ABAD, Roberto A.

Justice Roberto Abad became the 165th member of the Supreme Court on August 7, 2009. He earned his law degree at the Ateneo de Manila University in 1968 where he was on the Dean's honor list although a working student. He first engaged in private practice as a trial attorney at the Jose W. Diokno Law Office before he served as an Associate Attorney at the Supreme Court, in the Office of Chief Justice Fred Ruiz Castro. In 1975, he joined the Office of the Solicitor General where he served as Solicitor for ten years, before being promoted to Assistant Solicitor General in 1985. Afterwards, he left public service and started a successful law practice.

His career in the academe began in 1978 when the late Chief Justice Roberto C. Concepcion, then UST Faculty of Civil Law Dean, recruited him to teach Constitutional Law and Public International Law at UST. Later on, he shifted to another line of expertise: Remedial Law. To develop the student's skills in litigation work, he also began teaching Legal Writing and Trial Technique. He authored two books, Practical Book in Legal Writing in 2002 and Fundamentals of Legal Writing in 2004. The University of Santo Tomas named him Dean of its School of Law in 2008.

When Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno named him Bar Chairman for 2011, Justice Abad also embarked to reform the old system of the bar examinations by prescribing a syllabus for each bar subject to make reviewing for the exams less a nightmare and partly adopted a multiple choice question system, complimented by practical essay exams to qualify those who are to be admitted to the practice of law.

Justice Abad brings with him a wealth of experience from years of practice as a litigation lawyer both for the government and the private sector. This explains his passion for solving the problems of case congestions and delays in the justice system.  He chaired the Chief Justice Committee to Address Case Congestions and Delays in the Lower Courts.