Even pain has a purpose: Justice Reynato Puno
Chief Justice Puno
You may be wondering about the choice of this blawg’s header quote. It’s from the statement of Supreme Court Justice Reynato Puno (inset photo), months back after PGMA appointed Justice Panganiban as the new Chief Justice (by tradition, the most senior justice is appointed as the Chief Justice; Justice Puno is the most senior justice). For posterity, here’s the full statement:
The President has exercised her exclusive constitutional power of appointment. Let us all respect her judgment. The Almighty has a plan for all of us and I agree that the All Seeing Eye does not play dice with our destinies. Indeed, even pain has a purpose.
I dispel all rumors that I will opt for early retirement. Those who desire to reduce me to posthumous significance will not experience any ecstasy.
I will continue to work as a humble member of the court and as always, I pledge to be an independent-minded jurist regardless of consequence, to fight for the civil liberties of the people against abuses coming from any and all sources, to do battle with vested interests especially those who believe they have a divine right to selfishness and to protect the institutional independence of the High Court against threats of tampering from within and without its portals.
I wish Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban all the best!
(Photo courtesy of the Supreme Court [news bulletin]: Senior Associate Justice and Global Forum Chair Reynato S. Puno welcomes more than 400 delegates, including 12 Chief Justices, from 33 countries to the Global Forum on Liberty and Prosperity at the Makati Shangri-la Hotel yesterday. Justice Puno said the Forum theme “Safeguarding the Liberty and Nurturing the Prosperity of the Peoples of the World” is both timeless and timely: timeless because the story of mankind is the story of his heroic efforts to win mankind’s liberty from the claws and clutches of tyrants of all kinds as well as his efforts to lift mankind from the quicksand and quagmires of poverty; and timely because the fight for liberty and the struggle to attain prosperity whether in the East or the West are struggles that have beginnings but are without ends. The struggle for liberty and prosperity is therefore, the most difficult of all struggles, for it is a struggle where triumph is only temporary, where victory is never permanent.”)
[...] Arroyo’s appointment of Panaganiban, which bypassed Senior Associate Justice Reynato Puno, is only the fifth exception. (view Puno’s statement here) [...]
[...] Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban. Pres. Arroyo appointed then Justice Panganiban as Chief Justice, bypassing the most senior member of the Supreme Court – Senior Associate Justice Reynato Puno (Justice Puno later issued a moving statement). [...]
[...] (This is the statement of Chief Justice Puno, accepting his appointment as the 22nd Chief Justice of the Philippine Supreme Court. To read his statement given earlier this year, click here). [...]
[...] closing, allow me to paraphrase the words of Supreme Court Chief Justice Reynato Puno, for those who refuse to let their dreams die: The Supreme Court has exercised its exclusive power [...]