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Speech delivered by Chief Justice Maria Lourdes P. A. Sereno during the “Laban ng Kababaihan, Laban ng Bayan: A Forum in Defense of Women, Ethical Governance, and Sovereignty” on March 7, 2018 at the Kuniberta Hall, St. Scholastica’s College, Manila

Mga kaibigan, magsi-upo po tayo. Mga mahal kong kababaihan, maganda

po ba ang umaga ninyo? (Crowd responds, “maganda po”) Okay, buhay na

buhay po ba ang mga kababaihan? (Crowd responds, “Yes!”) Gaano ka-buhay?

Buhay na buhay? (Crowd responds, “Buhay na buhay!”) Magandang balita iyan

sa ating lahat. (Friends, please take your seats. To all the women here, how’s

your morning, is it good? (Crowd responds, “It was good.”) Okay, are you all in

high spirits? (Crowd responds, “Yes!.”) How much? (Crowd responds, “Very

much!”) That is very good news to hear for all of us.)

Now I’d like to of course thank my dear friend Dean [of the School of

Arts and Sciences, Saint Scholastica’s College] Maria Asuncion Azcuna, who

has been with me in many causes, thank you very much for that very exact

(Chief Justice Sereno looks at Dean Azcuna and laughs) introduction. And I’d

like to also acknowledge of course the former members of the Cabinet here,

that’s [Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD)] Secretary

Judy Taguiwalo, and I acknowledge all your signal achievements when you

were at the Department of Social Welfare and Development, and more than

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ever I really empathize and sympathize with the conditions that you went

through and I admire you enormously for what you went through and how

you stood. Of course former [Commission on Audit (COA)] Chairperson Maria

Gracia Pulido Tan, my dear friend of the Commission on Audit, who, like any

woman with a strong mind and the brains to go with it launched an

unprecedented investigation that has led to what we may call as equivalent to

the investigations of the Senate when the Senate was in its glory during many,

many decades ago. And of course we have Sr. Mary Frances Dizon, OSB,

President of the Saint Scholastica’s College; Sr. Mary John Mananzan, OSB,

Vice-President for External Affairs of Saint Scholastica’s College and Executive

Director Institute of Women's Studies; Scholasticans and the Benedictine

community, ladies and gentlemen, good morning! (Crowd responds, “Good

morning!”) It is my pleasure to join you in this Forum marking two auspicious

occasions: the 30th or Pearl Anniversary of the establishment of the Institute

of Women’s Studies as an affiliate of Saint Scholastica’s College and

tomorrow’s celebration, the celebration of International Women’s Day.

Both occasions demonstrate to all of us that aspiration and achievement

intersect. In many occasions these intersections are occasioned by great

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efforts of women. For example, The Institute of Women’s Studies envisions,

just imagine:

A just and free society where

• patriarchal values have been transcended and [oppressive]

structures overcome;

• women and men have equal rights and status;

• people participate and determine their own development;

• everyone respects and protects the environment; and

• opportunities for growth are accessible to all,

in which context, the people’s aspiration for the full flowering of

the human spirit and creativity can be actualized.i

Can you just imagine that? Very very ambitious goals of Scholasticans.

March 8 or Women’s Day, on the other hand, celebrates the

achievements of women “without regard to divisions, whether national,

ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic or political.” It also serves as a “rallying

point to build support for women’s rights and participation in the political and

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economic arena.”ii So in an audience composed — would I say 90% of women

— both occasions underscore our role in society and why we must never lose

faith in capacities as human beings.

And what strikes me as the common denominator of the two occasions

is how both today’s and tomorrow’s celebrations call us to work against the

exclusion of women and build on what binds, rather than what divides us.

Unfortunately, these appear to be one thing in the present climate.

The current state of the nation is one where perceived enemies of the

dominant order are considered fair game for harassment, intimidation, and

persecution; where shortcuts are preferred over adherence to constitutional

guarantees of human rights, including the denial of due process; where fake

news and propaganda abound to deceive and manipulate, rather than

enlighten and educate; and where coarseness, including the denigration of

women, rather than civility, mark the language of the podium. (Crowd

applauds)

Do you agree with me Scholasticans? (Crowd responds, “Yes!”)

Is it a whole-hearted agreement? (Crowd responds, “Yes!”)

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What can then be done?

First, let us be thoroughly convinced that we can do something to

change the situation as citizens of this country. We must not be passive

spectators to what is happening, thinking that it is but a game of thrones

among political forces with little connection to the lives of majority of the

Filipinos. To the contrary, every erosion of the Bill of Rights hits the poor and

the unknowing hardest. It is they who will be victimized the most.

