Sereno eyes publishing of justices’ SALN on SC website
Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno said the Supreme Court is studying the possibility of publishing the Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN) of justices on its website as part of the efforts to foster greater transparency in the judiciary.
In her speech during the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas 40th Top Level Management Conference, Sereno said “the Court has recently agreed to sincerely discuss how to publish on the SC’s website the relevant summaries of the information required law in our respective SALNs.”
“As soon as the steps needed to operationalize are agreed upon, then, we will be issuing the guidelines for this,” Sereno said.
Sereno said she had been asked repeatedly by many sectors about the issue of accessibility of the SALNs of the justices.
“I fail to see the problem here because these SALNs are accessible, upon request, and since 2012, you would have seen a noticeable rise in access to the SALNs of the members of the Court,” Sereno said.
“The Court has done all these not because it needs the attention or the publicity but because it has a duty to perform—that of ensuring that the public is informed, understands the work of the courts and, in the process, is assured that there is a system of justice in place that is working, and is working well. This, the Court is doing, with your help,” Sereno said.
But before the plan has been approved, Sereno assured the gathering and the public that the judiciary is transparent in all its workings adding that their decisions and even financial documents are already on the Court’s website.
“All that your reporter would need to do is to take the time to ready, study, analyze and write about these,” she added.
Last August, Sereno defended the stand of the high court regarding the release of the SALNs of the justices amid calls for greater transparency in the judiciary.
Sereno made her position several days after the high court ruled with finality junking the request of Bureau of Internal Revenue Commissioner Kim Jacinto Henares for copies of the SALNs of the SC justices as well as those from the Court of Appeals and the Court of Tax Appeals.
She said the ruling should not be misconstrued as lack of transparency in the part of the judiciary, and the SC in particular even as she questioned the reasons why the justices were being subjected to such an intense calls to make public their assets when they have already done that.
“Ano pa bang dahilan ng pagdududa? Gagawin po ba sa lahat ng mg opisyales yan o pinupuntirya lang ang mga miyembro ng hudikatura? Ano pa bang impormasyon ang kailangan na maipapakita namin para mapatunayan na wala kaming itinatago? Hindi ko po maintindihan kung ano ang dahilan. Ang SALN ko nga sobra nang nabusisi, alam ng taumbayan kung ilan ang sasakyan namin,” she said then.
Sereno likewise said that the SALNs they are submitting are not summary of their assets and liabilities but a complete and detailed list of their net worth.
Sereno also said then that the current system of releasing SALNs which are governed by guidelines issued by the high court in 2012 in the wake of the impeachment of then Chief Justice Renato Corona is a big step and improvement compared to the previous administration.
“This is a major improvement over the previous regime that prohibited the release of SALNs except in exceptional cases,” she added.
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