Press Release
March 29, 2008

NOT IMPOSSIBLE TO CONVINCE SC TO REVERSE RULING
ON NERI CASE -- PIMENTEL

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino "Nene" Q. Pimentel, Jr. (PDP-Laban) today said "it may be difficult but not impossible" to convince the Supreme Court to reverse its ruling on the Neri case which he branded as a "grave mistake."

Pimentel said the high court's ruling on the case was based on a number of erroneous premises as he expressed the hope that the tribunal's members who ruled in favor of Neri's petition will see this once the Senate files its motion for reconsideration.

"The filing of a motion for reconsideration is not only prudent. I think it is necessary for purposes of historical records. I think it is important that majority of the justices, nine of them, will have to be confronted with the facts as we see them," he told the Kapihan sa Senado.

By a 9-6 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that Commission on Higher Education chairman Romulo Neri could not be compelled by the Senate to reveal his conversations with President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo on the national broadband network-ZTE deal by virtue of executive privilege.

Pimentel said the decision prevents the Senate from unraveling the truth behind the tainted transaction which may amount to a "coverup of wrongdoing."

"Is it possible that we can change the minds of the justices? I would say it is difficult. But it is not impossible. It may be improbable, but not necessarily impossible. If the facts are laid clear to them that the majority conclusion are erroneous. And that is what the motion for reconsideration will attempt to do," he said.

The minority leader said the high tribunal erred when it faulted the Senate for allegedly failing to publish its in-house rules on investigation.

Pimentel said these rules have been published in national newspapers and can be found in the Senate's website. But since the Senate is a continuing body, he said there is no need to republish them every time a new set of 12 senators is elected into office.

"The Senate does not end with the termination of every congressional term. Unlike the House of Representatives whose term ends completely every three years, the Senate is a continuing body," he explained.

"The rules of the Senate continue for as long as the Senate is in place. Meaning to say, there is no need to republish them unless there are changes that have been made."

Pimentel said that according to the Senate Secretariat the rules were published as late as two years ago.

Pimentel praised Chief Justice Reynato Puno for his forceful dissenting opinion in which he warned that the majority decision would unduly weaken the legislative branch.

But he said Puno's pro-Senate stance should not be made a gauge for measuring the prospects for success of the motion for reconsideration to be filed by the chamber.

"Whether we succeed or not, the important things is, for the purposes of records, the Senate will be seen as fighting to the very end in the assertion of our powers and duties, rather than giving way to this erroneous decision which says that the private rights of Neri can trump the powers of the Senate as defined in the Constitution. To begin with, Neri is not the one entitled to Executive Privilege, it's Gloria," he said.

Pimentel said the implications of the SC ruling in terms emasculating the investigate powers of Congress are so far-reaching that even some House members have criticized the decision even if they are not a party to the case.

News Latest News Feed