Fire private lawyers. This was the advice given by SolGen Devanadera to OIC Nario of PCGG on account of the “inefficient and uncooperative” private lawyers retained by the latter to pursue ill-gotten wealth cases against the Marcoses and their cronies.
Sounds like a good advice right? Only if OSG also fires its “inefficient and uncooperative” lawyers who collect huge retainer fees from government agencies despite doing nothing.
Most government agencies (except the OSG of course) would admit their OSG lawyer (in some agencies it’s “lawyers”) rarely gives due attention to their cases. This is precisely the reason why government agencies hire private lawyers who are willing to at least do something with their pending cases.
So doesn’t that solve the problem? Not really. Government agencies can’t hire private lawyers without the approval of OSG and COA. However, OSG can approve hiring of private lawyers if it admits that it does not have enough lawyers to handle the cases of the requesting government agency. Now, can you honestly believe they will admit to such fact? Moreso when “[t]here is now a sufficient number of OSG lawyers to actively prosecute ill-gotten wealth cases instituted by the PCGG in the Sandiganbayan”.
Yeah right! I may agree with the claim on sufficiency of OSG lawyers, but not on the claim that they will actively prosecute cases, unless maybe when the case involves wide media attention.
Source:
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view_article.php?article_id=175996
