Davide's Chicken Is Coming Home To Roost

When then Supreme Court Chief Justice Hilario G. Davide, awoke from a fitful night of sleep on the morning of Saturday, 20 January 2001, he was faced with an awesome moral choice: whether to reconvene the Impeachment Trial of President Joseph Estrada and bring it to its proper conclusion, OR, to simply swear in the Vice President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and thus end both the trial and the regime of Erap.

At that crucial moment in the bedroom of the Chief Justice, with the Holy Bible cracked open to a passage in Isaiah about the "restoration of Zion", Hilario Davide knew that both courses of action were open to him.

He knew, for example, that the Armed Forces of the Philippines and Philippine National Police would do nothing to stop him from taking the second course of action above, because Chief of Staff Angelo Reyes had already mutineed with the entire General Staff and had appeared in uniform with them on the stage of the Edsa Dos rallies then on-going in front of a religious shrine-cum-shopping mall in Quezon City. He knew that the powerful Cardinal of Manila, Jaime Sin, would back him, as would former President Corazon Aquino. The Makati elites, many Cabinet officers and the Mass Media would back him too, as well he knew from Amando Doronila who was regularly in touch and giving him feedback on developments outside the Impeachment Court. It was just a matter of showing up himself at Edsa Dos in his black robe costume as Chief Justice, even if he really had no official business there, and the whole nightmare of Joseph Estrada would go away. He would be a hero and history would remember him.

But Davide also knew, deep in his heart, that the Constitution was not on the side of these social forces that wanted Erap Estrada overthrown and replaced with Gloria Arroyo. He knew that his own sworn duty was simply to order the House Prosecutors and Joker Arroyo to return from their walkout, reconvene the Impeachment Trial and bring it to its proper conclusion.

Unfortunately for History and the Filipino People, Hilario Davide, in his Bible-reading mode, no longer considered himself to be the cold, neutral and impartial Judge that the Code of Judicial Conduct absolutely requires. For in that crucial moment, Hilario Davide had removed the Blindfold of Justice that covered his eyes and knew from the vote of the "Craven Eleven" on Tuesday, 16 January 2001, that that conclusion to the Impeachment Trial was already certain: ACQUITTAL of Joseph Estrada by the Philippine Senate at the Impeachment Trial, at which he, Hilario G. Davide Jr. was the presiding judge.

Erap himself already knew he would surely be acquitted if the Impeachment Trial went on to its legal and logical conclusion--how could he not when he had eleven of the Senator Judges ready to vote Not Guilty? This simple and direct observation is what utterly falsifies the claim by the Supreme Court and the unrepentant supporters of Edsa Dos, that he "resigned" four days later, a ludicrous, illogical and deluded claim!

What really happened was that the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Hilario G. Davide, Jr. violated his own oath of office, willfully and knowingly ABORTED the Impeachment Trial, went to the Edsa Shrine with no legal or ethical justification, swore in GMA and OVERTHREW the President of the Republic of the Philippines in an act of gross violation of the Constitution. Before the few hundred thousands of Edsa's Hooting Throng, the Chief Justice tore up the Social Contract, threw out the Rule of Law and inaugurated the present Rule of Force, as lawyer Alan Paguia first exposed what happened in a pamphlet with that title.

Now, six years later, Davide's Chicken is coming home to roost. Throughout this time, the unindicted co-conspirators of Hilario Davide in the towering crime that is Edsa Dos, have claimed all along that VICTORY justified their defeat of the Constitution on that day, that a coup which succeeds is automatically legal and moral. These claims have been pressed, even if the Supreme Court itself proclaimed Edsa Dos to be "constitutional throughout" and not some kind of revolution, when in fact it was the Constitution being thrown out the window by an Immoral Cheating Judge, only pretending to be the Chief Justice.

If anyone should be jailed, it should be Hilario G. Davide Jr.

He may escape that punishment, safe now in the cocktail circuits of the United Nations in New York. But he cannot escape the judgment of History that he was a villain, a destroyer of the people's faith in Justice and Democracy.

If Davide had done his duty and simply continued the Impeachment Trial, Erap would've been acquitted--so what?--three years later his term would end, GMA and the Moral Opposition would've swept to a landslide victory in 2004, and by now, in 2007, Erap should've been four years in the Rear View Mirror. We could've survived another three years of Erap, if we have survived six years of GMA. But nooo....

Instead, here is, more powerful than he ever was, daring the Courts to find him guilty and put him in Muntinglupa, while he appeals his case all the way to the Supreme Court, to stuff back iin their faces the sheer stupidity of a Decision like Estrada vs. Arroyo!

Here is Erap Estrada just yesterday, talking to ABSCBN News, saying how the National Security Adviser himself had come to befriend him, to ask him what he, Erap Estrada, wanted to happen. Here is Joseph Estrada, basking in the victory that Hilario Davide actually gave him, more powerful than he ever was.

Joseph Estrada on Coming Verdict (MP3)

This is what happens when we fool with the Constitution. May all of Zion forever curse Hilario Davide and the evil he has wrought!

There are numerous Philippine Commentaries on Edsa Dos.

Chief Justice Panganiban Tells Seminarians The Story of Edsa Dos

Edsa Dos: The Real Coup D'etat