MANILA, Philippines - Hours before Christmas, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo made her sixth appointment to the Supreme Court (SC) this year, picking an insider who has been involved with a number of Malacañang-led global initiatives.

Arroyo appointed Supreme Court administrator Jose Perez Thursday to replace SC Justice Leonardo Quisumbing, who hung his robe on November 6.

Perez replaced court administrator Zenaida Elepaño only in 2008, but has served as deputy court administrator for eight years. As court administrator, he oversaw the budgetary and administrative management of lower courts.

A graduate of the UP College of Law, he started in the SC as a legal assistant in 1972 and steadily rose from the ranks.

Delegate and administrator

Perez recently participated in global undertakings led by the executive.

He was part of the group designated by Arroyo to prove to the Washington-led Millennium Challenge Corp. that the Philippines is worthy of the compact status, which would make the country eligible for a $562-million financial package under the Millennium Challenge Account.

Perez was tasked to explain the reasons behind the low conviction rate of the country, and how the judiciary is independent from the executive.

Prior to that, he was also sent to Geneva, Switzerland as part of the country’s delegation to the Universal Periodic Review at the UN Human Rights Council.  

The delegation, headed by Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, was grilled about the Philippines’ lack of action on the recommendations of UN Rapporteur Philip Alston, who had sought the prosecution of perpetrators of human rights violations.

Perez outlined the writ of amparo and writ of habeas data before the UN Human Rights Council, initiatives introduced by the SC to ensure the protection of alleged human rights victims and their families.

Reforms and questions

Perez will leave his post with the expansion of the Regional Court Administrator’s Office (RCAO) underway, and with stakeholders hoping for smoother operations this time around.

Perez has been candid about OCA’s apprehensions over the establishment of an RCAO, an initiative funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to decentralize the court’s operations. The RCAO would supervise the distribution of funds, salaries and supplies to local courts, which have been delayed, according to the ADB, under the current setup with OCA.

Presently, court employees from provinces direct their requests to OCA, which is located  in Manila. Judges in Cebu, where the pilot RCAO was established, had told Newsbreak that this usually meant having “paper clips to other office supplies delivered only after a month.”

In an earlier interview with Newsbreak, Perez admitted that having an RCAO raises fears of a diminished role for OCA, but he also agreed that the development of an RCAO cannot be stopped.

During the 33rd anniversary of OCA in November 2008, he said that they are looking into “how the experiment can be smoothly conducted.”

Aside from RCAO, it was also under Perez’s term when the Local Government Unit-Judiciary Equalization Fund (LGU-JEF) began. The LGU-JEF was introduced by the Cebu City government to prevent local officials from using allowances, which the LGUs provide to local judges, as a means to influence court decisions.