TV Scrambles to Broadcast History: Chief Justice No More

 

ON MAY 11, the Supreme Court (SC) by a vote of 8-6 granted Solicitor General Jose Calida’s quo warranto petition to remove Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno from her post.  By upholding this little known mechanism as a supposedly valid means of removing an impeachable public official, the decision has set a precedent:  the President, the Vice President, associate Supreme Court justices and other impeachable officials may now be removed through the same proceeding. This was unheard of, let alone thought to be possible.

But Sereno’s ouster also marks a historic first on several levels. This is the first time that associate justices have openly challenged the authority of the chief justice. This is also the first time that the High Court has weakened the authority of another branch, in this case, the Senate, which holds the sole power to remove a Supreme Court justice through conviction in an impeachment trial. Filipinos are used to the dirt of partisan politics. But for the first time, they have also witnessed political patronage openly influencing, through the Executive Branch’s Office of the Solicitor General, the removal of members of the highest court in the land.

While anticipated by many, given the number of justices who had shown their bias against Sereno, her ouster sparked heated protests on the streets as well as in social media.

Television was the first medium to carry reports of Sereno’s ouster. It is from such turns of events that television draws its primacy as a medium, demonstrating its power to connect the public at once to an event of historic import through live, on the spot, coverage.  Despite this advantage, however, some TV stations went live much later than others. Their followers were instead fed regular programming as scheduled, with some resorting to reports on the decision as breaking news.

9:00 a.m.

Free TV channel CNN Philippines and cable news channel ANC began reporting from the Supreme Court on Padre Faura an hour before the scheduled start of its en banc session. Their live reports mostly focused on the demonstrations for and against the quo warranto petition.

11 a.m.

Also on free TV, News To Go on GMA News TV started coverage at this time, as some media organizations began to pick up leaks from insider sources about the decision.

11:35 a.m.

Media trained their cameras on Supreme Court spokesperson Theodore Te as he made the official announcement of the decision: the Court had granted the quo warranto petition by a vote of 8-6. The press briefing was aired live by the ANC, CNN Philippines’ Balitaan and GMA News TV in its noontime broadcast program  Balitanghali.

12:00 n.n.

TV5’s scheduled noontime newscast Aksyon sa Tanghali began reporting the event live only with the scheduled noontime newscast at 12:00 n.n., recalling the events that had transpired in the Court and reporting on the current situation in the venue. The coverage, however, lasted only roughly eight minutes.

In monitoring the developments, the news anchors threw questions at their correspondents on site, asking them what was known so far and what was happening in the vicinity, as well as other detailed real-time updates. Other topics discussed on air included the political options of Sereno.

The coverage picked up reactions on the ruling:

Phone interviews accessed a range of views. News To Go sought the views of Sereno spokesperson Josalee Deinla before the announcement of the decision. Post-announcement, Balitaan booked Deinla, Presidential Chief Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo and Abdiel Fajardo, national president of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines, for interviews.

Free TV channels GMA-7 and ABS-CBN 2 continued with their regular programming, reporting the decision only briefly as breaking news. This failure denied the mass audience the appreciation of the event as a historic first, which it could have helped to do, gathering both information and context.

CHEERS to ANC’s special coverage, “Sereno: The Fight Continues” and later “The Fall of the Chief Justice,” which stood out for staying on the topic the longest, going live as early as 7:30 a.m., airing relevant reports on the quo warranto proceedings prepared for the occasion. ANC continued reporting on other news in the hours leading to the decision, maintaining a video inset to monitor events at the Court, and then shifting to the live coverage of what was happening outside. ANC also aired an exclusive interview with Sereno (“Exclusive: Ousted CJ Sereno says she has no regrets”) at 2:50 p.m., and covered Sereno’s press conference which started around 6:23 p.m. until 7:00 p.m.

ANC also featured panel discussions with guests. The morning panel, hosted by Christian Esguerra, included impeachment complainant Larry Gadon, Sereno spokesperson Jojo Lacanilao, and Soledad Margarita Deriquito-Mawis, Lyceum of the Philippines College of Law dean and Philippine Association of Law Schools chairperson. Its continuing coverage in the afternoon was hosted by Lynda Jumilla-Abalos and featured Abdiel Fajardo of the IBP.

The guests spoke on topics such as the validity of the quo warranto petition, Sereno’s next legal recourse, and the landmark decision’s impact on the framework of government, including the options to be taken by key sectors, such as the legal community, primarily the IBP, among others.

But as ANC is on cable, all this reached only a sector of the public audience. (ANC’s coverage is uploaded as a two-part video in their official YouTube channel [PART 1 | PART 2].)

CMFR notes the failure to go live, even if limited only on key developments, as an unfortunate option of free TV channels.  News media should attempt to engage much of the public as possible so more Filipinos can realize how certain events are relevant to them and will affect them as well as those who have personal, partisan or political interest in certain outcomes. Among the primary mandates of the news media is to make what is relevant and significant interesting to as many citizens as possible as a means of empowerment. The obligation is institutional, and non-recognition of this responsibility undervalues the gift of press freedom.

