Acting Chief Justice Antonio Carpio on Friday assured the public that the Supreme Court was functioning normally despite the uproar sparked by the ouster of Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno.
Carpio said people should learn to respect the high tribunal’s May 11 decision granting Solicitor General Jose Calida’s quo warranto petition that ousted Sereno.
“The Supreme Court decides. We must just follow,” Carpio said in an ambush interview with the media on the sidelines of the high court’s 117th anniversary celebration on Padre Faura Street in Manila.
“We just have to accept it because that’s how we can move on. We should accept the ruling because that’s the decision of the majority,” he stressed.
The senior magistrate joined five other colleagues in voting to dismiss Calida’s petition.
But they were outvoted by eight other justices who opined that constitutional officers may be unseated outside of the impeachment process as required by the 1987 Constitution. —MARLON RAMOS