And to give you the structural basis and the philosophical basis for this

adherence to high ideals, allow me to quote the Preamble of the Constitution

to emphasize where the country must head towards. And allow me to quote,

“We, the sovereign Filipino people, imploring the aid of Almighty God”— by

this we recognize that we need the help of God in order to bring our country

forward, a core belief of Scholasticans, am I right? (Crowd responds, “yes!”) —

“in order to build a just and humane society”— I quote again, so if you think

about it, the nation’s goal is set, is put forward in the Constitution, as the

building of a just and humane society, “just and humane society,” that is not

drawn from thin air my friends, it is what the Constitution requires of us as a

nation, so that anything that diminishes society’s humanity and justness is

anti-Constitution and anti-Filipino, and to what order — “and to establish” I

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will again start quoting, “a Government that shall embody our ideals and

aspirations”— in other words, government has the positive duty, the positive

duty to embody the highest level of nobility, good, wisdom, righteousness in

the Filipino, and this qualitative standard for governance is the norm, nothing

else will do — allow me again to quote from the Constitution, “that shall

embody and promote the common good, conserve and develop our patrimony,

and secure to ourselves and our posterity, the blessings of independence and

democracy” — which means inclusiveness not exclusion of critics; democracy

not authoritarianism — allow me again to quote, “under the rule of law and a

regime of truth,” — katotohanan is enshrined as a constitutional value; it is

not a tool, it is not to be dispensed with as a matter of expediency, it is not to

be twisted but it is an independent value that must be pursued under the

Constitutional design; “justice” or katarungan, and you are witnesses to the

injustices that are happening around us; “freedom,” kalayaan in all its

flowering, freedom of thought, freedom of conscience, freedom of expression;

“love,” pagmamahal, not hatred, not divisiveness; “equality,” pagkapantay-

pantay ng lahat — [a nod to gender equality]; “and peace,” not strife,

kapayapaan, and I quote again, we thus “do ordain and promulgate this

Constitution.”iii After starting with those very clear goals of us as a nation, we

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then go to the question of how these goals can be operationalized and allow

me to just speak from my small corner of the world.

And as head of the judiciary, safeguarding the Rule of Law and ensuring

transparency and accountability is considered within our province. It is within

our province, but not exclusively ours. And I will describe to you how our

Constitution designs how we are to operationalize transparency and

accountability. I do this — describing the Constitution’s operations

framework within a certain part of the Constitution out of respect and as a

tribute to my co-laborer in the vineyard of accountability, Chairperson Grace

Pulido Tan.

Now, the judiciary — and this is an oft neglected part when the

Constitution is taught in law schools, especially also in public for a such as in

the media — we have to know that the judiciary is part of a group of fiscally

autonomous agencies of government, and these agencies form themselves into

the Constitutional Fiscal Autonomy Group (CFAG). And this constitutes the

judiciary, headed by the Supreme Court in turn headed by the Chief Justice;

the Civil Service Commission (CSC), its Chairperson and Commissioners; the

Commission on Elections (COMELEC), its Chairperson and Commissioners; the

Commission on Audit (COA) formerly headed by Grace Tan and its

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Commissioners; the Office of the Ombudsman; and the Commission on Human

Rights (CHR). I take pains to show you that actually the Constitution, if you

had just been paying serious attention to it works, would have worked in the

past, and can still work in the future.

The CFAG comprises the institutions that are ordained to exact

transparency and accountability from government officials, thus: the CSC in

the matter of government appointments, the COMELEC in the matter of

elections, the COA in the matter of government expenditures, the Ombudsman

in the matter of graft and corruption, and the CHR in the matter of promotion

of human rights. The judiciary for its part under Article VIII, Sec. 1 of the

Constitution exercises the judicial power, which “includes the duty of the

courts of justice to settle actual controversies involving rights which are

legally demandable and enforceable, and to determine whether or not there

has been a grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of

jurisdiction on the part of any branch or instrumentality of the Government.”

If the CFAG agencies are fully functional we have actually a blueprint for

a major part of a working democracy. The Constitution in a sense is quite

substantial in the matter of transparency and accountability in this area and

actually we do not have to re-invent the wheel, at least in this area. As I have

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previously said what should occupy much of our people’s time is not politics

but how we can build our nation brick by brick by ensuring that as

constitutionally designed, the important watchdogs and checks and balances

that are designed to work, indeed work. It is here where the CFAG is supposed

to be the champions of accountability, the CFAG heads, their co-justices or co-

commissioners and the individual employees of their institutions must move

towards the Constitutional design of exacting accountability even from the

political and executive sectors of government.

The CFAG is intended to be a very strong dynamic group, peopled by

individuals completely devoted to ensure that constitutionalism and the Rule

of Law are upheld in every facet of public life. It is never intended to be a

group of silent commissions or agencies that will do political bidding. The

CFAG agencies are constitutionally designed to stay above the fray and look at

the future on a long term structured basis. Thus I have been calling on our

people to support them in their efforts to be independent and fiscally

autonomous.

The time will come when our people will realize that impromptu,

extemporized, unprepared, unthought out plans of action that run contrary to

the structured way the Constitution designed accountability harms our

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nation’s long term future. Ilalagay ko po sa ating wika — wika nating mga

nakakaintindi ng katotohanan sa kalye, sa pang araw araw — hindi po

maaaring padagos dagos ang galaw, hindi po puwedeng ang mga aksyon ay

panay bira lamang, pagkat ang konstitusyon ay nagsasabi sa atin na palakasin

ang mga institusyon ng demokrasya. Ang mga institution ng transparency and

accountability, huwag pahinain ito. May istruktura at pamamaraan kung

papaano ipapamalakad ang transparency at accountability, gawin ito ng tama.