 

What Went Before Solicitor General Jose Calida filed his quo warranto petition on March 5, 2018. This was probably the first time that some journalists covering the judiciary and the Department of Justice had heard the term. Not surprisingly, most news reporters were unable to report on the issue and the significance of the attempt to apply this mechanism in the attempt to remove an impeachable public official. Media did not sustain public interest in the quo warranto issue. Oral arguments on the case during the Supreme Court’s summer sessions in Baguio caught media attention, but only as a news event. Treating the matter as it would any breaking news, media failed to call attention to the issues that could have helped the public realize the gravity of the political questions Calida’s petition raises, not just on Sereno and the Court itself, but even more crucially on the future of the judiciary as the third, co-equal  branch of government, as well as on the system of  checks-and-balance required for democratic government to work. The media reports were bland and uninteresting, and thus left audiences with no better understanding of the grave political questions about the rule of law and due process involved, and the Supreme Court’s over-reach into the jurisdiction of the Senate which alone has the authority to constitute itself as an impeachment court. Late in the game The news accounts also glossed over such significant developments as the rise of organized public protests,  and the rare decision of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines to file an intervention before the Supreme Court last March 22 to oppose and seek the dismissal of the quo warranto petition. In general, media failed to mine various sources for their views: the framers of the constitution, retired justices of the Supreme Court as well as retired chief justices, whose refusal to speak would have been news. Media also failed to look at the issues from the perspective of the people represented by the NGOs camped out in front of the Supreme Court offices, and which took turns in demonstrating and making themselves  heard in  public forums. Ironically, some citizens felt that they needed to buy space in the media so as to articulate their sense of an impending historic wrong. It took a while before sources like the IBP were given the opportunity to talk about the quo warranto petition. In CNN Philippines’ On the Record on May 10 (“Experts discuss possible outcomes of quo warranto case vs. Chief Justice Sereno”), IBP national president Abdiel Fajardo again emphasized that the proper method of removing an impeachable officer is through an impeachment proceeding in the Senate. Fajardo also explained that the Supreme Court’s disciplinary authority and power to remove justices “only applies to lower court judges and justices,” adding that justices in the High Court “cannot remove any of their own.” Also invited was Al Vitangcol, lawyer of impeachment complainant Larry Gadon, who said the Supreme Court is the “final arbiter of things,” when asked by host Pia Hontiveros what is the proper means to remove Sereno from office. Rappler, on the same day, sought the views of Prof. Dan Gatmaytan who teaches constitutional law at the University of the Philippines College of Law (“Rappler Talk: Constitutional law professor Dan Gatmaytan on Sereno scenarios”). Speaking on the validity of the quo warranto petition, Gatmaytan was also of the  opinion that it can only be filed within a year after the official had assumed office. “Even if it was one of the viable options, it’s way too late to be used by anyone,” he said. Gatmaytan also said the High Court should have dismissed the petition outright. The professor raised possible scenarios should it grant the petition. One possibility he mentioned is ousting Sereno pro hac vice (“for this moment” or “for this occasion”). This means the decision to oust Sereno will only apply to her and cannot be used as a precedent in future legal cases. In an interview on dzMM Teleradyo, San Beda Graduate School of Law Dean Fr. Ranhilio Aquino did not criticize the quo warranto petition, but went on to discuss Sereno’s options, depending on the Court decision (“Law expert weighs in on future awaiting Sereno”). If the Supreme Court rejects the petition, Sereno may proceed to an impeachment trial, and if found guilty, she will not be allowed back in court and will be disqualified from public office. But if Sereno is removed via quo warranto, Sereno may return to private practice and may even be reappointed to a government position, Aquino said. Meanwhile, it was left to Rina David, Inquirer columnist, to keep the people connected to the protest groups, their commitment, and their dedication. In her May 9 column “On the sidewalk,” David wrote on the 10-day “Dasal at Ayuno Para sa Katotohanan at Katarungan (Prayer and Fast for Truth and Justice)” and recalled that the fasters had been visited by police and government security personnel with threats to dismantle their camp. “Among other hardships, the protesters camped out on the sidewalk of Padre Faura must deal with diesel fumes from passing vehicles, ‘mosquitoes the size of cats,’ and worst of all, the heat, which is especially oppressive at midday and at night,” David wrote. “It is all for a cause worth the suffering: to convince the Supreme Court justices to vote against the petition for a quo warranto to be issued against Chief Justice (on leave) Maria Lourdes Sereno. If granted, the petition would subject Sereno to instant dismissal from her post. This, even if the Constitution specifically states that the Supreme Court justices, among other office-holders of independent bodies, can be ousted only through an impeachment.”