Chavez' Advice.

November 16, 2007 at 1:05 am
Chavez’ advice.
After last Friday’s walkout of the officers and their lawyers at the court martial hearing (the first in military history) of those allegedly involved in the plan to withdraw support from Gloria Arroyo on Feb. 2006, I’m anxious to know what’s going to happen in today’s hearing.

Frank Chavez, counsel for Maj. Gen. Renato Miranda, the highest- ranking officer among the accused, and Maj. Jason Aquino, has filed a motion to suspend the proceedings until they are presented a copy of a pre-trial advice signed by AFP Chief of Staff Hermogenes Esperon. The PTA is the basis for the charges of mutiny and conduct unbecoming of an officer and gentleman against the 28 officers.

Judging from the decisions made by the court in past hearings, I’m willing to bet my much-devalued ten dollars that Chavez’ motion will again be denied.
Chavez wrote his clients and advised them not to participate in the hearing today as well as in future hearings.

His letter: “I write to you because the court martial hearing on November 9, 2007 merely confirmed what had been clear to us from the very beginning, that it cannot dispense justice. Our petitions lodged with the appellate courts have emphasized that the court martial was created and constituted by Mister Hermogenes Esperon, the very person who had already pronounced you and several of your brother officers guilty. He also retains the power to affirm or reverse the judgment against all of you. The court martial may find you innocent, but Esperon can still send you to jail or prolong your arbitrary detention. The very basis of its existence, therefore, ensures that the court martial will deny rather than uphold justice. It is destined to bend to the will of its creator, Mister Esperon.

“The proceedings of November 9, 2007 marked the turning-point for this anomalous situation because the court martial panel was unabashed in brooking no opposition. It would not listen to our legitimate protests. It obviously was implementing orders from Mister Esperon to put you on trial on the basis of an unsigned and an unapproved PTA. The panel was determined to railroad the proceedings by making a sweeping denial of the right to peremptory challenge that several other officers had not yet exercised. In short, the court martial had completely unmasked itself before us as an instrument of oppression.

“As a lawyer it is my duty to advise that you and the other officers would be well within your rights not only to challenge the jurisdiction of the court martial but likewise, by necessary implication, to refuse to participate in its sham proceedings altogether. Otherwise, if you allow injustice to befall upon you inside the session hall you will be bound to the cycle of assailing piece-meal each and every oppressive act of the panel and orchestrating walkouts every now and then. There will be no end to this process. If you continue to participate in the sham trials, then you would have accepted the power of the court martial to pronounce its verdict no matter how wrong. You would have surrendered yourselves to its jurisdiction and therefore to its oppression and illegality.

“You cannot allow yourselves to be played with like willing pawns in a scheme of persecution masquerading as prosecution. You must not permit yourselves to be used in order to lend a semblance of legality to proceedings that are totally devoid of legitimacy. And if Mister Esperon is attempting to rob you of your dignity as officers of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, let it be by his own hand and not with your own yielding cooperation.

“Hence, not only as a lawyer, but likewise as a citizen who shares the same cause (good governance, honesty in government service, justice and legal vindication of wrongs) with you, I suggest that you desist altogether from further participation in the court martial hearings until you are properly charged.”

Chavez’ advice reminds me of the boycott of the late Ninoy Aquino of his own court martial trial in 1973 when the country was under Marcos’ martial law. In a letter to his son, now Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III, Ninoy said, “Son, my decision is an act of conscience. It is an act of protest against the structures of injustice that have been imposed upon our hapless countrymen. Futile and puny, as it will surely appear to many, it is my last act of defiance against tyranny and dictatorship.”

I asked Atty. Vicente Verdadero, counsel of Brig. Gen. Danny Lim, what is expected in today’s Camp Capinpin hearing. Verdadero replied blithely. “There will be dancing: pasadoble, rhumba, tango. There will be plenty of space for that.”

