The Sandiganbayan has steadily decongested its dockets of pending cases filed against public officials and employees and private individuals charged with them with only 1,490 cases pending as of Dec. 31, 2023 compared to 2,339 cases in 2022.
Known as the anti-graft court, the Sandiganbayan is not only a trial court but also an appellate court for rulings of the regional trial courts (RTCs) on cases of public officials and employes with Salary Grade 26 and below.
It said it is enforcing strictly the mandates under the judiciary’s five-year Strategic Plans for Judicial Innovations (SPJI) 2022-2027 to dispense justice “efficiently, effectively, and timely.”
Based on Statistics on Cases Filed, Pending and Disposed of as of Dec. 31, 2023, the lowest number of pending cases recorded by the anti-graft court was in 1979 with only 543 cases. In 1980, the pending cases rose to 1,523 and further increased to 2,970 in 1981.
In 2018, the number of pending cases was 5,237 but it decreased to 3,981 cases in 2019.
The data show that the numbers steadily dropped in 2020 with 3,268 pending cases; 2,956 in 2021; 2,339 in 2022; and 1,490 in 2023.
The data also show that the lowering number of pending cases was attributed to the court’s higher disposal of cases and lower number of cases filed by the Office of the Ombudsman (OMB).
In 2023, the Sandiganbayan disposed of 1,353 cases. Due to Covid-19, case disposals in 2020 were only 340; 366 in 2021; and 775 in 2022.
Also, the cases filed by the OMB decreased with only 117 in 2020; 163 in 2021; 240 in 2022; and 263 in 2023.