Updated (5:17 p.m.)
While Supreme Court decisions should be respected, Associate Justice Diosdado Peralta on Tuesday clarified that the high court also respects the duty and mandate of Congress.
Peralta said this in response to Albay 1st District Rep. Edcel Lagman’s clarification Chief Justice Teresita Leonardo De Castro’s statement that the SC is “untouchable” and the high court “should be left alone.”
“It’s better for the chief justice to answer, but I understand from what she said that our decisions should be respected, I think that’s what she said,” Peralta said during the Judiciary’s budget defense before the House committee on appropriations.
“She did not mean that (we are untouchable)… I think we respect also the duty of Congress. That should also be respected, your honor,” he added.
On Monday, De Castro chided the critics of the high court, saying “we should be left alone to decide for ourselves.”
“People outside would like to judge us by what they see or hear from afar but it is us, the justices and officials of the Court, who know what is happening inside the Supreme Court and we should be left alone,” De Castro said during her first flag ceremony as the top magistrate.
“We demand respect from the other co-equal branches of the government,” she added.
READ: De Castro tells Palace, Congress: Leave SC alone
READ: Leave SC alone, De Castro tells critics, allies
Peralta, in a separate interview after the budget briefing, interpreted De Castro’s “leave us alone” statement as a “general statement,” which did not refer to any specific issue.
He also said the chief justice probably meant that the SC should be “left alone in solving its own problems.”
‘SC should not be untouchable’
Lagman earlier criticized De Castro’s statement, saying the SC should not be untouchable especially when it comes to its “unjust or malicious” decisions.
“The Supreme Court should not be untouchable and the decisions of the SC once they are unjust or malicious or grossly unconstitutional should not defer the other departments of government from making an issue out of these malevolent decisions,” the opposition lawmaker said in a separate briefing. /ee