THE Supreme Court’s information technology consultant whose six-digit salary is higher than any of the justices will testify in today’s resumption of the impeachment hearing against Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno.
The House committee on justice, chaired by Negros Oriental Rep. Reynaldo Umali, said the IT consultant, Helen Macasaet, confirmed her attendance in Wednesday’s hearing.
Supreme Court Associate Justice Teresita Leonardo-de Castro earlier told lawmakers that she found the P250,000 monthly fee that Sereno had given to Macasaet too high.
De Castro, a former Sandiganbayan associate justice, said she had been in charge of the judiciary’s computerization, and yet she never knew nor heard of Helen Macasaet.
In an earlier impeachment hearing, it was revealed that the Court under Sereno’s watch had paid a total of P12 million to Macasaet from 2013 to 2017.
Deputy Court Administrator Raul Villanueva, head of the SC bids and awards committee, earlier told the House justice committee that the Court, through Sereno’s instructions, paid roughly about P2.4 million a year—or P200,000 a month—to Macasaet.
Sources in the judiciary revealed that each justice received an average of P152,000 monthly in 2017—an amount which has increased to P198,000 this year with the implementation of the second tranche of the Salary Standardization Law.
Sereno got a monthly salary of P180,000 in 2017 and reached P235,000 in 2018—still way below the P250,000 monthly consultancy fee she had extended to Macasaet from 2013 to 2017.
Aside from Macasaet, the other resource persons expected to appear at the committte are Bureau of Internal Revenue Commissioner Cesar Dulay, Sandiganbayan Justice Zaldy Trespeses, and Court Administrator Midas Marquez.
Dulay will testify on the tax records of Sereno who failed to file her Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth for 17 years when she was still a law professor at the University of the Philippines.
Trespeses, on the other hand, will speak on the chief magistrates’ alleged refusal to include now Justice Francis Jardeleza as nominee then.
Umali maintained that his committee will decide on the probable cause of the Sereno impeachment complaint by end of February. He said four more hearings may be conducted before it votes on probable cause.
