MANILA – Recognizing their achievements and contributions to the judiciary and to the country, the Senate has adopted two resolutions honoring newly retired Supreme Court (SC) Justice Jose Perez and outgoing Associate Justice Arturo Brion, who is set to vacate his post before the year ends.
The Senate approved Senate Resolution Numbers 254 for Perez and 255 for Brion the same day they were filed on Tuesday, December 13.
Senator Richard Gordon, chairman of the committee on justice and human rights, filed the two resolutions before the 17th Congress adjourned session for the Christmas break.
“It is only proper that your chairman in the Committee of Justice recognizes stalwart members of the Supreme Court who are retiring to show our faith, confidence and respect to the judiciary. I move that we pass this resolution recognizing, through Justices Perez and Brion, the achievements and contributions of the judiciary to the Filipino people,” Gordon said in his sponsorship speech.
Gordon noted that Perez, who retired last December 14, has the distinction of being the first “homegrown” justice, starting out as Technical Assistant in the Supreme Court in 1972 after passing the bar exams. He then rose through the ranks so that on July 10, 2008 then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo appointed him as Court Administrator and subsequently as the 167th Associate Justice of the SC.
Among the notable decisions that Perez wrote include the law creating a new district of Camarines Sur, the disqualification of former Marinduque Representative Regina Reyes from the 2013 midterm polls because of citizenship and residency issues, and the landmark ruling that declared Senator Grace Poe a natural born Filipino citizen, allowing her to run for president.
On the other hand, Brion, who is set to retire on December 29, was cited for having served in the three branches of government. He was an assemblyman from Laguna from 1984 to 1986, Secretary of the Department of Labor and Employment from 2006 to 2008, and SC justice from 2008 to 2016. Like Perez, Brion was also an Arroyo appointee.
Gordon said he had the privilege of working with Brion when, as Philippine Red Cross chairman, he worked with then labor Secretary Brion to get the overseas Filipino workers out of Lebanon when a crisis broke out in that country.
“And certainly Justice Brion, from my own personal knowledge, still lives in a humble abode. He has been threatened with death by a drug lord but has remained steadfast in the judiciary. Both of them have already earned their way in the firmament of league of scholars and league of jurists and great citizens of the Republic. They were also stalwart ponentes in the Supreme Court,” he stressed. (Senate)