Oh no, its Panganiban!
Many women’s rights advocates must have exclaimed, ” oh no, it’s Panganiban” when he was appointed Chief Justice yesterday, Dec. 20, 2005. He is known, quite infamously, for writing the decision that made it very difficult for women to get a decree of nullity of marriage. That was Molina versus Court of Appeals. The Regional Trial Court judge who granted the decree of nullity in that case was Judge Helia Mallare-Philipps of Baguio City, now retired. Judge Philipps was a classmate of my parents in Silliman University in 1946.
I will research more about CJ Panganiban’s decisions, but his saving grace is at least one decision - Gualberto vs. Gualberto, which is in this weblog (see previous entries). In Gualberto, then Justice Panganiban wrote that being a lesbian does not disqualify a mother from having custody of her minor child, unless she acted with moral depravity that is detrimental to the development of the child. (For that matter, the “moral depravity” also applies to heterosexuals.)
To our Kennedy School alumni, Chief Justice Panganiban is the father of Mabel, who was in KSG (MPP) in 1995. She and Maite Defensor (and Dina Abad too) went to church everyday, and I had to join them if I wanted their company for supper.
