G.R. No. 196804               October 9, 2012MAYOR BARBARA RUBY C. TALAGA, vs. COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS and RODERICK A. ALCALA, Respondents.x - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - xG.R. No. 197015PHILIP M. CASTILLO vs. COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, BARBARA RUBY TALAGA and RODERICK A. ALCALA, Respondents.

D E C I S I O N

BERSAMIN, J.:In focus in these consolidated special civil actions are the disqualification of a substitute who was proclaimed the winner of a mayoralty election; and the ascertainment of who should assume the office following the substitute’s disqualification.

The consolidated petitions for certiorari seek to annul and set aside the En Banc Resolution issued on May 20, 2011 in SPC No. 10-024 by the Commission on Elections (COMELEC), the dispositive portion of which states:WHEREFORE, judgment is hereby rendered:1. REVERSING and SETTING ASIDE the January 11, 2011 Resolution of the Second Division;2. GRANTING the petition in intervention of Roderick A. Alcala;3. ANNULLING the election and proclamation of respondent Barbara C. Talaga as mayor of Lucena City and CANCELLING the Certificate of Canvass and Proclamation issued therefor;4. Ordering respondent Barbara Ruby Talaga to cease and desist from discharging the functions of the Office of the Mayor;5. In view of the permanent vacancy in the Office of the Mayor of Lucena City, the proclaimed Vice-Mayor is ORDERED to succeed as Mayor as provided under Section 44 of the Local Government Code;6. DIRECTING the Clerk of Court of the Commission to furnish copies of this Resolution to the Office of the President of the Philippines, the Department of Interior and Local Government, the Department of Finance and the Secretary of the Sangguniang Panglunsod of Lucena City.

Let the Department of Interior and Local Government and the Regional Election Director of Region IV of COMELEC implement this resolution.SO ORDERED.1

AntecedentsOn November 26, 2009 and December 1, 2009, Ramon Talaga (Ramon) and Philip M. Castillo (Castillo) respectively filed their certificates of candidacy (CoCs) for the position of Mayor of Lucena City to be contested in the scheduled May 10, 2010 national and local elections.2

Ramon, the official candidate of the Lakas-Kampi-CMD,3 declared in his CoC that he was eligible for the office he was seeking to be elected to.

Four days later, or on December 5, 2009, Castillo filed with the COMELEC a petition denominated as In the Matter of the Petition to Deny Due Course to or Cancel Certificate of Candidacy of Ramon Y. Talaga, Jr. as Mayor for Having Already Served Three (3) Consecutive Terms as a City Mayor of Lucena, which was docketed as SPA 09-029 (DC).4 He alleged therein that Ramon, despite knowing that he had been elected and had served three consecutive terms as Mayor of Lucena City, still filed his CoC for Mayor of Lucena City in the May 10, 2010 national and local elections.

The pertinent portions of Castillo’s petition follow:1. Petitioner is of legal age, Filipino, married, and a resident of Barangay Mayao Crossing, Lucena City but may be served with summons and other processes of this Commission at the address of his counsel at 624 Aurora Blvd., Lucena City 4301;2. Respondent Ramon Y. Talaga, Jr. is likewise of legal age, married, and a resident of Barangay Ibabang Iyam, Lucena City and with postal address at the Office of the City Mayor, City Hall, Lucena City, where he may be served with summons and other processes of this Commission;3. Petitioner, the incumbent city vice-mayor of Lucena having been elected during the 2007 local elections, is running for city mayor of Lucena under the Liberal party this coming 10 May 2010 local elections and has filed his

certificate of candidacy for city mayor of Lucena;4. Respondent was successively elected mayor of Lucena City in 2001, 2004, and 2007 local elections based on the records of the Commission on Elections of Lucena City and had fully served the aforesaid three (3) terms without any voluntary and involuntary interruption;5. Except the preventive suspension imposed upon him from 13 October 2005 to 14 November 2005 and from 4 September 2009 to 30 October 2009 pursuant to Sandiganbayan 4th Division Resolution in Criminal Case No. 27738 dated 3 October 2005, the public service as city mayor of the respondent is continuous and uninterrupted under the existing laws and jurisprudence;6. There is no law nor jurisprudence to justify the filing of the certificate of candidacy of the respondent, hence, such act is outrightly unconstitutional, illegal, and highly immoral;7. Respondent, knowing well that he was elected for and had fully served three (3) consecutive terms as a city mayor of Lucena, he still filed his Certificate of Candidacy for City Mayor of Lucena for this coming 10 May 2010 national and local elections;8. Under the Constitution and existing Election Laws, New Local Government Code of the Philippines, and jurisprudence the respondent is no longer entitled and is already disqualified to be a city mayor for the fourth consecutive term;9. The filing of the respondent for the position of city mayor is highly improper, unlawful and is potentially injurious and prejudicial to taxpayers of the City of Lucena; and10. It is most respectfully prayed by the petitioner that the respondent be declared disqualified and no longer entitled to run in public office as city mayor of Lucena City based on the existing law and jurisprudence.5

The petition prayed for the following reliefs, to wit:WHEREFORE, premises considered, it is respectfully prayed that the Certificate of Candidacy filed by the respondent be denied due course to or cancel the same and that he be declared as a disqualified candidate under the existing Election Laws and by the provisions of the New Local Government Code.6 (Emphasis supplied.)

