Guilty as charged.

The now former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court issued a statement from his hospital bed that he, Renato Corona, accepts the guilty verdict handed down by the Philippine senator-judges.

Renato Corona was found guilty of not declaring truthfully his assets in his Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth.

Majority of the senator-judges who gave Corona the guilty verdict were not lawyers.  Majority of the Filipino people who followed the impeachment proceedings were non lawyers, too.  As Senator Lito Lapid, when casting his verdict said to this effect, "ako po ay high shool graduate lang, di marunong mag ingles, hindi ko naiintindihan ang mga legal talk, pero ako bilang representante ng mga mahihirap at di nag aral ay boboto base sa aking konsyensya."  He found Corona guilty as charged.

Before Ferdinand E. Marcos was ousted from his post through a People Power,  the Filipino people never imagined for a moment, that Marcos would be overthrown. It was simply unthinkable.  Why? Because he controlled every nut and bolt of the government and military machinery; anyone who defied him, landed in jail or was never seen again.

It was unthinkable, too, that Joseph "Erap" Estrada would have been thrown off his Malacanang seat; it was not the impeachment trial that did him in, but another EDSA uprising: EDSA DOS.

Renato Corona, not being an executive figure was relatively unknown by the Filipino masa. He came into radar only when he prominently issued a TRO to allow ex-President Gloria Arroyo to travel out of the country.

That's why at the start of his impeachment trial, very few Filipinos knew the extent or importance of the proceeding against him. But as the trial progressed, the Filipinos started to learn more about the case and about the man Renato Corona.

When he testified in his trial, when he lambasted personalities in his testimony in a three-hour long diatribe, when he stormed out of the impeachment court, and when he finally came back and admitted that he had 2.4 million dollars and 80 million pesos stashed in banks and undeclared in his SALN, suddenly, almost 75% of the Filipino people casted a guilty verdict on the ex-Chief Justice.

Although Corona's popularity and approval rating had been continually slipping and was at its lowest negative 14, the guilty verdict became cemented in the people's minds and in most senators' minds in the last week of the impeachment trial.

If this same scenario happened in the U.S.A or Canada, I would venture to say that five months would have been too much.  The Clinton impeachment trial took just two months to be completed.

In Canada, impeachment takes another form, in that the Prime Minister can be voted out of office, by a vote of non confidence by the Parliament where a new election can be called.

With the conviction of a Chief Justice who is charged with protecting a corrupt ex-President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, the Filipino people is elated at the prospect of change - that the present administration would push through with its promise of eradicating corruption.

Miriam Defensor Santiago said that the Philippines has always been voted as a most corrupt nation. No doubt about that; corruption has been a problem made worse by the Marcos dictatorship.

Since more and more Filipinos are working overseas and have been exposed to the democratic workings and economic successes of developed nations, these same Filipinos are demanding more and more accountability, transparency and progressive policies and actions from their government.

I remember a very rich American woman, Leona Helmsley, who was convicted of tax evasion by a New York federal court. She served 19 months in prison and more under house arrest. 

Her household help heard her say:  "We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes...", a saying that became notorious and was identified with her for the rest of her life.

Leona Helmsley mug shot.