Judicial Reforms under the Davide Watch: A triumph of will over adversities

By: Alvin T. Claridades

The Philippine Supreme Court, the last bastion of justice and democracy in this country of ours, has recently gone past its centenary age and is now heading towards the new millennium teeming with hope and reinvigorated with a renewed passion for excellence and effectiveness. As it treads an entirely new dimension, a peculiarly diverse setting, the highest tribunal of our land is bracing itself up for the challenges that lie ahead, with much passion and zeal and inspired no end by its hundred-year-old judicial and jurisprudential track record and performance which have dispensed justice in countless disputes and controversies brought before its sacrosanct halls.

And what would be a better and more novel way of meeting these approaching challenges head-on than to re-engineer the judiciary and make it keep pace with the revolutionary changes unfolding in its midst. A judiciary that remains lethargic and reactive in this time and age of increasing paperless transactions will one day wake up and find itself hopelessly buried underneath oodles of ancient documents that have gathered cobwebs in their dingy dustbins. The Supreme Court, not wanting to be caught flat-footed in that unseemly situation, has early on taken dynamic and pro-active steps to cope with the impending phenomenon and keep itself abreast of the developments in other fronts even before the controversy arises, so to speak.

Chief Justice Hilario G. Davide, Jr. and the members of the High Court over which he has presided since November 1998 must take full credit for taking the first major step towards reforming and preparing the judiciary for the third millennium. That they have so faithfully and selflessly devoted much of their time, effort and acumen to come up with a visionary approach to the institution of the needed judicial reforms is a testament to their highly laudable liberalism and passionate but well-grounded activism. We doff our hat to these respectable members of the bench for such alacrity to pave the way to freeing the courts from the unnecessary conventions and tight-rein traditions that have almost always snagged and delayed the dispensation of justice in this land.

To our mind, there is not an iota of doubt that the goals Chief Justice Davide wanted to pursue for the judiciary -- which he translated into a document aptly called the Davide Watch: Leading the Philippine Judiciary and the Legal Profession Towards the Third Millennium -- are doable objectives that can effectively be carried out by a trustworthy and credible judiciary. They are by no means mere pipedreams or figments of the imagination that would soon die with the dreamer. On the contrary, they are part of a great plan, real and substantial, just waiting to be performed and accomplished and will continue to be pursued even long after its chief architect and prime-mover, CJ Davide, has hung up his robe and gavel for good.

It thus bears stressing that under the watchful eye of the Davide Court, several members of the judiciary engaged in influence-peddling and other despicable activities have to date either been dismissed, censured or admonished. The High Tribunal has also vowed to go after and crack down on corrupt judges and justices in the country as part of its sustained battle against corruption in the judiciary, and the people now begins to believe it, but not with a grain of salt, given the great efforts the Court has so far poured into the judiciarys Action Program for Judicial Reform (APJR) envisioned under the Davide Watch.

At the very outset, the Davide Watch has envisaged a judiciary that is independent, efficient and effective, and worthy of public trust and confidence. It likewise conceives of a legal profession that provides quality, ethical, accessible and cost-effective legal service to our people, and is willing and able to answer the call of public service. Sensing the need for an office that will take special care of the information requirements of the Supreme Court in particular, and of the entire judiciary in general, with the end in view of helping carry out the vision of a trustworthy and credible judiciary, the High Tribunal, in its resolution in A.M. No. 98-12-08-SC which took effect on January 1, 1999, officially created a Public Information Office (PIO) under the office of the Chief Justice for that purpose. This is a particularly welcome move and innovation considering that the efficacy of the administration of justice is often believed to be dependent to a great extent upon the level of trust and confidence the public reposes on the judicial system. As can be gleaned from the Courts resolution establishing the

PIO, the role of such office is seen as vital to the Courts work considering (that) its deliberations are, by the very nature of the Courts functions, not open to the public and its members do not express themselves on the issues before them through their decisions and separate opinions.

We find such a heretofore unseen kind of openness and transparency with which the High Court now holds itself out to the public as good indicia that the judiciary shall henceforth provide the general public with easily comprehensible pieces of judicial information by way of news and reports concerning the Court and its decisions, circulated as swiftly and as extensively as the PIO can. Attempts at reforming the judiciary, we believe, will not gain any appreciable headway and, worse, may end up as an utter failure sans a good, healthy relationship between the courts and the general public.

The Supreme Court is therefore well on its way to rectifying a grave image problem that has stalked it and the legal profession in the past. Unlocking the doors to judicial information and opening them up to the public as a matter of natural right without so much infringing on the innate sensitivity of court processes and deliberations will go a long way towards correcting certain unpalatable misimpressions that have nestled in the minds of the people for so long and made them swallow hook, line and sinker the commonly held conception that the balance of justice generally leans heavily in favor of the moneyed and the influential.

