The woman caller was obviously upset. Her son had been arrested on charges of illegal possession of a firearm and was now in jail. The caller said her son had been out drinking with friends, one of whom had brought along a gun. But their boy�s night out had been disrupted by an unexplained interest in their group by some policemen, who had approached them, sending the gun-toting drinking buddy in an apparent panic fit. Somehow, it was the caller�s son who got caught with the weapon.
The woman sounded desperate, but rene cayetano, co-host of the popular eadio program companero y companera, knew what to say. After making sure the caller�s son was not the gun�s real owner, �sabi niya, �may lusot ho diyan, maaabsuwelto yan�,� recounts a prominent makati-based lawyer who had happened to tune in to the show that night. �he said if there is no intent to commit a crime, you cannot be convicted.�
Of course the woman was overjoyed, says the lawyer, �at pasalamat nang pasalamat.� Unfortunately, he says, there was one hitch: illegal possession of firearms in itself is already a crime, no matter who own the weapon. But the woman didn�t know that. Adds the lawyer: �you can be sure that her whole family voted for cayetano last may.�
In many ways, cayetano the private practitioner was not what people like to call an abogado de campanilla, although he styled himself as one and commanded high fess like other corporate lawyers who made company boardrooms and courts their second homes. Collegues say Cayetano was more like an abogado de kape, given the hours he spent in hotel lobbies and restaurants, chatting with clients and influential friends over cups and cups of coffee.
Not that there was anything wrong with that; many law firms usually have at least one lawyer who does much of the office PR, which may call for messaging the egos of prospective or current clients or sweet-talking certain individuals who may help win a case. But while some lawyers may resist devoting much of their time in such tasks, cayetano apparently didn�t. more precisely, says a former co-worker, he enjoyed it.
Thus, at the powerful angara abello concepcion regala & cruz law office (Accra), where he rose to become senior partner in the late 1970s, cayetano did little litigation and was not even known for his work in labor law, his supposed field of expertise. What occupied much of his time there was, �going around with big shots� such as then makati mayor nemesio yabut and fiscal b. jose Castillo of rizal, partly because the partners thought he would be of most use to the firm doing that. Later, the partners assigned him to liaise with the firm�s �special friend�, then defense minister juan ponce enrile.
It was enrile who brought cayetano his first taste of being in the media spotlight, via pepsi paloma rape case in 1982. The teenage starlet, who said had been raped by three hosts of a popular noontime tv show, had approached defense minister for help. Enrile decided to refer the matter to Accra, and contacted cayetano. �ang sabi sa kin, �rene, I�m sending pepsi over to you�,� recalls cayetano in an interview. �kako, �I don�t drink pepsi, I drink coke�.� �seryoso ako,� he says. �I didn�t know who she was.�
The case is often among those cited by cayetano whenever he is queried about his trial work. According to a lawyer who was privy to the case, though, cayetano never got to be directly involved in litigating it. He had little trial experience, says the lawyer, and he was not assigned to handle the trial. His role was to handle the media because Accra trial lawyers don�t like being interviewed.�
To be sure, it was not as if cayetano was not academically prepared for the work demanded by Accra of most of its lawyers. U university of the Philippines law school graduate (class of �59), he had gone on to the university of michigan to earn two master�s degrees �one in public administration and the other in law (with a thesis in collective bargaining) �as well as doctorate in law. But many of those who know him personally agree that much of his talents lie not in the courtroom but in relating to people. �marunong kasi siyang pumulso, humanap ng kiliti,� concedes jesus manalastas, a colleague at Accra who is now a senior partner at the ponce enrile reyes manalastas (Pecabar) law offices that cayetano halped found in 1983. �He�s a born politician, he really likes dealing with people.�
But at Pecabar, says manalastas, cayetano took on more management responsibilities and became more active in assisting corporate clients during collective bargaining agreement negotiations. Senior partner Edwin gastenes, who was also cayetano�s campaign manager in the 1998 elections adds: �contrary to some observations that he does not do legal work, rene sets the tone and contributes his own theories. He�s there in the thick of the flight. Rene handled most of the foreign banks that retained us and dealt with their unions.�
Yet both admit that �social skills� remained a serious matter for cayetano, who considered these essential in getting and keeping clients. He encouraged Pecabar lawyers to loosen up, at one point even setting aside Friday afternoons for ballroom dancing. The lawyers were also urged to take up sports, especially golf.
Cayetano at least was one who took his own advice �and it ended up serving him very well. It was at the alabang country club golf greens, for example, that he often bumped into then president fidel v. ramos, who later offered him the post of presidential legal counsel in 1996. It was also in between putts at the club course that he and abs-cbn bigwig Freddie Garcia first agreed to put companero y companera on radio.
He was already anchoring a radio program at a client-owned station by then. In the program, he and other Pecabar lawyers took queries on legal matters from phone callers. But the station had a very weak signal; although based in makati, just few floors aaove the Pecabar offices at salcedo village, its broadcast could not even reach alabang. While cayetano says he was overwhelmed by the response the show was getting, his absences from it soon got more frequent. He now says that he was simply growing tired of the program, which he was doing without pay. Yet he would later adopt some of its features on his dzmm show, which took the 7-8 pm time slot.
