The Judicial and Bar Council (JBC) scrapped the age cap of applicants to the Supreme Court in its en banc meeting held recently, opening the race to SC hopefuls who are more than 65 years old.

Rep. Matias Defensor of Quezon City, JBC ex-oficio member, said that the body voted to make its age qualification flexible as applicants should be considered more based on their “competence.”

“The vote was unanimous,” he told Abs-cbnnews.com/Newsbreak in a phone interview.

This eliminates a huge obstacle for Rodolfo Robles, lawyer and president of real estate company Landphil Corp., who was cut from the list of nominees last year because he is 65 years and 4 months old.

Robles, whose father is a friend of the Arroyo patriarch, former Pres. Diosdado Macapagal, was touted as one of Malacañang’s top picks to replace Justice Ruben Reyes, who hang his robe on January 3.

Robles was however taken out of the running as Rule 8.2 of the internal rules of the JBC cites that non-career applicants must serve the SC for “at least five years” to “discourage” short-lived appointments.

Last Monday, however, the JBC aligned its age qualification on the constitutional requirements for SC contenders following “letters from some people” which purportedly questioned the current guidelines.

'Discourage,' not mandate

Rule 8.7 of the 1987 Constitution stipulates that an SC magistrate must be at least 40 years of age, and must have been a judge or a private practitioner for 15 years.

Defensor said that Justices Leonardo Quisumbing and Consuelo Ynares-Santiago, both JBC consultants, read the letters and decided that the JBC would not violate any constitutional rules if it allows applicants to the High Court who are older than 65.

Defensor said that the JBC, after all, could only “discourage” the appointment of people who would not be able to serve in the High Tribunal for a “reasonably sufficient time.”

He explained that this does not provide the JBC the authority to discriminate against applicants who may be older than 65. “The JBC rules are not mandatory in nature,” he added.

He explained that various opinions from constitutionalist Fr. Joaquin Bernas and Ret. Justice Isagani Cruz were also noted in their deliberations.

“Consider, however, that the constitutional age requirement of Supreme Court justices is that they must not be more than 70 years old. Moreover, unlike in the case of justices and judges of lower courts, not even Congress is allowed to add to the constitutionally enumerated qualifications. It would seem to me that by enacting a rule which automatically excludes a non-career person who is 65 years old or a career person in the judiciary who is 68 years old the JBC has effectively amended the

Constitution. We know that the JBC has no authority to do that,” Bernas wrote in his Dec. 15 column in the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

Welcomed decision

Aside from Robles, those who would also benefit from JBC’s decision include former Bureau of Internal Revenue commissioner Jose Mario Buñag.
Buñag also tried for Reyes’s post, but failed to make the shortlist.

Pablito Sanidad, who was earlier reported to be 65, said he is not yet affected by the JBC’s rule on age qualification because he is just 64 years old. He would turn 65 on April 25.

Sanidad is one of the hopefuls vying for the seat of Justice Adolfo Azcuna, who is set to retire on February 16.

Defensor said that even if Robles and Buñag would stay less than five years in the SC if ever they get appointed, they seemed to possess the competence necessary to dispose cases in two years, the standard period for SC justices in clearing their caseload.

“Robles is a bar topnotcher while Bunag is a valedictorian of the Ateneo Law,” he said.

Robles welcomed JBC’s decision, saying that “it is good news.”

Sanidad expressed similar sentiments, saying that it “widens the field.”