impeachment articles.  It was done so fast that  the vice chairman of the justice committee, Rep. Rodolfo Farinas, was unable to sign the document because he wanted to read it first as required by impeachment rules.  This breach of courtesy, not to mention due diligence, will keep returning like a ghost in a bad dream to haunt the House prosecutors in the Senate trial.

Mistake No. 2

Flushed with early success, the President hosted a lunch for the House impeachers.     Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. said the impeachment was their “gift” to the President because the House supported his moral crusade.

Then hubris set in.  An ancient saying goes, “Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad.”

The House prosecutors, led by Rep. Niel Tupas Jr., took the trial to the public by using the media to expose raw evidence they planned to use at the trial.  Many senators resented the breach of courtesy for the court, which was still to start the trial.

Sen. Panfio Lacson, mincing no words, said, “We should throw our Senate rules out the window or straight into (the prosecutors’) faces.”

Trial by publicity

It was clear at this point that the House prosecutors were going to litigate the case by publicity -- the Senate be damned --  hoping perhaps to force Mr. Corona to resign, as Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez had been forced earlier.

That seemed like a workable strategy, if they could pull it off.  But Mr. Corona is made of sterner stuff.

A Batangueno, Mr. Corona respects his regional heritage.  A Batangueno will go down fighting in a balisong duel bloody but unbowed.

‘Kill me’

Buoyed by his troops who organized novena Masses at the Supreme Court compound, Mr. Corona vowed, “They have to kill me if they want to get rid of me.”  He stood his ground and vowed to fight to the end.

The nine-day Masses ended on the day the Senate opened the trial.  Mr. Corona’s defense lawyers, led by the able octogenarian retired Justice Serafin Cuevas, were given a rousing send off worthy of rock stars.  So honored, they went to the Senate with adrenalin pumping in their veins.

After an opening statement meant more for the Plaza Miranda crowd than the senator-judges, the House prosecutors’ game plan unravelled.  Caught unprepared, the prosecutors were not ready with their witnesses on Day 2.

Senate Majority Leader Vicente Sotto III, ever quick on his toes, moved for adjournment.

Downhill skid

Dogged by a string of bad luck, lack of preparation and bad organization, everything seemed downhill for the prosecutors from there on.

Pursuing a flawed strategy of trial  by publicity, they changed game plans in midstream by opting to lead off with Article 2, which was a showcase of their rush to impeach.

Article 2 sounded more like a smorgasbord of innuendo, suspicions and reported crimes.  Ever sharp, Sen. Chiz Escudero begged the prosecutors, “Will you kindly explain to me how the senator-judges are to vote on Article 2?  One out of three, two out of three, or all three?”

Freshman lawyers

Justice Cuevas went to town, lecturing the prosecutors and reducing them to less than freshman law students.  It is a legal precept that each article of impeachment must allege only one crime.  That is even in the House rules of impeachment, Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile pointed out.

When the private lawyers hired to assist the congressmen fumbled their presentation of witnesses, Sen, Freankin Drion, one of the better lawyers in the Senate, could not help himself but to save the day for the prosecutors with incisive questioning.

Drilon’s intervention may have saved the day, but it opened him to accusations of “lawyering” for the prosecution and calls to inhibit himself for obvious bias.  He denied improper behavior.

(In fairness to Drilon and similarly situated members of the Liberal Party, Drilon’s impartiality as a senator-judge had been compromised by the President himself when he made the Hang-Corona campaign a party advocacy.  Now all the LP senators are suspect.)

Enter the dragon lady

All this seemed like opening-day jitters.  And then along came the dragon lady.

Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago, on sick leave for high-blood pressure, appeared on the second week of the trial right after the Chinese New Year of the Water Dragon.  Her appearance changed both the character and the tempo of the court.

A no-nonsense trial court judge before becoming a senator, she took the prosecution lawyers to task for unpreparedness, ignorance of the law, and contemptuous temerity.  Her doctors pulled her out of the trial when her blood pressure shot up to 180/90.  But the damage had been done.

Voices found

All of a sudden, the senators imbibed Mrs. Santiago’s assertiveness and found their voice as senator-judges.

Senator Escudero became more confident with his clarificatory questions.  So did Senators Pia Cayetano, Aquilino Pimentel III, Joker Arroyo, Jinggoy Estrada, Bongbong Marcos, and even  the normally reticent Lito Lapid  and Bong Revilla of movie fame.  Suddenly we had a real trial going, but to the consternation of the under-performing prosecution panel.

We had a real trial going, but the prosecutors  seemed to have lost their way and with it their brief crack at history.