Ramon countered that that the Sandiganbayan had preventively suspended him from office during his second and third terms; and that the three-term limit rule did not then apply to him pursuant to the prevailing jurisprudence 7 to the effect that an involuntary separation from office amounted to an interruption of continuity of service for purposes of the application of the three-term limit rule.

In the meantime, on December 23, 2009, the Court promulgated the ruling in Aldovino, Jr. v. Commission on Elections,8 holding that preventive suspension, being a mere temporary incapacity, was not a valid ground for avoiding the effect of the three-term limit rule. Thus, on December 30, 2009, Ramon filed in the COMELEC a Manifestation with Motion to Resolve, taking into account the intervening ruling in Aldovino. Relevant portions of his Manifestation with Motion to Resolve are quoted herein, viz:4. When respondent filed his certificate of candidacy for the position of Mayor of Lucena City, the rule that ‘where the separation from office is caused by reasons beyond the control of the officer – i.e. involuntary – the service of term is deemed interrupted’ has not yet been overturned by the new ruling of the Supreme Court. As a matter of fact, the prevailing rule then of the Honorable Commission in [sic] respect of the three (3)-term limitation was its decision in the case of Aldovino, et al. vs. Asilo where it stated:"Thus, even if respondent was elected during the 2004 elections, which was supposedly his third and final term as city councilor, the same cannot be treated as a complete service or full term in office since the same was interrupted when he was suspended by the Sandiganbayan Fourth Division. And the respondent actually heeded the suspension order since he did not receive his salary during the period October 16-31 and November 1-15 by reason of his actual suspension from office. And this was further bolstered by the fact that the DILG issued a Memorandum directing him, among others, to reassume his position." (Emphasis supplied.)

5. Clearly, there was no misrepresentation on the part of respondent as would constitute a ground for the denial of due course to and/or the cancellation of respondent’s certificate of candidacy at the time he filed the same. Petitioner’s ground for the denial of due course to and/or the cancellation of respondent’s certificate of candidacy thus has no basis, in fact and in law, as there is no ground to warrant such relief under the Omnibus Election Code and/or its implementing laws.6. Pursuant, however, to the new ruling of the Supreme Court in respect of the issue on the three (3)-term limitation, respondent acknowledges that he is now DISQUALIFIED to run for the position of Mayor of Lucena City having served three (3) (albeit interrupted) terms as Mayor of Lucena City prior to the filing of his certificate of candidacy for the 2010 elections.7. In view of the foregoing premises and new jurisprudence on the matter, respondent respectfully submits the

present case for decision declaring him as DISQUALIFIED to run for the position of Mayor of Lucena City.9

Notwithstanding his express recognition of his disqualification to run as Mayor of Lucena City in the May 10, 2010 national and local elections, Ramon did not withdraw his CoC.

Acting on Ramon’s Manifestation with Motion to Resolve, the COMELEC First Division issued a Resolution on April 19, 2010,10 disposing as follows:WHEREFORE, premises considered, the instant Petition is hereby GRANTED. Accordingly, Ramon Y. Talaga, Jr. is hereby declared DISQUALIFIED to run for Mayor of Lucena City for the 10 May 2010 National and Local Elections.SO ORDERED.

Initially, Ramon filed his Verified Motion for Reconsideration against the April 19, 2010 Resolution of the COMELEC First Division.11 Later on, however, he filed at 9:00 a.m. of May 4, 2010 an Ex-parte Manifestation of Withdrawal of the Pending Motion for Reconsideration.12 At 4:30 p.m. on the same date, Barbara Ruby filed her own CoC for Mayor of Lucena City in substitution of Ramon, attaching thereto the Certificate of Nomination and Acceptance (CONA) issued by Lakas-Kampi-CMD, the party that had nominated Ramon.13

On May 5, 2010, the COMELEC En Banc, acting on Ramon’s Ex parte Manifestation of Withdrawal, declared the COMELEC First Division’s Resolution dated April 19, 2010 final and executory.14

On election day on May 10, 2010, the name of Ramon remained printed on the ballots but the votes cast in his favor were counted in favor of Barbara Ruby as his substitute candidate, resulting in Barbara Ruby being ultimately credited with 44,099 votes as against Castillo’s 39,615 votes.15

Castillo promptly filed a petition in the City Board of Canvassers (CBOC) seeking the suspension of Barbara Ruby’s proclamation.16

It was only on May 13, 2010 when the COMELEC En Banc, upon the recommendation of its Law Department, 17

gave due course to Barbara Ruby’s CoC and CONA through Resolution No. 8917, thereby including her in the certified list of candidates.18 Consequently, the CBOC proclaimed Barbara Ruby as the newly-elected Mayor of Lucena City.19

On May 20, 2010, Castillo filed a Petition for Annulment of Proclamation with the COMELEC,20 docketed as SPC 10-024. He alleged that Barbara Ruby could not substitute Ramon because his CoC had been cancelled and denied due course; and Barbara Ruby could not be considered a candidate because the COMELEC En Banc had approved her substitution three days after the elections; hence, the votes cast for Ramon should be considered stray.

In her Comment on the Petition for Annulment of Proclamation,21 Barbara Ruby maintained the validity of her substitution. She countered that the COMELEC En Banc did not deny due course to or cancel Ramon’s COC, despite a declaration of his disqualification, because there was no finding that he had committed misrepresentation, the ground for the denial of due course to or cancellation of his COC. She prayed that with her valid substitution, Section 12 of Republic Act No. 900622 applied, based on which the votes cast for Ramon were properly counted in her favor.

