[quote="Flyingroc Chung":10ajgkyq]Hm, I could use your tactic of saying: "I've explained this many many times before" and imply that a.) you do not read my posts, or b.) you cannot understnad what you read. But this is not true, sometimes people certain kinds of explanation are difficult for peole to understand, and some other kinds of eplanation are easier. So... I will attempt to explain another way.
Maybe a little personal background will help. I come from the Philippines, originally. It's a wonderful country with people as warm as its tropical climate. It would be paradise on earth, except we have a very corrupt and inefficient government.
While many of you view your RL judiciary with respect, a lot of Filipinos view ours with distrust. Our judges are likely to be corrupt than not. We have a set of byzantine legal procedures in the Philippines, probably not so different from other countries, but there judges use these procedures to throw out cases against the rich and powerful on small technical matters.
Where I come from, people who win court cases are quite often those who can afford the most expensive lawyers, *not* the party who is *right*. Despite this, nobody seeks to remove judges from their lifetie terms. Aside from the personal risk to life and limb, guess what, the judge is better at navigating the complex legal system than the ordinary person.[/quote:10ajgkyq]
It is unfortunate that your judiciary is corrupt. It is very unfair, however, for you to criticise the proponents of our judiciary, who come from countries with judicial systems that work well, for being power hungry, or for pressing for an unreasonable or unworkable system based on your anti-judicial prejudices from your unfortunate judicial background. The fact that there are many nations on earth with well-functioning judiciaries proves that it most certainly is possible to have a judiciary that works well, is truly independent, skilled and fair, and produces the best outcomes. That is what the elected legislature voted for thrice when it passed the judiciary act, and that is what I am not entirely unreasonably asking people now to respect.
[quote:10ajgkyq]So you will forgive me if I don't view *this* judiciary or *any* judiciary as necessarily good. And I hope you understand if I am leery of judges with lifetime terms. That the likely new judges don't seem to be corrupt does not mean that future judges won't be. It is not mere speculation but my own personal experience that tells me that judges are likely to be corrupt than not (legislators too, but the RA has proven itself as an institution); and this JA does not inspire confidence that this will not be the case in the future.[/quote:10ajgkyq]
It is unfortunate that judges in your country are corrupt. That is not any reason at all, however, for predicating our system design on the premise that ours will be.
[quote:10ajgkyq]In fact, there are already troubling signs to *me* that the judiciary is trying to hold on to more power than it should have: the insistence on lifetime terms[/quote:10ajgkyq]
Why is it troubling to you that the present judiciary should defend the constitutional principle of security of tenure that was agreed upon after a lengthy, detailed, intensive principled debate by the legislature thrice in a row unanimously, and that is a vital bastion of judicial independence and therefore impartiality and fairness?
[quote:10ajgkyq]a procedural code only its author seems to be able to explain, the resistance to change the same procedures.[/quote:10ajgkyq]
I have explained many times the importance of having detail. If you cannot muster arguments against those principled points, then mere assertions to the contrary have no worth.
[quote:10ajgkyq]And from yesterdays commission meeting, flat out saying that the RA should *not* continue having a special commission for the judiciary.
All this insistence on judicial independence to my ears sounds like a judiciary trying to avoid oversight. This is all very troubling to me, and perhaps it should be troubling to all of us.[/quote:10ajgkyq]
If you took the trouble to listen to what I was saying yesterday, it was that the judiciary should most certainly be overseen: by the body that the constitution provides for to oversee it: the Public Judiciary Scrutiny Panel. I was arguing against duplication, as, indeed, were a number of other people. Ludo Merit is hardly biased or power-hungry, is she?