One of the most famous last words of
Christ before He died on the cross was narrated in the Gospel of Matthew: Now
from the sixth hour darkness fell upon all the land until the ninth hour. And
about the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “My God, My
God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:45-46)
The Lenten season is still two months
away. Yet the question lingers this early throughout the land. When it is
convenient to ignore the truth and forget one’s moral sense, the question fills
the air like a crying hound.
A presidential government prides itself
with a built-in safeguard against official abuse: the principle of separation
of powers. State powers are distributed to the three co-equal branches of
government to prevent their concentration in the hands of a single person. Under
the Constitution, the power to make laws is entrusted to the Legislative Department
while the power to implement them belongs to the Executive Department. Of
course, courts are independent to interpret the laws and dispense justice
without fear or favor.
The essence of separation of powers is: Restraint!
Yes, restraint so that nobody can have naked powers.
Ours is theoretically a limited
government because powers corrupt and absolute powers corrupt absolutely! It
was true in the past as unto this day.
President PNoy has no business interfering
with the affairs of a co-equal branch of the government. This is basic in
Constitutional Law. And if Senator
Revilla’s revelation is to be believed, then, there had been a gross violation
of the Constitution. Any sensible citizen would know the gravity of the
President’s indiscretion when he dipped his fingers in the internal affairs of
the Senate: He tampered with the principle of separation of powers. He
committed a culpable violation of the Constitution. He betrayed the public
trust. He committed a mortal sin against the Constitution. Gravely, he wronged
the Filipino People!
But only few are sounding the alarm. Only
Dean Fr. Ranhillo C. Aquino of San Beda Graduate School of Law had the balls to
declare openly that what the President did is an impeachable offense. Self-proclaimed
experts who inhabit the social networks and the mass media had fallen into deep
slumber. Other whodunit scholars conveniently brushed aside the revelation as an
unnecessary noise resorted to muddle gross corruption issues. A conspiracy of silence camouflaged the
gross violation of the fundamental principle of our constitutional democracy.
Miserably, it seems that any act of
indiscretion on the part of President Benigno C. Aquino III can pass unnoticed
even to the most intelligent segment of the society. He is that popular—he can
break the public will without anyone complaining about it.
The
question is not for President PNoy of course. The question is for us.
Have
our ears gone deaf to the cries for righteous indignation?
Have
we crucified the future with the callousness of our insensitivity to such moral
evil?
Have
we forsaken our people?
Have
we forsaken our children?
