SC draws support in fight to keep JDF

The Supreme Court. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO

LUCENA CITY—The head of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines on Wednesday said the plan of the House of Representatives to transfer the judiciary’s Judicial Development Fund (JDF) to the national treasury smacks of an insult to the Supreme Court.

“It would be demeaning to the Supreme Court to always beg the Department of Budget and Management for the use of their own fund,” said IBP president Vicente Joyas said in a phone interview on Wednesday.

The high court also got the support of a nongovernment organization amid pressure from Congress over the JDF.

“If Congress continues to insist on looking into the Judiciary’s Judicial Development Fund (JDF), the judiciary should respond with the title of Jose Rizal’s immortal work: ‘Noli Me Tangere’ (Touch Me Not)!” the group Bayan Mamamayan Abante Movement (BMAA) said in a statement.

Rizal’s Noli is credited with exposing social ills during the Spanish occupation of the Philippines.

The movement’s chair, pastor Bienvenido Abante Jr., called on his friends in the House to end attempts to amend the law that established the JDF, a source of allowances for justices, judges and other personnel of the judiciary set up under Presidential Decree No. 1949.

The 1984 law mandates that 80 percent of judicial collections be set aside for personnel allowances and 20 percent for judiciary facilities.

“The judiciary was given fiscal autonomy for a reason—it was to insulate it from politics so that neither Congress nor the Executive could exert undue pressure on an institution that could rule against them,” said BMAA.

“The chief Justice is right—the timing of the inquiry into the JDF is suspect,” said the group.

“The motivation is also questionable as there is no evidence that the judiciary abused or misused the fund,” it added.

Joyas expressed doubt on the legality of the lawmakers’ plan to transfer the controversial JDF from the high court to the Bureau of Treasury.

“It will violate the fiscal autonomy of the Supreme Court and the judiciary,” he said.

Joyas said the House move against the JDF would lead to widespread demoralization of judges and all court employees.

He said it would “have a chilling effect on the entire judicial system.”

Local court employees here also assailed the inclination of some lawmakers to investigate the JDF.