In the area of reforms geared towards the transformation of the members of the bench and of the bar, the High Court has commendably gone deeper into endeavoring to improve the law school curriculum by initiating the setting up of a Legal Education Board (LEB) that will watch over the operation of law colleges throughout the country and revisit and modify their respective curricula with the end in view of making them responsive to the needs of the changing times. It has also pilot-tested recently another creditable APJR project, the Judicial Apprenticeship Program (JAP) which primarily aims to expose junior and senior law students to actual court proceedings and train them extensively in legal research and decision-writing. To ensure that members of the Philippine Bar are constantly kept abreast of current laws and jurisprudence, the High Tribunal has reinforced the Mandatory Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) Program for lawyers. As for judges, their continuing judicial education is effectively taken care of by the Philippine Judicial Academy (PhilJA) through the conduct of actual classroom seminars and long-distance e-learning programs.

With respect to improvements in the judiciarys working environment, we note with approval the recent pilot-testing of the Case Flow Management (CFM) system, a software program designed to expedite the resolution of cases through close monitoring and strict observance of time restrictions in the conduct of case events, from the filing of each particular case to the final determination or resolution thereof. This system is clearly complementary to the Case

Administration Management Information System (CAMIS) project recently pilottested in Metro Manila with the support of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) which automates statistical data gathered from the courts in order to improve case tracking and reporting.

A year ago, the Supreme Court launched its own electronic library or ELibrary, reputedly the first web-based searchable electronic library in the country. Additionally, it has undertaken on a continuing basis a Computer Literacy Program for the approximately 28,000 officials and employees of the judiciary nationwide. It leaves one in awe at how such highly ambitious and colossal undertakings are successfully carried out given the pitifully scarce resources fiscal or otherwise -- the Court has at its disposal.

Another impressive large-scale project in the pipeline is the Judicial Reform Support Project (JRSP) which is expected to aid the High Tribunal develop a more effective and accessible judicial system. Funded by a $22 million loan from the World Bank, the JRSP will help promote the integrity of the judiciary by enhancing its institutional capacity and ensuring the active support of the various key stakeholders in sustaining the much-needed judicial reforms. Among the reforms envisioned to be accomplished under the project are the establishment of pilot mobile courts, the setting up of comprehensive computerbased administrative and financial systems, the improvement of the High Courts

information and communications system, and the strengthening of the feedback mechanisms for judicial performance.

The other major accomplishments under the APJR are no less impressive and worthy of praise. Notable among these initial successes are the designation of some branches the Regional Trial Courts (RTCs) as special family courts, drugs courts, commercial and intellectual and anti-money laundering courts, and environmental courts; the creation of the Executive Committee on Judicial Reform headed by the Chief Justice, the Program Management Office (PMO) to ensure that the APJR is pursued and implemented vigorously and monitored effectively, and the Change Management Committee to promote and implement a smooth transition process of strengthening and restructuring various offices within the judiciary; the renaming of the Committee on Appropriations as Committee on Executive and Legislative Relations, and expanding its functions so that it can more effectively deal with the Executive and Legislative Branches of the Government with the end in view of gaining full support for full fiscal autonomy and better remuneration package and other benefits for the Judiciary in addition to that granted in Republic Act No. 9227; the strengthening of the institutional and administrative capacity of PhilJA, the Courts education and training arm; the promulgation of a Resolution Strengthening the Role and Capacity of the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC); the revision of the Rules on Criminal Procedure and the promulgation of new rules, such as on the examination of a child witness, the protection of juveniles in conflict with the law,

adoption, search and seizure in civil cases for infringement of intellectual property rights, electronic evidence, the conduct of pre-trial and use of deposition discovery measures, the implementation of the enhanced pre-trial proceedings through conciliation and neutral evaluation, corporate rehabilitation, and intracorporate controversies, and recently, the rules on violence against women and their children, and on Administrative Procedure in Sexual Harassment Cases and Guidelines on Proper Work Decorum in the Judiciary;

The rest of the Courts reform-oriented achievements include the publication of a Bench Book for trial court judges and updating of the Philippine Reports; the uploading to its own website of Supreme Court decisions within forty-eight (48) hours from their promulgation; the automation of the courts which will soon be completed so that all courts will have computers and full access to the Internet by years end; the renaming of the Committee on Library and Printing Services as Committee on Library, Records Management, Legal Research Facilities and Printing and expanding its functions; the adoption of an administrative and financial reform project aimed at realizing the financial and administrative autonomy of the Judiciary and at decentralizing of functions for effective and efficient delivery of judicial services; the promulgation of the New Code of Judicial Conduct for the Philippine Judiciary and the Code of Conduct for Court Personnel, both of which took effect last 1 June 2004; the promulgation of a resolution (A.M. No. 02-9-02-SC) directing the automatic conversion into cases for disbarment of certain administrative cases against justices, judges, and

other court officials who are lawyers if the grounds therefor are also grounds for disbarment; the amendment of Rule 140 of our Rules of Court on Discipline of Judges by classifying the nature and gravity of administrative offenses and providing for administrative investigation and sanctions for such offenses; the Annual Conferment of Awards for Judicial Excellence; the adoption of reforms in the Bar Examinations (Bar Matter No. 1161, 8 June 2004), which includes the eventual computerization of the examinations, the appointment of a tenured Board of Examiners, adoption of objective multiple-choice questions for 30% to 40% of the total number of questions, designation of two examiners per subject depending on the number of examinees, creation and organization of readership panels for each subject to address the issue of bias or subjectivity and facilitate the formulation of test questions and the correction of examination booklets, and the perpetual disqualification from taking the Bar examination of one who flunked five times.