On July 26, 2010, Roderick Alcala (Alcala), the duly-elected Vice Mayor of Lucena City, sought to intervene, 23

positing that he should assume the post of Mayor because Barbara Ruby’s substitution had been invalid and Castillo had clearly lost the elections.

On January 11, 2011, the COMELEC Second Division dismissed Castillo’s petition and Alcala’s petition-in-intervention,24 holding:In the present case, Castillo was notified of Resolution 8917 on May 13, 2010 as it was the basis for the proclamation of Ruby on that date. He, however, failed to file any action within the prescribed period either in the Commission or the Supreme Court assailing the said resolution. Thus, the said resolution has become final and executory. It cannot anymore be altered or reversed.x x x xx x x. A close perusal of the petition filed by Castillo in SPA 10-029 (Dc) shows that it was actually for the

disqualification of Ramon for having served three consecutive terms, which is a ground for his disqualification under the Constitution in relation to Section 4(b)3 of Resolution 8696. There was no mention therein that Ramon has committed material representation that would be a ground for the cancellation or denial of due course to the CoC of Ramon under Section 78 of the Omnibus Election Code. The First Division, in fact, treated the petition as one for disqualification as gleaned from the body of the resolution and its dispositive portion quoted above. This treatment of the First Division of the petition as one for disqualification only is affirmed by the fact that its members signed Resolution No. 8917 where it was clearly stated that the First Division only disqualified Ramon.

Having been disqualified only, the doctrine laid down in Miranda v. Abaya is not applicable. Ramon was rightly substituted by Ruby. As such, the votes for Ramon cannot be considered as stray votes but should be counted in favor of Ruby since the substituted and the substitute carry the same surname – Talaga, as provided in Section 12 of Republic Act No. 9006.x x x xMoreover, there is no provision in the Omnibus Election Code or any election laws for that matter which requires that the substitution and the Certificate of Candidacy of the substitute should be approved and given due course first by the Commission or the Law Department before it can be considered as effective. All that Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code as implemented by Section 13 of Resolution No. 8678 requires is that it should be filed with the proper office. The respondent is correct when she argued that in fact even the BEI can receive a CoC of a substitute candidate in case the cause for the substitution happened between the day before the election and mid-day of election day. Thus, even if the approval of the substitution was made after the election, the substitution became effective on the date of the filing of the CoC with the Certificate of Nomination and Acceptance.

There being no irregularity in the substitution by Ruby of Ramon as candidate for mayor of Lucena City, the counting of the votes of Ramon in favor of Ruby is proper. The proclamation, thus, of Ruby as mayor elect of Lucena City is in order. Hence, we find no cogent reason to annul the proclamation of respondent Barbara Ruby C. Talaga as the duly elected Mayor of the City of Lucena after the elections conducted on May 10, 2010.25

Acting on Castillo and Alcala’s respective motions for reconsideration, the COMELEC En Banc issued the assailed Resolution dated May 20, 2011 reversing the COMELEC Second Division’s ruling.26

Pointing out that: (a) Resolution No. 8917 did not attain finality for being issued without a hearing as a mere incident of the COMELEC’s ministerial duty to receive the COCs of substitute candidates; (b) Resolution No. 8917 was based on the wrong facts; and (c) Ramon’s disqualification was resolved with finality only on May 5, 2010, the COMELEC En Banc concluded that Barbara Ruby could not have properly substituted Ramon but had simply become an additional candidate who had filed her COC out of time; and held that Vice Mayor Alcala should succeed to the position pursuant to Section 44 of the Local Government Code (LGC).27

IssuesThe core issue involves the validity of the substitution by Barbara Ruby as candidate for the position of Mayor of Lucena City in lieu of Ramon, her husband.Ancillary to the core issue is the determination of who among the contending parties should assume the contested elective position.

RulingThe petitions lack merit.1.Existence of a valid CoC is a condition sine qua non for a valid substitution.The filing of a CoC within the period provided by law is a mandatory requirement for any person to be considered a candidate in a national or local election. This is clear from Section 73 of the Omnibus Election Code, to wit:Section 73. Certificate of candidacy — No person shall be eligible for any elective public office unless he files a sworn certificate of candidacy within the period fixed herein.

Section 74 of the Omnibus Election Code specifies the contents of a COC, viz:Section 74. Contents of certificate of candidacy.—The certificate of candidacy shall state that the person filing it is announcing his candidacy for the office stated therein and that he is eligible for said office; if for Member of the Batasang Pambansa, the province, including its component cities, highly urbanized city or district or sector which he seeks to represent; the political party to which he belongs; civil status; his date of birth; residence; his post office address for all election purposes; his profession or occupation; that he will support and defend the

Constitution of the Philippines and will maintain true faith and allegiance thereto; that he will obey the laws, legal orders, and decrees promulgated by the duly constituted authorities; that he is not a permanent resident or immigrant to a foreign country; that the obligation imposed by his oath is assumed voluntarily, without mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that the facts stated in the certificate of candidacy are true to the best of his knowledge. x x xThe evident purposes of the requirement for the filing of CoCs and in fixing the time limit for filing them are, namely: (a) to enable the voters to know, at least 60 days prior to the regular election, the candidates from among whom they are to make the choice; and (b) to avoid confusion and inconvenience in the tabulation of the votes cast. If the law does not confine to the duly-registered candidates the choice by the voters, there may be as many persons voted for as there are voters, and votes may be cast even for unknown or fictitious persons as a mark to identify the votes in favor of a candidate for another office in the same election. 28 Moreover, according to Sinaca v. Mula,29 the CoC is:x x x in the nature of a formal manifestation to the whole world of the candidate’s political creed or lack of political creed. It is a statement of a person seeking to run for a public office certifying that he announces his candidacy for the office mentioned and that he is eligible for the office, the name of the political party to which he belongs, if he belongs to any, and his post-office address for all election purposes being as well stated.

