Baguio activists gather to protest Sereno ouster

Baguio activists, church workers and youth groups gather at the Malcolm Square in Baguio City to protest the Supreme Court decision ousting Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno. INQUIRER-Northern Luzon photo / Richard Balonglong

BAGUIO CITY—Baguio-based activists gathered at the Malcolm Square on Friday night (May 11) to protest the ouster of Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno following a Supreme Court en banc decision granting the quo warranto petition of Solicitor General Jose Calida.

A protester joined the 6 p.m. rally dressed as a “grieving Lady Justice,” to express what the activists called a “mockery of the Constitution, the highest law of the land.”

Another rally participant Beng Garcia, of the Coalition of Justice, said removing an impeachable official like Sereno through a quo warranto proceeding should concern everyone. “If a Chief Justice could be ousted unconstitutionally, how much more the ordinary people,” she said.

A quo warranto petition challenges an official’s appointment to public office, seeking its nullification.

“The eight colluding justices are the best examples of what lawyers should not be,” Garcia added, referring to the justices who voted in favor of the quo warranto petition namely Associate Justices Teresita Leonardo De Castro, Diosdado Peralta, Lucas Bersamin, Samuel Martires, Francis Jardeleza, Andres Reyes Jr., Alexander Gesmundo, and Noel Tijam.

READ: Peers kick Sereno out via Calida’s QW

Activist Jeannette Ribaya-Cawiding, of the Movement against Tyranny, said the administration did not forgive Sereno, who was among the first people to criticize the government’s war on drugs.

The Court heard oral arguments on the quo warranto petition here when it held its annual summer sessions at its Baguio courthouse in April. /jpv

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