(I will talk in the vernacular — in the language where an average man will

understand the truth — we cannot rush things, we cannot just mindlessly take

action, for the Constitution says that we should strengthen these democratic

institutions. We should not weaken the institutions of transparency and

accountability. There exists a structure on how to run these institutions of

transparency and accountability, let us follow it and do it right.)

Eventually as our people get exposed to understanding the Constitution,

and it is here, my dear young Scholasticans, where I ask you to be co-builders

of our nation in explaining to them the beautiful structure that the

Constitution has designed to exact accountability and transparency. It is our

common hope that they will internalize the paintaking steps that must be

taken to truly build a nation — I’m sorry painstaking. Beyond the CFAG

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agencies, every public servant from the highest to the lowest must internalize

the concepts of stewardship and public servanthood and in turn, you young

people must demand genuine public service in the concept of stewardship and

servanthood. For us to build a genuinely democratic and prosperous nation,

all public institutions must be populated with people of integrity, competence,

skills, and the management know-how to make the institutions run well. My

second proposition to you is that we must collectively bring our voices to say

that only the best people, only our best efforts using the best means and

methods must be employed in the service of our people. We cannot content

ourselves with second rate, half [-hearted] effort, and less than the best and

most responsive methods. We cannot be content with anything less than the

best because the future of our nation is at stake.iv

Thus I cannot end my talk without giving tribute to a woman who not

only embodies the best of and in the Filipino and Filipina without mentioning

a woman whose life was practically dedicated to the defense of the Rule of

Law, justice, and human rights; and who is a heroine in my eyes. She also

embodies to the utmost the can do spirit in reference to my first proposition

that all of us must be actively involved in nation-building. She has been called

“a woman exemplar for all seasons,” who graduated valedictorian from her

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high school class of 1931 here at Saint Scholastica. She is no other than the

late Supreme Court Associate Justice Cecilia Muñoz-Palma, (crowd applauds)

who by her sheer hard work and excellence of qualities broke many glass

ceilings for women as the country’s first woman fiscal, first woman judge of

the Court of First Instance, and first woman justice of the Supreme Court. And

yet — and this is the most significant aspect of her public life — in some of the

darkest days of our nation’s history, similar to the situation that I described a

few days ago when hope seems at its dimmest, she was at her bravest. And I

call upon all of you to be at your bravest when hope seems at its dimmest.

(crowd applauds) Her light shone, for all of us, it shone the brightest as she

courageously dissented in several Martial Law cases that to her undermine

the Rule of Law. It was at peril to her own safety that she did it. She did not

earn the approval of her peers: instead she had to trek the lonely road by

voicing her dissent against authoritarianism. Even after her retirement from

the Court, she continued to speak up fearlessly against the excesses of the

Martial Law regime. And I would run out of time and pages and pages of paper

just to retell you her most significant written work and passages from them.

But allow me to just encapsulate her thoughts in a few simple phrases. And

this is was delivered nearly 40 years ago, and she made this call when she

delivered a homily entitled “What Are Our Options Today?” and it was

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delivered during the Liturgical celebration in commemoration of the 31st

anniversary of the UN (United Nations) Declaration of Human Rights in

December 1979, still perilous times. And I will quote: “On this particular day,

let us then rededicate ourselves to the cause of justice and human rights, more

particularly here in our troubled country. Be not silent, nor afraid nor

compromising in attitude.”v

May these words resonate in our souls today, may we take up her call,

may our aspirations one day be matched by reality. Thank you very much.

i St. Scholastica’s College Outreach and Advocacies. Institute of Women’s Studies. N.d. http://ssc.edu.ph/outreach-and-advocacies/institute-of-womens-studies/, accessed March 6, 2018. ii United Nations. “International Women’s Day” 8 March. http://www.un.org/en/events/womensday/history.shtml, accessed March 6, 2018. iii Speech delivered by Chief Justice Maria Lourdes P. A. Sereno during the 25th Year Anniversary of Constitutional Fiscal Autonomy Group (CFAG): Katapatan, Karapatan, at Katarungan on November 29, 2017 at the Blue Leaf Filipinas, Parañaque City. Bracketed portion added.

iv Speech delivered by Chief Justice Maria Lourdes P. A. Sereno during the Constitutional Fiscal Autonomy Group (CFAG) Retirement and Testimonial Dinner on January 30, 2015 at the Manila Hotel.

v Cecilia V. Muñoz Palma. “What Are Our Options Today?” Homily delivered during the Liturgical celebration in commemoration of the 31st anniversary of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights under the auspices of the Kilusan para sa Katarungan at Kapayapaan (Ecumencial Movement for Justice and Peace), December 10, 1979, 3:00 p.m., Christ the King Seminary Chapel, Quezon City in The Mirror of My Soul: selected decisions, opinions, speeches, and writings of Cecilia Muñoz-Palma, First Woman Justice, Supreme Court of the Philippines. 2001, pp. 358-370, 370. The Supreme Court Printing Services. Padre Faura, Manila.