Accordingly, a person’s declaration of his intention to run for public office and his affirmation that he possesses the eligibility for the position he seeks to assume, followed by the timely filing of such declaration, constitute a valid CoC that render the person making the declaration a valid or official candidate.

There are two remedies available to prevent a candidate from running in an electoral race. One is through a petition for disqualification and the other through a petition to deny due course to or cancel a certificate of candidacy. The Court differentiated the two remedies in Fermin v. Commission on Elections,30 thuswise:x x x A petition for disqualification, on the one hand, can be premised on Section 12 or 68 of the Omnibus Election Code, or Section 40 of the Local Government Code. On the other hand, a petition to deny due course to or cancel a CoC can only be grounded on a statement of a material representation in the said certificate that is false. The petitions also have different effects. While a person who is disqualified under Section 68 is merely prohibited to continue as a candidate, the person whose certificate is cancelled or denied due course under Section 78 is not treated as a candidate at all, as if he/she never filed a CoC.31

Inasmuch as the grounds for disqualification under Section 68 of the Omnibus Election Code (i.e., prohibited acts of candidates, and the fact of a candidate’s permanent residency in another country when that fact affects the residency requirement of a candidate) are separate and distinct from the grounds for the cancellation of or denying due course to a COC (i.e., nuisance candidates under Section 69 of the Omnibus Election Code; and material misrepresentation under Section 78 of the Omnibus Election Code), the Court has recognized in Miranda v. Abaya32 that the following circumstances may result from the granting of the petitions, to wit:(1) A candidate may not be qualified to run for election but may have filed a valid CoC;(2) A candidate may not be qualified and at the same time may not have filed a valid CoC; and(3) A candidate may be qualified but his CoC may be denied due course or cancelled.

In the event that a candidate is disqualified to run for a public office, or dies, or withdraws his CoC before the elections, Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code provides the option of substitution, to wit:Section 77. Candidates in case of death, disqualification or withdrawal. — If after the last day for the filing of certificates of candidacy, an official candidate of a registered or accredited political party dies, withdraws or is disqualified for any cause, only a person belonging to, and certified by, the same political party may file a certificate of candidacy to replace the candidate who died, withdrew or was disqualified. The substitute candidate nominated by the political party concerned may file his certificate of candidacy for the office affected in accordance with the preceding sections not later than mid-day of the day of the election. If the death, withdrawal or disqualification should occur between the day before the election and mid-day of election day, said certificate may be filed with any board of election inspectors in the political subdivision where he is a candidate, or, in the case of candidates to be voted for by the entire electorate of the country, with the Commission.

Nonetheless, whether the ground for substitution is death, withdrawal or disqualification of a candidate, Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code unequivocally states that only an official candidate of a registered or accredited party may be substituted.

Considering that a cancelled CoC does not give rise to a valid candidacy,33 there can be no valid substitution of the

candidate under Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code. It should be clear, too, that a candidate who does not file a valid CoC may not be validly substituted, because a person without a valid CoC is not considered a candidate in much the same way as any person who has not filed a CoC is not at all a candidate.34

Likewise, a candidate who has not withdrawn his CoC in accordance with Section 73 of the Omnibus Election Code may not be substituted. A withdrawal of candidacy can only give effect to a substitution if the substitute candidate submits prior to the election a sworn CoC as required by Section 73 of the Omnibus Election Code.35

2.Declaration of Ramon’s disqualification rendered his CoC invalid; hence, he was not a valid candidate to be properly substituted.

In the light of the foregoing rules on the CoC, the Court concurs with the conclusion of the COMELEC En Banc that the Castillo petition in SPA 09-029 (DC) was in the nature of a petition to deny due course to or cancel a CoC under Section 78 of the Omnibus Election Code.

In describing the nature of a Section 78 petition, the Court said in Fermin v. Commission on Elections:36

Lest it be misunderstood, the denial of due course to or the cancellation of the CoC is not based on the lack of qualifications but on a finding that the candidate made a material representation that is false, which may relate to the qualifications required of the public office he/she is running for. It is noted that the candidate states in his/her CoC that he/she is eligible for the office he/she seeks. Section 78 of the OEC, therefore, is to be read in relation to the constitutional and statutory provisions on qualifications or eligibility for public office. If the candidate subsequently states a material representation in the CoC that is false, the COMELEC, following the law, is empowered to deny due course to or cancel such certificate. Indeed, the Court has already likened a proceeding under Section 78 to a quo warranto proceeding under Section 253 of the OEC since they both deal with the eligibility or qualification of a candidate, with the distinction mainly in the fact that a "Section 78" petition is filed before proclamation, while a petition for quo warranto is filed after proclamation of the winning candidate.