The format of companero y companera, which he also did for free, was simple: on Mondays, callers could phone in their questions, which would be answered live by cayetano. Santos-relos would try to translate any legalese into lay terms, and provide follow-up questions that a non-lawyer would probably want to ask. From Tuesdays to Fridays, santos-relos would read a letter or two, and cayetano would give his legal opinion on them. It was only Mondays that cayetano would be at the station and giving advice off top of his head. The letters santos-relos reads the rest of the week were pre-selected. Copies were given to cayetano, who would then turn them over to Pecabar lawyers to study. By broadcast time, cayetano would be armed with copies of the letters and lawyers� research �and bantering with his co-host by remote from his office, gym, or yet another hotel lobby.
Admittedly, the setup was not very innovative. But with many Filipinos having no access to all lawyers and yet were wondering just where they stood legally in a gamut situations, it worked just fine. As for giving rene cayetano, esquire, a public voice matched by a flattering public image, it worked even better.
By his own estimate, Cayetano says 60% of the more than 30 million voters who went to the polls in 1998 �became aware of me because of the (radio and tv) programs.� He also does not deny that his image as companero did much to catapult him next to the number one position in the senate race. But he says while having radio and tv shows gave him an edge over many of the other candidates, these were not enough to ensure his win. That he did so well, cayetano, was also largely because he had succeeded in �bringing my message to the people, na dapat pagandahin ang administration ng criminal justice.�
It dovetailed neatly with companero the show seemed to champion. Whether or not that was intended is unclear, although cayetano�s campaign manager gastenes says harping on a single theme was part of their camp�s strategy. He also says the decision to focus on ensuring �swift and fair delivery of justice for all� stemmed from cayetano�s �knowledge of the process of litigation.�
Until now, however, legal observers say they still have a hard time with the image of cayetano as companero, champion of the poor. They point out that neither of the two law firms that he was part of has a reputation for representing the unwashed (although both in all probability handle some pro bono cases, as do many lawyers). Rightly or wrongly, both have seen as having political connections to thank for their lucrative practice, and observers say cayetano is very much the microcosmic version of these firms.
The good news is that for now, cayetano has seen it fit to follow thru with his campaign theme at the senate. He says his first bill contains the stipulation that all successful bar examinees will have to render free legal aid to the poor. �I see hundreds of indigents in jail,� says cayetano, �(and they are there) for two reasons: they have no money and they have no lawyers.�
If rene will put his heart into it, he could be a good fiscalizer,� observes a lakas partymate who also ran for the senate in 1998 but lost. �And if I�m going to take into account the qualifications of everyone in the senate, I would consider him in the top 50%. Among those who won, top 30.� The assessment has some basis. Aside from being ramos� legal adviser, cayetano was also co-vice chairman of the presidential anti-crime commission (PACC). He was an assemblyman during the marcos administration, as well as trade and industry deputy minister and administrator of the export processing zone authority.
Yet despite all these, cayetano still fails to impress �and elicit confidence from- those who should know him better than most: his colleagues in the legal community. Why many of them do not take him seriously partly comes from his reputation for being a master of malapropisms. Some even say the infamous phrase �landscape victory� attributed to president joseph Estrada was actually first uttered by cayetano, who was announcing the election of his mentor-friend Accra boss edgardo angara as president of the integrated bar of the Philippines. �He also says things like, �It�s raining cat or dog�,� says a former officemate. �In one office meeting pa nga he said, very seriously, ha, �we are facing a blank wall. Let�s climb it very high�.�
In a profession where precise language is a must, such slips, although petty, are nearly unforgivable. But cayetano�s saving grace, says his colleagues, is that he is able to laugh at himself.
Many say it is not really his propensity to mangle the English language that makes them unable to give him professional respect. The reason, they say, lies in the manner in which he manufactured his climb. While most of his legal colleagues agree that cayetano deserves to be credited for working hard to get where he is, there is little admiration for what they say is his penchant to latch on to people with clout, and his habit, as one lawyer put it, of �seizing every opportunity to make himself look good.�
Most of the lawyers interviewed for this piece, for example, believe cayetano �volunteered� for many, if not all, of the media-attractive cases he involved in, such as vizconde murders ang the beltran libel case. Cayetano himself acknowledges that his participation in such �sensational� cases enabled the public to get acquainted with him. But he insists that he had not gone of his way to offer his services in any of these cases. According to cayetano, it was either one of the litigants sought his help or he was simply lucky enough to be at the right place at the right time.
�In the manila film festival scam, I remember I was delivering an invitation for louie beltran at dzrh for my daughter�s wedding,� says cayetano, explaining that beltran was a very good friend and was going to be one of the wedding sponsors. �When I got there, I saw (manila) mayor (alfredo) lim, and he was being interviewed. And suddenly (station manager) joe taruc pulled me aside and on the air said, �o, mayor, eto nang abogado mo.�
�To tell you frankly I was flabbergasted because I didn�t know what it was all about,� cayetano says, �except that I was listening to dzrh on my way there about this manila filmfest scam.� Lim, whom he says is another good friend, later invited him to participate in the public hearing being held that same day.
�To a lot of people, he�s all fake cayetano,� says his former UP law school classmate ismael kahn. �But I think a lot of the criticisms against him have been unfair. They may say he�s shallow, but he�s gotten that far, so maybe there�s something.� #
source:
From Loren to Marimar
The Philippine media in the 90s
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism
(first published in i magazine)