Posted in Media, Military By Ellen
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‘Plotters’ : AFP chief violated military discipline in 2004 polls?
11/17/2007
In a move to get back at Armed Forces chief Gen. Hermogenes Esperon Jr. who said the troops who walked out on their mutiny hearing last week could be held liable for ‘breach of discipline,’ the 28 Army Scout Rangers and Marines officers yesterday claimed it was the ‘Hello Garci’ general who violated the military discipline for his alleged part in the rigging of the 2004 presidential elections in favor of President Arroyo.
‘Mr. Esperon again entertained the nation with his myopic view of what ails this country via his pronouncements in media. Mr. Esperon, your so-called breach of discipline started in 2004. Only an undisciplined officer would allow himself to be used for cheating,’ the detained officers, in a statement, said.
Esperon was among the four military generals mentioned in the Hello Garci wiretapped conversations between Mrs Arroyo and former Elections Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano.
‘An undisciplined officer disregards the Constitution and subverts the will of the people. An officer who does not face squarely all allegations hurled toward him, but instead shrinks from every opportunity to defend himself via alibis, is a mark of indiscipline, if not outright cowardice,’ they noted.
The accused officers, led by former Marines commandant Maj. Gen. Renato Miranda, former First Scout Ranger
Regiment commander Brig. Gen. Danilo Lim and Medal of Valor awardees Marines Col. Ariel Querubin and Marines Lt. Col. Custodio Parcon, along with all the other officers, walked out of the courtroom last week to protest the court’s alleged bias.
Esperon branded their action as a breach of discipline.
‘You don?t even have the guts to sign the PTA (pre-trial advice) and now you say we breached the limits of discipline’ Come on Mr. Esperon, don’t give us that crap,’ they stressed.
The accused and their lawyers are challenging Esperon to sign the PTA so that their charge would become legal.
The military chief, however, insisted on not signing pre-trial advice, which served as among his basis in convening the court martial to try the officers.
Tension also gripped during the resumption of the proceedings.
The accused refused to stand when ordered by the court, as panel president Maj. Gen. Jogy Leo Fojas swore in one of the panel members who was absent during the last hearing.
The prosecution then asked the court to put on record the accused officers? refusal to stand.
Defense counsel Robert Gallos asked the court to allow First Lt. Homer Estolas to enter his peremptory challenge.
A peremptory challenge is the right of the accused before arraignment to eject any member of the military court without laying the grounds.
But the prosecution opposed, claiming that based on the transcript of last week’s hearing, Estolas said he had exercised his right.
When the officer raised his hand to challenge the prosecution, the court did not recognize him which prompted Estolas to stand up.
A military policeman, however, motioned him to sit down.
A confrontation then occurred as Marine Lt. Col. Achilles Segumalian stood up and questioned the court’s action.
‘Why did you stop him’? he said.
During a recess, Segumalian also accused the lead prosecution of lying.
Fojas ordered the accused to observe proper decorum when inside the court. He also warned them of ‘appropriate sanctions’ should the officers violate his order.
collator.pee.dee@yahoo.co.uk

WE SALUTE YOU MAJOR - BASILIO POOTEN

144 Responses to “Walkout for justice”
Ellen Says:
November 11th, 2007 at 9:51 pm

Statement
from the detained officers in Camp Capinpin:
WE SALUTE YOU MAJOR BASILIO POOTEN (JAGS)

“I am an officer of the Armed Forces of the Philippines and at the same time a lawyer. I will not allow myself to trample upon the rights of the accused gentlemen officers and be a party to the denial of their Constitutional rights. And by these, your Honors, I ask to be excused from these proceedings.”
Fighting words said under the sharp and glaring eyes of Col Marian Aleido, the Law member of the Special General Court Martial #2 trying the twenty-eight (28) Marines and Scout Rangers in Tanay.
We, Marines and Scout Rangers, salute you Major Pooten. You proved yourself to be a true Marine. Being a lawyer, you may not have been a Marine all your career life, but you surely had imbibed that WARRIOR spirit and honor. You have refused to be cowed into toeing the line emanating from illegitimate orders.
You humbled us by entertaining thoughts that you will succumb to the whims and caprices of Mister Esperon. How wrong we were. However, we worry for you Major Pooten. Given the vengeful character of the present leadership of the AFP, you might find yourself out in the cold. However, we have no doubt in our minds that you will weather the storm given the kind of stuff you are made of.
Col Marian Aleido, you are a great disappointment. You have been with the Marines also, longer than Major Pooten. We only had great admiration for your sense of justice and fairness and religious fervor then. However, as the trial progressed, we observed a very disturbing transformation in you which is way out of character…way out of what we have always known you. What happened Col Aleido?
Major Pooten, you have provided us with an inspiration that there are still decent officers in the AFP. We are aware there are more like you. We call on their moral and professional sense to stop the bastardization of our Military Justice System. We, officers in Tanay, are just collateral victims in this drama.
The real victim here is our justice system.