Castillo’s petition contained essential allegations pertaining to a Section 78 petition, namely: (a) Ramon made a false representation in his CoC; (b) the false representation referred to a material matter that would affect the substantive right of Ramon as candidate (that is, the right to run for the election for which he filed his certificate); and (c) Ramon made the false representation with the intention to deceive the electorate as to his qualification for public office or deliberately attempted to mislead, misinform, or hide a fact that would otherwise render him ineligible.37 The petition expressly challenged Ramon’s eligibility for public office based on the prohibition stated in the Constitution and the Local Government Code against any person serving three consecutive terms, and specifically prayed that "the Certificate of Candidacy filed by the respondent Ramon be denied due course to or cancel the same and that he be declared as a disqualified candidate."38

The denial of due course to or the cancellation of the CoC under Section 78 involves a finding not only that a person lacks a qualification but also that he made a material representation that is false.39 A petition for the denial of due course to or cancellation of CoC that is short of the requirements will not be granted. In Mitra v. Commission on Elections,40 the Court stressed that there must also be a deliberate attempt to mislead, thus:The false representation under Section 78 must likewise be a "deliberate attempt to mislead, misinform, or hide a fact that would otherwise render a candidate ineligible." Given the purpose of the requirement, it must be made with the intention to deceive the electorate as to the would-be candidate’s qualifications for public office. Thus, the misrepresentation that Section 78 addresses cannot be the result of a mere innocuous mistake, and cannot exist in a situation where the intent to deceive is patently absent, or where no deception on the electorate results. The deliberate character of the misrepresentation necessarily follows from a consideration of the consequences of any material falsity: a candidate who falsifies a material fact cannot run; if he runs and is elected, he cannot serve; in both cases, he can be prosecuted for violation of the election laws.

It is underscored, however, that a Section 78 petition should not be interchanged or confused with a Section 68 petition. The remedies under the two sections are different, for they are based on different grounds, and can result in different eventualities.41 A person who is disqualified under Section 68 is prohibited to continue as a candidate, but a person whose CoC is cancelled or denied due course under Section 78 is not considered as a candidate at all because his status is that of a person who has not filed a CoC.42 Miranda v. Abaya43 has clarified that a candidate who is disqualified under Section 68 can be validly substituted pursuant to Section 77 because he remains a candidate until disqualified; but a person whose CoC has been denied due course or cancelled under

Section 78 cannot be substituted because he is not considered a candidate.

To be sure, the cause of Ramon’s ineligibility (i.e., the three-term limit) is enforced both by the Constitution and statutory law. Article X, Section 8 of the 1987 Constitution provides:Section 8. The term of office of elective local officials, except barangay officials, which shall be determined by law, shall be three years and no such official shall serve for more than three consecutive terms. Voluntary renunciation of the office for any length of time shall not be considered as an interruption in the continuity of his service for the full term for which he was elected.

Section 43 of the Local Government Code reiterates the constitutional three-term limit for all elective local officials, to wit:Section 43. Term of Office. – (a) x x x(b) No local elective official shall serve for more than three (3) consecutive terms in the same position. Voluntary renunciation of the office for any length of time shall not be considered as an interruption in the continuity of service for the full term for which the elective official concerned was elected. (Emphasis supplied.)

The objective of imposing the three-term limit rule was "to avoid the evil of a single person accumulating excessive power over a particular territorial jurisdiction as a result of a prolonged stay in the same office." The Court underscored this objective in Aldovino, Jr. v. Commission on Elections,44 stating:x x x The framers of the Constitution specifically included an exception to the people’s freedom to choose those who will govern them in order to avoid the evil of a single person accumulating excessive power over a particular territorial jurisdiction as a result of a prolonged stay in the same office. To allow petitioner Latasa to vie for the position of city mayor after having served for three consecutive terms as a municipal mayor would obviously defeat the very intent of the framers when they wrote this exception. Should he be allowed another three consecutive terms as mayor of the City of Digos, petitioner would then be possibly holding office as chief executive over the same territorial jurisdiction and inhabitants for a total of eighteen consecutive years. This is the very scenario sought to be avoided by the Constitution, if not abhorred by it.

To accord with the constitutional and statutory proscriptions, Ramon was absolutely precluded from asserting an eligibility to run as Mayor of Lucena City for the fourth consecutive term. Resultantly, his CoC was invalid and ineffectual ab initio for containing the incurable defect consisting in his false declaration of his eligibility to run. The invalidity and inefficacy of his CoC made his situation even worse than that of a nuisance candidate because the nuisance candidate may remain eligible despite cancellation of his CoC or despite the denial of due course to the CoC pursuant to Section 69 of the Omnibus Election Code.45

Ramon himself specifically admitted his ineligibility when he filed his Manifestation with Motion to Resolve on December 30, 2009 in the COMELEC.46 That sufficed to render his CoC invalid, considering that for all intents and purposes the COMELEC’s declaration of his disqualification had the effect of announcing that he was no candidate at all.

We stress that a non-candidate like Ramon had no right to pass on to his substitute. As Miranda v. Abaya aptly put it:Even on the most basic and fundamental principles, it is readily understood that the concept of a substitute presupposes the existence of the person to be substituted, for how can a person take the place of somebody who does not exist or who never was. The Court has no other choice but to rule that in all the instances enumerated in Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code, the existence of a valid certificate of candidacy seasonably filed is a requisite sine qua non.

All told, a disqualified candidate may only be substituted if he had a valid certificate of candidacy in the first place because, if the disqualified candidate did not have a valid and seasonably filed certificate of candidacy, he is and was not a candidate at all. If a person was not a candidate, he cannot be substituted under Section 77 of the Code. Besides, if we were to allow the so-called "substitute" to file a "new" and "original" certificate of candidacy beyond the period for the filing thereof, it would be a crystalline case of unequal protection of the law, an act abhorred by our Constitution.47 (Emphasis supplied)

3.Granting without any qualification of petition in SPA No. 09-029(DC) manifested COMELEC’s intention to declare Ramon disqualified and to cancel his CoC.

