Anytime this week, the Union of Foreign Service Officers, will bring to court the issue of the extension of the service of political ambassadors appointed by Gloria Arroyo.

It would be the first suit against officials of the Aquino administration. Members of the UNIFORS are not happy doing this but they have to do this to restore the rule of law in the department.

The foreign service suffered immensely with Gloria Arroyo’s utter contempt of the law implemented dutifully by her (and now Aquino’s) Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo. Foreign service officers had great hopes that under the leadership of President Aquino, professionalism would return and department would regain its premier role in the government.

It is this yearning for professional foreign service that they are bringing the issue of the extension of the service of political ambassadors to court.

The issue stemmed from the assignment orders issued by Romulo starting July 1 to all 21 political ambassadors who stayed on in Philippine embassies despite the fact that they were co-terminus with Gloria Arroyo who appointed them.

His July 2 assignment order to Ambassador to Greece, Rigoberto Tiglao spoke of the “President’s approval of your extension as AEP to Greece in a holdover capacity for a period of three months effective noon of 30 June 2010.”

Tiglao, former press secretary and author of Arroyo’s “Strong Republic” program, continues to enjoy Greece even as he has started writing a column for the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

Six of the political ambassadors, outside the 21, have returned home namely Generoso Senga (Iran), Alejandro del Rosario (Poland), Acmad Omar (Oman) and Alexander Yano (Brunei), Domingo Siazon (Japan) and Delia Albert (Germany).

The six, two of them former foreign secretaries, are proof that it’s not impossible for an ambassador to comply with the law and wrap up his or her work before the termination of his appointment June 30, 2010.

Last Friday, DFA issued a statement announcing the extension of the services of the 21 ambassadors “upon their request” from “30 June 2010 to 30 September 2010.”

It should be recalled that Romulo immediately after election, while he was still lobbying to be retained as foreign secretary issued an order for political ambassadors to return by June 30, 2010. Later Arroyo’s Executive Secretary Leandro Mendoza countermanded that order which elicited some concerns from then presidential candidate Noynoy Aquino.

Romulo’s July 1 assignment order in effect reiterates Mendoza’s order.

Yet, last Monday, July 5, the Office of the Press Secretary issued a strange press release.

Strange because the title was, “Palace eyes envoys’ 3-month term extension.” The lead sentence said, “Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr., and Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo have jointly recommended to President Benigno “P-Noy” S. Aquino III a three-month extension of the term of all ambassadors whose appointments are co-terminus with that of former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, and therefore deemed to have expired last June 30.”

The release said, “The recommendations are now at the President’s desk.”

In the same release, Ochoa was quoted as saying, “all ambassadors, either career or political appointees, should stay put in their foreign postings until Sept. 30, unless recalled earlier.”

“Everybody stays until they are replaced or until the agreed period, whichever comes first,’ Ochoa was quoted as having said.

Romulo, in a TV interview Tuesday, said President Aquino has approved the recommendation “retroactive June 30.”

I would like to know in what form was the approval of Aquino made. If it was an “extension” as Romulo and Ochoa say, what was the legal basis? What did he extend? Arroyo’s appointment of the ambassadors ended June 30, 2010. On July 1, those ambassadors were no longer ambassadors. There is nothing in the Constitution that empowers a president to “extend” a terminated appointment.

What the Constitution empowers the President is appointment of ambassadors. Did Aquino appoint those 21 former ambassadors? If he did, then those appointments should pass confirmation by the Commission on Appointments which would be convened after the opening of Congress on July 26.

After the confirmation of the CA, the DFA should request an agrément or approval from the host country. After that is obtained, it’s only then that the ambassador goes to his country of assignment and presents his credentials to the host country.

Without completing the process, the former ambassador has no legal personality in the embassy. He can be charged with usurpation of authority if he insists on performing acts for the government. He could also be charged of malversation if he spends government money.

Career finance officers in embassies are worried that they would also be dragged in the malversation cases since they are under pressure to release money to the “ambassadors”.

Ochoa showed unfamiliarity with diplomacy when he said he agreed with Romulo “to recommend that they be extended for a few more months because we don’t want to disrupt diplomatic relations with other countries.”

What disruption of diplomatic relations would happen if political appointees are recalled? Every embassy has a number two officer. They are usually career officers. They become charges d’affaires in the absence of an ambassador. The Vienna convention that governs diplomatic relations recognizes that role of CDAs.

Right now, the six embassies whose ambassadors complied with the law and came home before June 30 (Japan, Germany, Poland, Iran, Oman, Brunei) are run by CDAs. There are no reports of problems in our relations with those countries.

When the UNIFORS files their suit, the Aquino government would not be defending an oppressed group of citizens. It would be defending and protecting Gloria Arroyo’s privileged envoys.