How do you solve a problem like Jamby?
That is the question confronting the senators and congressmen who are members of the powerful Commission on Appointments (CA).Last week Sen. Ana Consuelo Madrigal invoked wholesale Article 20 of the bicameral body’s rules, thus preventing the promotion of 24 ranking officers of the Armed Forces of the Philippines. She raised her objection in plenary session although other CA members do not recall her doing so when the appointment of the same officers were being tackled at the committee level.
Agusan del Sur Rep. Rodolfo Plaza told the Kapihan sa Sulo media forum Saturday that while Madrigal may have attended the pre-plenary deliberations on the officers’ promotion, he does not recall her coming on time.
Madrigal, according to CA and Senate sources, is notorious for her tardiness. Even columnist Angelito Banayo, in his testimony before the Senate blue-ribbon inquiry into the NBB-ZTE deal, revealed that Madrigal came late to the “secret meeting” former economic planning secretary Romulo Neri had with Sen. Panfilo Lacson, star witness Jun Lozada and others in Makati last December.
According to CA rules, any member can invoke Section 20 to suspend consideration of any nomination or appointment—including those favorably recommended by a standing committee and the chairman—without question from the rest of the bicameral body.
So why did Madrigal invoke Section 20 last Wednesday?
Other CA members said they believe it was her way of getting back at her colleagues who did not go along with her two weeks ago when she tried to block the promotion of a general who had a run-in with jailed Sen. Antonio Trillanes 4th, another Jamby favorite.
“She was awake but sleeping,” was how a published report quoted Plaza as saying about the incident when Madrigal failed to hear the name of the officer when it was read during plenary session for confirmation.
The only other CA member who agreed with Madrigal when she wielded her one-woman veto last Wednesday was Lacson—to the surprise of no one.
The Ping and Jamby tandem has been the motive force behind the NBN-ZTE probe, seemingly superseding the blue-ribbon committee chairman Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano.
A number of Senate reporters noted that Lacson and Madrigal—putative partners in the 2010 presidential election—now seem to be “running the chamber, setting the agenda, overstepping even some of their more senior colleagues, including those who also belong to the opposition.”
A veteran newspaperman who has covered the chamber since the 1990s noted how the Ping and Jamby team seems to be exercising greater influence over their fellow senators than Senate President Manuel Villar.
The tandem’s newfound sense of power has evidently extended even to the CA. However, most of the 22 other members of the bicameral body now feel that Madrigal, as abetted by Lacson, has gone too far.
Sen. Rodolfo Biazon, a former AFP chief of staff, fumed after Madrigal invoked Section 20. The former Marine general, who took up the cudgels for the officers affected by Jamby’s stunt, moved to amend the CA rules if only to prevent her from repeating it in the future.
Madrigal responded that she blocked the AFP officers’ confirmation because she wants to “reform” the CA.
“As minority floor leader of the commission, I invoke this powerful provision of our rules to send a strong message: Reform the commission now!” Madrigal said. “Tapusin na natin ang bata-bata at padrino system sa Commission on Appointments.”
Madrigal’s reformist posturing, however, failed to impress most of her CA colleagues—and the public.
Sen. Richard Gordon summed up the annoyance with Madrigal when he said: “She must explain to everyone and to every individual here that has earned star rank through blood and guts that she is using it fairly—without whim, caprice or arbitrariness.”
So, how do you solve a problem like Madrigal who evidently will not hesitate to brandish Section 20 just to make a point, no matter how bizarre?
Former Sen. Francisco Tatad said, also at the Kapihan sa Sulo, that any CA member “who does not actively participate in the pre-plenary deliberations should not be allowed to invoke Section 20.”
The leading opposition figure added that objections to any appointment should be voiced at the committee level, which Madrigal apparently failed to do in the case of the 24 AFP officers whose careers she has put on hold and whose individual reputations she has besmirched—with Lacson’s collaboration.
Tatad, however, did concede that the CA could stand some reforming. He said that the bicameral body needs to be “more proactive,” as he recalled the case of former Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. who was named the country’s permanent representative to the United Nations—even without CA confirmation and despite the fact that he is past the mandatory retirement age of 70 for public officials.
But that’s another matter—or is it?