That the COMELEC made no express finding that Ramon committed any deliberate misrepresentation in his CoC was of little consequence in the determination of whether his CoC should be deemed cancelled or not.

In Miranda v. Abaya,48 the specific relief that the petition prayed for was that the CoC "be not given due course and/or cancelled." The COMELEC categorically granted "the petition" and then pronounced — in apparent contradiction — that Joel Pempe Miranda was "disqualified." The Court held that the COMELEC, by granting the petition without any qualification, disqualified Joel Pempe Miranda and at the same time cancelled Jose Pempe Miranda’s CoC. The Court explained:The question to settle next is whether or not aside from Joel "Pempe" Miranda being disqualified by the Comelec in its May 5, 1998 resolution, his certificate of candidacy had likewise been denied due course and cancelled.

The Court rules that it was.Private respondent’s petition in SPA No. 98-019 specifically prayed for the following:WHEREFORE, it is respectfully prayed that the Certificate of Candidacy filed by respondent for the position of Mayor for the City of Santiago be not given due course and/or cancelled.Other reliefs just and equitable in the premises are likewise prayed for.(Rollo, p. 31; Emphasis ours.)

In resolving the petition filed by private respondent specifying a very particular relief, the Comelec ruled favorably in the following manner:WHEREFORE, in view of the foregoing, the Commission (FIRST DIVISION) GRANTS the Petition. Respondent JOSE "Pempe" MIRANDA is hereby DISQUALIFIED from running for the position of mayor of Santiago City, Isabela, in the May 11, 1998 national and local elections.SO ORDERED.(p.43, Rollo; Emphasis ours.)

From a plain reading of the dispositive portion of the Comelec resolution of May 5, 1998 in SPA No. 98-019, it is sufficiently clear that the prayer specifically and particularly sought in the petition was GRANTED, there being no qualification on the matter whatsoever. The disqualification was simply ruled over and above the granting of the specific prayer for denial of due course and cancellation of the certificate of candidacy. x x x.49

x x x xx x x. There is no dispute that the complaint or petition filed by private respondent in SPA No. 98-019 is one to deny due course and to cancel the certificate of candidacy of Jose "Pempe" Miranda (Rollo, pp. 26-31). There is likewise no question that the said petition was GRANTED without any qualification whatsoever. It is rather clear, therefore, that whether or not the Comelec granted any further relief in SPA No. 98-019 by disqualifying the candidate, the fact remains that the said petition was granted and that the certificate of candidacy of Jose "Pempe" Miranda was denied due course and cancelled. x x x.50

The crucial point of Miranda v. Abaya was that the COMELEC actually granted the particular relief of cancelling or denying due course to the CoC prayed for in the petition by not subjecting that relief to any qualification.

Miranda v. Abaya applies herein. Although Castillo’s petition in SPA No. 09-029 (DC) specifically sought both the disqualification of Ramon and the denial of due course to or cancellation of his CoC, the COMELEC categorically stated in the Resolution dated April 19, 2010 that it was granting the petition. Despite the COMELEC making no finding of material misrepresentation on the part of Ramon, its granting of Castillo’s petition without express qualifications manifested that the COMELEC had cancelled Ramon’s CoC based on his apparent ineligibility. The Resolution dated April 19, 2010 became final and executory because Castillo did not move for its reconsideration, and because Ramon later withdrew his motion for reconsideration filed in relation to it.

4.Elected Vice Mayor must succeed and assume the position of Mayor due to a permanent vacancy in the office.

On the issue of who should assume the office of Mayor of Lucena City, Castillo submits that the doctrine on the rejection of the second-placer espoused in Labo, Jr. v. Commission on Elections51 should not apply to him because Ramon’s disqualification became final prior to the elections.52 Instead, he cites Cayat v. Commission on Elections,53 where the Court said:x x x In Labo there was no final judgment of disqualification before the elections. The doctrine on the rejection of the second placer was applied in Labo and a host of other cases because the judgment declaring the candidate’s disqualification in Labo and the other cases had not become final before the elections. To repeat, Labo and the

other cases applying the doctrine on the rejection of the second placer have one common essential condition — the disqualification of the candidate had not become final before the elections. This essential condition does not exist in the present case.

Thus, in Labo, Labo’s disqualification became final only on 14 May 1992, three days after the 11 May 1992 elections. On election day itself, Labo was still legally a candidate. In the present case, Cayat was disqualified by final judgment 23 days before the 10 May 2004 elections. On election day, Cayat was no longer legally a candidate for mayor. In short, Cayat’s candidacy for Mayor of Buguias, Benguet was legally non-existent in the 10 May 2004 elections.

The law expressly declares that a candidate disqualified by final judgment before an election cannot be voted for, and votes cast for him shall not be counted. This is a mandatory provision of law. Section 6 of Republic Act No. 6646, The Electoral Reforms Law of 1987, states:Sec. 6. Effect of Disqualification Case.— Any candidate who has been declared by final judgment to be disqualified shall not be voted for, and the votes cast for him shall not be counted. If for any reason a candidate is not declared by final judgment before an election to be disqualified and he is voted for and receives the winning number of votes in such election, the Court or Commission shall continue with the trial and hearing of the action, inquiry, or protest and, upon motion of the complainant or any intervenor, may during the pendency thereof order the suspension of the proclamation of such candidate whenever the evidence of his guilt is strong. (Emphasis added)

Section 6 of the Electoral Reforms Law of 1987 covers two situations. The first is when the disqualification becomes final before the elections, which is the situation covered in the first sentence of Section 6. The second is when the disqualification becomes final after the elections, which is the situation covered in the second sentence of Section 6.