Capping the long list of the High Tribunals early gains in judicial reforms are the strengthening of the Mandatory Continuing Legal Education (MCLE) Program for lawyers by the creation in the Supreme Court of a Committee for that purpose which was recently converted into a regular office; the promulgation of the 2004 Rules on Notarial Practice to advance and foster, among other purposes, ethical conduct among notaries public, who are mostly lawyers; the taking of vigorous and decisive steps to protect and promote the integrity of the legal profession by its cracking the whip on erring members of the legal profession who

violated the Lawyer's Oath or the Code of Professional Responsibility and for contempt of court; the completion of studies on how to strengthen access to justice by the disadvantaged sectors of society through the formulation of information, education, and communication plans and adequate legal assistance programs and the launching last 20 December 2004 of the Justice on Wheels Project with the blessing of the first mobile court -- a large air-conditioned bus with a small courtroom, offices of the judge, personnel, and mediator, and other amenities; the adoption of the Strategic Gender and Development Mainstreaming Plan, which the Committee on Gender Responsiveness in the Judiciary has formulated; the review for the final implementation of the Disclosure Policy, Judiciary-Media Relations Guide, the Judicial Awareness through Education Project in conjunction with the Department of Education (DepEd), and the OffCampus Masteral Degree on Court Management Project; the renovation, acquisition, and construction of Halls of Justice, the upgrading and renovation of the session halls and conference rooms of the Supreme Court, and the construction of a parking building under a joint venture with the Court of Appeals; and, finally, preparations for the construction of the first three (3) model courts (one in Angeles City for Luzon, one in Lapulapu City for Visayas, and one in Cagayan de Oro City for Mindanao) are now being fast-tracked.

No doubt, the judicial reforms originally envisioned under the Davide Watch have progressed not inch-by-inch -- like the wheels of justice which, in the olden days, have grinded exceedingly slow -- but by leaps and bounds, in fact

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galloping in great strides to go past its very own targets. We gawk in disbelief at how such preliminary reforms could be put in place in so short a time and with so scant resources at hand. The unmatched ingenuity and stanch obsession of the Davide Court in sourcing out assistance and support from external sources to fund its proposed reforms have been awe-inspiring and deserve our peoples acclaim and approbation. For, in the final analysis, when the billows of smoke have all but gone up, it is the Filipino people, rich and poor alike not CJ Davide nor his willing collaborators in this self-sacrificing struggle for judicial transformation -who shall ultimately reap the fruits of the seeds of reforms budding right where they have been sown.

In a nutshell, the judicial reforms envisioned under the Davide Watch, with all its avowed strengths and weaknesses and confronted with veritable opportunities and threats from all sides, are realizable and workable solutions to our judiciarys inherent dysfunctions. True, they may not offer the best panacea to our judiciarys ills but to a certain extent they are good enough preliminary prescriptions to get deeper into the root of the malady and treat its cause.

Given the renewed vigor and zeal with which the High court has pursued the proposed judicial reforms, we can now safely look to the day when the judiciary would easily be accessible to the poor and marginalized sector of our society; when the current backlog of court cases -- which stood at more than 800,000 cases in all levels at the last count will be trimmed down to its all-time

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low or even completely disposed of in record time; when an average court case shall take only a few months not several years to be decided with finality; when all the judgeship positions shall be fully occupied; and when corruption in the judiciary as widely perceived by the public at present will just be a thing of the past. The people are inspired no end and buoyed up incessantly by the promise of speedy and evenhanded dispensation of justice -- uninhibited by too stringent court processes, unbridled by superfluous rules, unrestrained by antediluvian conventions, nor unfazed by threats of bribery and corruption.

The Herculean task of reforming the judiciary looms awesome and daunting but with the full cooperation and critical collaboration of all the key stakeholders concerned, viz: the revered members of the bench and of the bar, the concerned government instrumentalities, the non-governmental organizations, the private sector, the academe, and the general public, it will just be a matter of time before the vision espoused by CJ Davide, et. al. will become a living reality. The Davide Court, with all its inherent limitations, has taken the first bold step of a thousand mile-long journey towards judicial reformation. Let that audacious initiative not remain a mere promise unfulfilled or a goal unachieved. For unless the torch of judicial change is kept burning and their bearers remain fired up in their quest, justice in this country of ours will continue to be an illusory creature and a hopelessly incurable aberration.

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