A Wrong System

Hole of justice

By Peter G. Jimenea

Wrong System

In a TV talk show “Kape kag Isyu” hosted by this writer, aired live over Sky Cable TV every Saturday morning at Hotel Del Rio, Prosecutor Domingo Casiple, Jr. of the Iloilo Provincial Prosecutor’s Office lamented over the undermanned provincial office of the National Prosecution Service.

He claimed that there are only nine (9) prosecutors servicing the forty-two (42) Courts in the province of Iloilo. But as noted, there are many applicants for provincial prosecutor. On why the government failed to fill-in the vacancy, we have yet to know.

Lack of prosecutors added to the delay of the prosecution service in resolving the bundles of folders at their office. The Department of Justice (DOJ) failed to respond on this request of the provincial attorney for additional fiscal on reason that it is the president signing the appointments.

Thus, as the request fell on deaf ears, people with pending case at the provincial prosecutor’s office will now have a big problem about the early resolution of their cases. Perhaps they can now rightfully say; “justice delayed is justice denied!”

  

During the previous administration, the departments, agencies and instrumentalities of the government seem to have been overrun by thieves. It looks like almost all of our public officials have been swallowed by the worst “system” of all – corruption. I’m sure Pros. Domingo subscribes to this!

Even qualified applicants for government job are bypassed by the wrong system of selection process being practiced by corrupt public officials. The unqualified ones get the position not on managerial capability but by political expediency.

Same is true with our criminal justice system today. There is an urgent need to cut the dirty hands of politics that has penetrated it. Remove the irresponsible and corrupt individuals who were hired under this contemptuous “maninoy” system. The same must be done to the godfathers who appointed them.

What is alarming is the existence of irresponsible people in the system, which is basically composed of the four pillars, i.e. law enforcement, prosecution, courts and correction and probation. The danger of the community that comprised the fifth is if these people easily yield to temptation of greed.

Worse, the dirty hands of politics penetrated the system, the hands that had a Midas touch in reverse. Everything they touched turn not into gold but smacks for the administration. True, politics is dirty and contagious. In fact, it creates war.

A retired member of the judiciary claims that few decades ago, the Philippine Criminal Justice System is a knight in shining armor. He proudly showed the same at the United Nations, Asia and Far East Institute (UNAFEI) in 1971 during a training course for criminal justice practitioners in Asia and Pacific.

This Philippine pride can easily be restored without the dirty hands of politics. It can be initially done by the so-called “judicial ladder” that subject all appointments and promotions to a rigid public screening such as confirmation by Congressional Commission on Appointments.

Unfortunately, the “judicial ladder” was taken over by “judicial elevator” which is faster in catapulting individuals to various pillars of the criminal justice system to the prejudice and demoralization of those who have served with honesty and dedication. What a dismal dysfunction of justice!

The deterioration continued as the appointees are no longer subjected to a rigid public scrutiny like the confirmation by the Legislative Commission on Appointments. Now as noted, even the Supreme Court Justices were not spared by the “system” that nearly swallowed all of them.

Going back to the Iloilo Provincial Prosecutor’s Office, the lack of fiscals due to the deliberate neglect of the national government, gives us an impression without affirming the perception that funds for hiring of additional prosecutors were kept as savings of the government for other use than the purpose.

I fear this mess to become a problem-in-eternity. If aggravated by corruption the provincial prosecutor’s office would teeter in the brink of collapse. Let’s not allow the oppressed ones to run amuck and put the law in their hands!