The present case falls under the first situation. Section 6 of the Electoral Reforms Law governing the first situation is categorical: a candidate disqualified by final judgment before an election cannot be voted for, and votes cast for him shall not be counted. The Resolution disqualifying Cayat became final on 17 April 2004, way before the 10 May 2004 elections. Therefore, all the 8,164 votes cast in Cayat’s favor are stray. Cayat was never a candidate in the 10 May 2004 elections. Palileng’s proclamation is proper because he was the sole and only candidate, second to none.54

Relying on the pronouncement in Cayat, Castillo asserts that he was entitled to assume the position of Mayor of Lucena City for having obtained the highest number of votes among the remaining qualified candidates.

It would seem, then, that the date of the finality of the COMELEC resolution declaring Ramon disqualified is decisive. According to Section 10, Rule 19 of the COMELEC’s Resolution No. 8804,55 a decision or resolution of a Division becomes final and executory after the lapse of five days following its promulgation unless a motion for reconsideration is seasonably filed. Under Section 8, Rule 20 of Resolution No. 8804, the decision of the COMELEC En Banc becomes final and executory five days after its promulgation and receipt of notice by the parties.

The COMELEC First Division declared Ramon disqualified through its Resolution dated April 19, 2010, the copy of which Ramon received on the same date.56 Ramon filed a motion for reconsideration on April 21, 201057 in accordance with Section 7 of COMELEC Resolution No. 8696,58 but withdrew the motion on May 4, 2010,59

ostensibly to allow his substitution by Barbara Ruby. On his part, Castillo did not file any motion for reconsideration. Such circumstances indicated that there was no more pending matter that could have effectively suspended the finality of the ruling in due course. Hence, the Resolution dated April 19, 2010 could be said to have attained finality upon the lapse of five days from its promulgation and receipt of it by the parties. This happened probably on April 24, 2010. Despite such finality, the COMELEC En Banc continued to act on the withdrawal by Ramon of his motion for reconsideration through the May 5, 2010 Resolution declaring the April 19, 2010 Resolution of the COMELEC First Division final and executory.

Yet, we cannot agree with Castillo’s assertion that with Ramon’s disqualification becoming final prior to the May 10, 2010 elections, the ruling in Cayat was applicable in his favor. Barbara Ruby’s filing of her CoC in substitution of Ramon significantly differentiated this case from the factual circumstances obtaining in Cayat. Rev. Fr. Nardo B. Cayat, the petitioner in Cayat, was disqualified on April 17, 2004, and his disqualification became final before the May 10, 2004 elections. Considering that no substitution of Cayat was made, Thomas R. Palileng, Sr., his rival,

remained the only candidate for the mayoralty post in Buguias, Benguet. In contrast, after Barbara Ruby substituted Ramon, the May 10, 2010 elections proceeded with her being regarded by the electorate of Lucena City as a bona fide candidate. To the electorate, she became a contender for the same position vied for by Castillo, such that she stood on the same footing as Castillo. Such standing as a candidate negated Castillo’s claim of being the candidate who obtained the highest number of votes, and of being consequently entitled to assume the office of Mayor.

Indeed, Castillo could not assume the office for he was only a second placer.1âwphi1 Labo, Jr. should be applied. There, the Court emphasized that the candidate obtaining the second highest number of votes for the contested office could not assume the office despite the disqualification of the first placer because the second placer was "not the choice of the sovereign will."60 Surely, the Court explained, a minority or defeated candidate could not be deemed elected to the office.61 There was to be no question that the second placer lost in the election, was repudiated by the electorate, and could not assume the vacated position.62 No law imposed upon and compelled the people of Lucena City to accept a loser to be their political leader or their representative.63

The only time that a second placer is allowed to take the place of a disqualified winning candidate is when two requisites concur, namely: (a) the candidate who obtained the highest number of votes is disqualified; and (b) the electorate was fully aware in fact and in law of that candidate’s disqualification as to bring such awareness within the realm of notoriety but the electorate still cast the plurality of the votes in favor of the ineligible candidate.64

Under this sole exception, the electorate may be said to have waived the validity and efficacy of their votes by notoriously misapplying their franchise or throwing away their votes, in which case the eligible candidate with the second highest number of votes may be deemed elected.65 But the exception did not apply in favor of Castillo simply because the second element was absent. The electorate of Lucena City were not the least aware of the fact of Barbara Ruby’s ineligibility as the substitute. In fact, the COMELEC En Banc issued the Resolution finding her substitution invalid only on May 20, 2011, or a full year after the decisions.

On the other hand, the COMELEC En Banc properly disqualified Barbara Ruby from assuming the position of Mayor of Lucena City. To begin with, there was no valid candidate for her to substitute due to Ramon’s ineligibility. Also, Ramon did not voluntarily withdraw his CoC before the elections in accordance with Section 73 of the Omnibus Election Code. Lastly, she was not an additional candidate for the position of Mayor of Lucena City because her filing of her CoC on May 4, 2010 was beyond the period fixed by law. Indeed, she was not, in law and in fact, a candidate.66

A permanent vacancy in the office of Mayor of Lucena City thus resulted, and such vacancy should be filled pursuant to the law on succession defined in Section 44 of the LGC, to wit:67

Section 44. Permanent Vacancies in the Offices of the Governor, Vice-Governor, Mayor, and Vice-Mayor. – If a permanent vacancy occurs in the office of the governor or mayor, the vice-governor or vice-mayor concerned shall become the governor or mayor. x x xWHEREFORE, the Court DISMISSES the petitions in these consolidated cases; AFFIRMS the Resolution issued on May 20, 2011 by the COMELEC En Banc; and ORDERS the petitioners to pay the costs of suit.

