(Eagle News)–Lawyer Larry Gadon on Thursday, March 28, formally opposed the application to the post of justice at the Court of Tax Appeals of a Judicial and Bar Council member who supposedly accepted the incomplete Statements of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth of Maria Lourdes Sereno when she applied for the Chief Justice post.
In opposing the application of Maria Milagros Fernan-Cayosa in a letter to Chief Justice Lucas Bersamin, the ex-officio chair of the JBC, Gadon said she “committed irregularities” when she supposedly accepted Sereno’s SALNs.
The filing of complete SALNs is a requirement for one to be considered for the position of chief magistrate.
Sereno, who was eventually named to the position, was ousted via a quo warranto petition in 2018 after it was discovered she failed to file hers when she was teaching at the University of the Philippines.
According to Gadon, Fernan-Cayosa was also a regular member of the JBC, which would deliberate on the same application for the posts left vacant by Justice Lovell Bautista and Justice Caesar Casanova.
As such, he said “there seems to be a conflict of interest, much more a sense of unprofessionalism, (on her part) to send an application to the JBC..”
“(She) should have resigned from the JBC prior to her applying for the position of CTA justice,” Gadon said.
“Allowing Fernan-Cayosa to be an aspiring CTA justice would run counter to this Honorable Council’s mission of recommending appointees, ‘only persons of proven competence, integrity, probity and independence,’ and insulating the ‘nomination process from undue influence of any kind,'” he added.
