SC should take pause
| C.R.O.S.S.R.O.A.D.S |
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| Jonathan De la Cruz |
The Supreme Court should consider taking pause on the issue of sanctioning the UP professors who had issued that statement on the plagiarism case involving Associate Justice Mariano del Castillo. This is a no win situation for the high court and the earlier it realizes that the better for all concerned. We may grant that the UP professors were quite aggressive and, some say, uncouth in their critique of the alleged misdeed. They may have gone overboard and breached the line, so to speak, as officers of the court. They may have even taken shortcuts and taken their own rules lightly. In fact, up to now the issuers have not even explained how they got to put the signature of retired SC Associate Justice Vicente Mendoza in that statement without the latter’s knowledge and consent.
But having let things pass, as it were, by passing off Justice del Castillo’s error as an “MS mistake,” an aberration, if you will, they should have ended the ruckus with a simple show cause order. Not a seven-page ruling which only prolonged the debate and the aggravation longer than necessary. In any event, now that the court has issued this order it should just await the professors’ answer and leave things at that. It is not wise, even unhealthy for it or any of its personnel to engage in public debate over an act which can only be described as unfortunate. Let this thing end the way it began — hardly noticed until the court got suckered into the fray by those whose clients’ had expected but did not get the court’s ruling the way they had wanted it to be. As the high court had always advised those who had taken up positions in the government service, especially those considered high and mighty in the public eye — do not be onion skinned. That applies to all not just in the two co-equal branches of government..... MORE
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20101103com3.html
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