MANILA -- The House of Representatives' prosecution panel yesterday said the latest Pulse Asia survey result showing 47 percent of the population believing that impeached Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona is guilty of the charges leveled against him is a most welcome development.

Marikina City Rep. Romero Federico  Quimbo, one of the spokesmen for the prosecution, said the result only shows that the prosecution team had done its job in presenting overwhelming evidence to convince majority of the populace that the chief magistrate should be removed from office.

“The survey shows a snap shot of the growing sentiments of the people to remove the Chief Justice,” he said.

“It not only showed the strength of our evidence that we have managed to present but, in my mind, also showed the displeasure or disdain of the public with the resorting to legal technicalities of the defense to explain their side,” he added.

A survey conducted by Pulse Asia from February 26 to March 9, 2012 showed that 47 percent of Filipinos viewed Corona as guilty of the charges contained in the Articles of Impeachment accusing him of betrayal of public trust, culpable violation of the Constitution and bias in favor of detained former president and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Only five percent believed the chief justice was innocent while 43 percent were undecided.

The survey covered 1,200 respondents in Metro Manila and the rest of Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao with a plus-minus 3 percent error of margin at 95 percent confidence level.

House Deputy Speaker and Quezon Rep. Lorenzo  Tañada III said the results showed that the people are monitoring the impeachment proceedings and are convinced by the evidence presented by the prosecution despite earlier criticisms they received in the course of presenting them.

“It shows that the evidence we have presented is substantial to sway the minds of the people that the Chief Justice is guilty,” he said.

However, House prosecutors pointed out that the impeachment proceeding is not all about surveys but rather about evidence.

“We strongly believe that we have presented overwhelming evidence. Corona’s deliberate and repeated omissions of real properties and bank accounts in his Statements of Assets and Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN) for several years, his failure to explain millions in peso deposits that up to today have not been explained and the dollar accounts which until now remained hidden -- these are all the legal cases that the senator-judges would consider when the time comes,” Quimbo said.*PNA

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