Trillanes quotes Miriam

An officer and a gentleman, Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV, is courteous to Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago. Last Sept. 3, the detained senator filed a resolution questioning Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita's meddling in Senate processes by presiding the Senate Technical Working Group on Philippine Baseline Bills on Aug. 14, 2008, in Malacañang. Trillanes, who is one of the five senators who have filed a bill delineating the country's archipelagic baseline, said Ermita's role as presiding officer of a Senate committee meeting is a clear violation of the constitutionally enshrined principle of separation of powers of the three branches of government. "Secretary Ermita's actions effectively undermined the independence of the Senate as an institution," he said. Santiago, chair of the Senate committee on Foreign Relations that is tackling the baseline bills, was furious. "This is the first time that a senator has ever questioned the discretion of a committee chair to appoint the head of a TWG and the first time that a senator has ever questioned the credentials of the head of the TWG," she said. Santiago, who was a judge before she entered politics, asked Trillanes to cite the legal bases for his charges against Ermita within 15 days and for Ermita to submit comments on Trillanes' statements within the same time period. In a letter to Santiago last week (Sept. 17), Trillanes said although he was told that he is not in any way obliged to comply with her request nor bound by her 15-day deadline, he was explaining his position in writing " as a courtesy to a fellow senator." Trillanes, a non-lawyer, cited to Santiago, who styles herself as an expert in constitutional law, passages from her book. A portion of Trillanes' letter: "The principle of separation of powers is quite a well known doctrine in any introductory course in government and I have been told that it is also an important doctrine in Political law. But to accommodate your further request for me to quote the legal provision(s) and/or basis of my claim, my staff came upon your own position as you have extensively discussed in Chapter 3 of your book: 'Constitutional Law Text and Cases, Volume I, Political Structure' Second Edition [2000], particularly on pages 163 to 212. "Allow me to directly quote a few relevant passages from your book in support of my position, to wit: "The principle of separation means that the governmental powers are divided among the three department of government–the legislative, executive, and judicial–and that each is separate from the other. As a principle, it has been described in our constitutional system as a feature that is both characteristic and cardinal. The principle has been traced back to Cicero, Aristotle, Locke, and Montesquieu. "The Philippine Constitution establishes three great departments of government: the Legislative to pass the laws; the Executive to approve and execute them; and the Judiciary to expound and enforce them. The difference between the departments is that the legislative makes, the executive executes, and the judiciary construes, the law; xxx" Trillanes said the undermining of the independence of the Senate was clear when Ermita openly declared during the committee's Aug. 14 hearing that he intends to have Henry Bensurto, secretary general of the Commission on Maritime and Ocean Affairs and/or the Secretariat from the Department of Foreign Affairs to prepare the draft of the "substitute bill" which will replace the bills filed by the senators. Trillanes' bill differs from the position taken by Malacañang on the Scarborough Shoal. Malacañang wants it treated as regime of islands while Trillanes included it within the country's archipelagic baseline. He said inclusion of Scarborough Shoal, which is less than 125 nautical miles from the shorelines of Luzon would gain for the Philippines approximately 14,500 square meters nautical miles of Economic Exclusive Zone and continental shelf. Trillions further told Santiago: "It cannot be disputed that the duty and function of crafting bills is essentially a legislative function and, thus, cannot be delegated or assigned either directly or indirectly to functionaries of the executive branch of Government. This is tantamount to allowing the executive, which has shown undue and unusual interest in the Baselines bills not only in the Senate but also in the House of Representatives, to control the outcome of the legislative process." Here again, he quoted from her book: "Under the doctrine of separation, the lawmaking function is assigned exclusively to Congress; therefore, Congress cannot delegate the power to make laws to any other authority or body. This is a cardinal principle of representative government." Trillanes said since it's Santiago's office that designated Ermita as chair of the Technical Working Group on the Philippine Baselines Bills, it would not be the proper venue to thresh out and rule on the matter. His resolution calls for the Senate to convene itself into a committee of the whole to look into it. Santiago, meanwhile, has directed Ermita to temporarily abstain from presiding over the TWG meeting. She named her deputy chief of staff, lawyer Fatima Panontongan, as acting chair to preside in future meetings to be able to meet with the May 2009 deadline of the United Nation Convention on the Law of the Sea for submission of claims of extended continental shelf, which can only be measured once the archipelagic baseline is defined.