Revocation of Trillanes amnesty ‘recipe for disaster’ — Lacierda

FILE: Senator Antonio Trillanes IV delivers a privilege speech on his support for the continuation of the recent Senate probe on the statements of former SPO3 Arthur Lascañas while Senate Minority Leader Franklin M. Drilon listens. (Photo: Albert Calvelo via Senate of the Philippines/Facebook)

Former Presidential Spokesperson Edwin Lacierda on Friday, September 7, called the recent move of President Rodrigo Duterte against Senator Antonio Trillanes IV as a “recipe for disaster.”

Lacierda made this remark after Duterte, through Proclamation No. 572, declared void from the beginning the grant of amnesty to Trillanes under former President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III’s Proclamation No. 75 in 2011.

“It’s a recipe for disaster. You’re opening up a can of worms,” Lacierda told ANC’s Headstart.

In issuing his proclamation, Lacierda said the President is “turning the entire legal philosophy of amnesty upside down.”

Lacierda further stressed that the cases thrown against Trillanes were already considered ‘settled’ when Aquino granted the amnesty to the former Navy officer.

“The amnesty in legal effect would be, unlike pardon, amnesty looks back and says wala ng kaso (there will be no case), we’re throwing your case into oblivion,” the lawyer explained.

On Thursday, Trillanes asked the Supreme Court (SC) to stop Duterte’s withdrawal of his amnesty.

The opposition senator, in his 36-page petition, said Proclamation No. 572 is “clearly unconstitutional” because it violated the “constitutional design” which makes amnesty granting a “joint power” of the Chief Executive and the members of the two chambers of Congress.

Lacierda, in the same interview, said if the SC will allow the revocation of Trillanes’s amnesty, then that decision will be labelled as a “bad case.”

“If the Supreme Court would render otherwise, would decide otherwise that they can revoke a succeeding president can revoke a previous president’s proclamation or that amnesty is not absolute, that’s what we call a bad case and bad case makes bad law,” he said.

Senate Minority Franklin Drilon earlier warned that voiding the amnesty given to Trillanes may result in ‘instability’ in the government.

“If we allow this, it will create such instability and then you can no longer rely on the officials’ acts of government, including, in this particular case, the executive, the legislative and the judiciary – all three branches of government,” Drilon said in an interview with ANC’s Headstart on Thursday.

The senator said Duterte’s proclamation cannot just simply invalidate the decision that was agreed upon by the three branches of the government.

“The three branches of government were on the same track. All acted in unison insofar as this case is concerned. Don’t tell me that we can just void that,” he said.

Drilon then expressed hope that the high court will decide on the Trillanes’s case “in the way the logic and jurisprudence would dictate.”