Con-Com eyes JBC overhaul, change to JADC

FILE: President Rodrigo Roa Duterte presides over a meeting with the members of the Consultative Meeting at the Malacañan Palace on February 13, 2018. KING RODRIGUEZ/PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO

The Consultative Committee (Con-Com) is considering in a proposal overhauling the Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) in terms of power, function, composition, organization, and name.

Con-Com proposed the new name of the council to be Judicial Appointments and Disciplinary Council (JADC) to reflect its broader powers, functions, and coverage of vetting.

JBC is originally tasked to recommend appointees to the Judiciary and promote transparency and public awareness when it comes to the nomination, screening, and selection processes. This function will be retained in JADC but will also include the investigation of cases filed against members of the Judiciary, which now requires the council to submit its findings to the High Court that has control and supervision over the probe.

In a press briefing on May 30, Wednesay, Con-Com member and former Supreme Court (SC) associate justice Antonio Eduardo Nachura called the new function and power as a “very big” recommendation.

JADC is proposed to be independent that it would not be under the SC’s supervision.

The Con-Com also proposed the chairmanship of the JADC to be rotated every two years among the Chief Justice of the Federal Supreme Court, Presiding Justice of the Federal Constitutional Court, and Presiding Justice of the Federal Administrative Court.

The number of JADC’s members is also a double of the current seven in JBC consisting of 10 ex-officio members and four regular members.

Ex-officio members will be made up of the Chief Justice of the Federal Supreme Court, the presiding Justice of the Federal Constitutional Court, the presiding Justice of the Federal Administration Court, a representative from the Senate, a representative from the House of Representatives, the Ombudsman, the Chairman of the Commission on Audit (COA), the Chairman of the Civil Service Commission (CSC), the Secretary of Justice, and the Court Administrator of the Federal Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, the regular members would compose of a representative designated by the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP), a law professor designated by the Philippine Association of Law Schools (PALS), a representative from and designated by the Association of Generals and Flag Officers (AGFO), and a retired member of the Federal Supreme Court to be designated by the Association of the Retired Justices of the Federal Supreme Court.

Nachura then said that “These are supposed to be men of proven competence and integrity – men and women.”

The Con-Com was formed by President Rodrigo Roa Duterte to review proposals on the amendment and/or revision of the 1987 Constitution in preparation for a federal form of government.