Leonen used to be one of SC's harshest critics

https://www.rappler.com/nation/special-coverage/former-peace-panel-chair-joins-sc

One of the harshest critics of the Supreme Court has just become its newest member.

President Benigno Aquino III appointed government peace panel chief Marvic Leonen to the High Court on Wednesday, November 21. He will take over the seat vacated in August by now Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno.

The President views his appointment as a "contribution to his vision of an empowered and independent" judiciary, according to Presidential Spokesman Edwin Lacierda in a press briefing at 4:20 pm. It's "a lasting legacy" of the Aquino adminstration that is "consistent with his desire" to see a "judiciary imbued with high standards of probity and inpendence," Lacierda added.

The President met with the 49-year-old Leonen in Malacañang Wednesday at 1 pm. He was the last of the 7 nominees to the position to be interviewed since Leonen was in Kuala Lumpur last week for the negotiations with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.

Leonen is the 4th appointee of Aquino to the SC after Sereno, Justices Bienvenido Reyes and Estela Perlas-Bernabe.

He will stay in the SC for 21 years (the mandatory retirement age for members of the judiciary is 70). At 49, Leonen is the second youngest justice to be named in the High Court after Justice Manuel Moran (Moran was 45, Leonen is 49).