MANILA, Philippines—Heaving “sighs of relief,” members of the panel probing the Court of Appeals handling of the controversial court case between the Manila Electric Co. and the Government Service Insurance System on Thursday submitted their report to the Supreme Court.

But the report of the panel—composed of retired Supreme Court Justices Carolina Griño Aquino, Flerida Ruth Romero and Romeo Callejo Sr.—cannot be made public until after the high court deliberates on it, said Supreme Court spokesperson Jose Midas Marquez.

Marquez said the report has to remain secret as it will form part of the decision-making process of the high court.

But he said the high court justices have given the case the highest priority and would act quickly on it as they want to end the controversy hounding the country’s second highest court.

In a week or two

The panel’s report will be included in the agenda of the court’s regular en banc session on Tuesday, and the court could decide to adopt or modify it, Marquez said.

A ruling could be handed down in a week or two, he said.

The high court could impose sanctions as light as a reprimand or as severe as dismissal, if any impropriety is found, said Marquez.

“If it would be shown by the factual findings that there are major violations, improprieties that took place, then the penalties can range from a simple admonition to dismissal from the service. It would depend on the improprieties,” he said.

Marquez said the panel members, whose daily hearings on the case were “unprecedented,” appeared to heave “sighs of relief” when they submitted the report.

Comprehensive

Marquez said that as far as he knew, no investigating panel has conducted hearings everyday, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and with several Court of Appeals justices, including the Presiding Justice, taking part in the proceedings.

He said the high court justices expect the panel’s report to be “comprehensive” considering the amount of work that its members have put into the probe.

The unprecedented investigation into the Court of Appeals came about because of a conflict over which justices should handle a case involving a petition by the Lopez-led Meralco to stop the move of the GSIS and the Securities and Exchange Commission to annul the results of the recent board elections of the electric utility.

Associate Justice Jose Sabio Jr. was acting chair of the appellate court’s 9th Division that initially heard the case and issued a restraining order against the SEC which had ordered a stop to the counting of proxy votes of the Lopez group in the May 27 board elections. Associate Justices Myrna Dimaranan-Vidal and Vicente Roxas were members of the division.

However, on July 23, the court’s 8th Division, chaired by Justice Vicente Reyes, issued a ruling deciding the case, voiding the SEC order and upholding Meralco’s argument that the SEC had no jurisdiction on the case. It was Roxas who penned the decision.

Something ‘fishy’

The 8th Division’s decision triggered an internal protest among the appellate court’s justices, particularly Vidal and Sabio, who said that there was something “fishy” in the way the case was transferred from the 9th to the 8th Division.

Adding fire to the controversy, Sabio, in a letter to Presiding Justice Conrado Vasquez, disclosed that a businessman allegedly acting as a Meralco emissary offered him P10 million to inhibit himself from the case and pave the way for Reyes’ division to rule on the issue.

Businessman Francis de Borja, saying he was the emissary referred to, claimed in a counter-affidavit that Sabio had told him that he had been offered a Supreme Court seat and money to rule in favor of the GSIS. De Borja also alleged that Sabio had told him that his price to reject the offer was P50 million.

Sabio also later disclosed that his older brother Camilo, who chairs the Presidential Commission on Good Government, called him up to convince him to favor the GSIS stand. Camilo subsequently revealed that Jesus Santos, a member of the GSIS board who is more known as the lawyer of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo, had called him about the Meralco case.