SO ORDERED.

G.R. No. 189698               February 22, 2010

ELEAZAR P. QUINTO and GERINO A. TOLENTINO, JR., Petitioners, vs.COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, Respondent.

R E S O L U T I O N

PUNO, C.J.:Upon a careful review of the case at bar, this Court resolves to grant the respondent Commission on Elections’ (COMELEC) motion for reconsideration, and the movants-intervenors’ motions for reconsideration-in-intervention, of this Court’s December 1, 2009 Decision (Decision).1

The assailed Decision granted the Petition for Certiorari and Prohibition filed by Eleazar P. Quinto and Gerino A. Tolentino, Jr. and declared as unconstitutional the second proviso in the third paragraph of Section 13 of Republic Act No. 9369,2 Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code3 and Section 4(a) of COMELEC Resolution No. 8678,4

mainly on the ground that they violate the equal protection clause of the Constitution and suffer from overbreadth. The assailed Decision thus paved the way for public appointive officials to continue discharging the powers, prerogatives and functions of their office notwithstanding their entry into the political arena.

In support of their respective motions for reconsideration, respondent COMELEC and movants-intervenors submit the following arguments:(1) The assailed Decision is contrary to, and/or violative of, the constitutional proscription against the participation of public appointive officials and members of the military in partisan political activity;(2) The assailed provisions do not violate the equal protection clause when they accord differential treatment to elective and appointive officials, because such differential treatment rests on material and substantial distinctions and is germane to the purposes of the law;(3) The assailed provisions do not suffer from the infirmity of overbreadth; and(4) There is a compelling need to reverse the assailed Decision, as public safety and interest demand such reversal.We find the foregoing arguments meritorious.

I.Procedural IssuesFirst, we shall resolve the procedural issues on the timeliness of the COMELEC’s motion for reconsideration which was filed on December 15, 2009, as well as the propriety of the motions for reconsideration-in-intervention which were filed after the Court had rendered its December 1, 2009 Decision.

i. Timeliness of COMELEC’s Motion for ReconsiderationPursuant to Section 2, Rule 56-A of the 1997 Rules of Court,5 in relation to Section 1, Rule 52 of the same rules,6

COMELEC had a period of fifteen days from receipt of notice of the assailed Decision within which to move for its reconsideration. COMELEC received notice of the assailed Decision on December 2, 2009, hence, had until December 17, 2009 to file a Motion for Reconsideration.

The Motion for Reconsideration of COMELEC was timely filed. It was filed on December 14, 2009. The corresponding Affidavit of Service (in substitution of the one originally submitted on December 14, 2009) was subsequently filed on December 17, 2009 – still within the reglementary period.

ii. Propriety of the Motions for Reconsideration-in-InterventionSection 1, Rule 19 of the Rules of Court provides:A person who has legal interest in the matter in litigation or in the success of either of the parties, or an interest against both, or is so situated as to be adversely affected by a distribution or other disposition of property in the custody of the court or of an officer thereof may, with leave of court, be allowed to intervene in the action. The court shall consider whether or not the intervention will unduly delay or prejudice the adjudication of the rights of the original parties, and whether or not the intervenor’s rights may be fully protected in a separate proceeding.

Pursuant to the foregoing rule, this Court has held that a motion for intervention shall be entertained when the following requisites are satisfied: (1) the would-be intervenor shows that he has a substantial right or interest in the case; and (2) such right or interest cannot be adequately pursued and protected in another proceeding.7

Upon the other hand, Section 2, Rule 19 of the Rules of Court provides the time within which a motion for intervention may be filed, viz.:SECTION 2. Time to intervene.– The motion for intervention may be filed at any time before rendition of judgment by the trial court. A copy of the pleading-in-intervention shall be attached to the motion and served on the original parties. (italics supplied)

This rule, however, is not inflexible. Interventions have been allowed even beyond the period prescribed in the Rule, when demanded by the higher interest of justice. Interventions have also been granted to afford indispensable parties, who have not been impleaded, the right to be heard even after a decision has been rendered by the trial court,8 when the petition for review of the judgment has already been submitted for decision before the Supreme Court,9 and even where the assailed order has already become final and executory.10 In Lim v. Pacquing,11 the motion for intervention filed by the Republic of the Philippines was allowed by this Court to avoid grave injustice and injury and to settle once and for all the substantive issues raised by the parties.

In fine, the allowance or disallowance of a motion for intervention rests on the sound discretion of the court 12 after consideration of the appropriate circumstances.13 We stress again that Rule 19 of the Rules of Court is a rule of procedure whose object is to make the powers of the court fully and completely available for justice. 14 Its purpose is not to hinder or delay, but to facilitate and promote the administration of justice.15

We rule that, with the exception of the IBP – Cebu City Chapter, all the movants-intervenors may properly intervene in the case at bar.

First, the movants-intervenors have each sufficiently established a substantial right or interest in the case.

As a Senator of the Republic, Senator Manuel A. Roxas has a right to challenge the December 1, 2009 Decision, which nullifies a long established law; as a voter, he has a right to intervene in a matter that involves the electoral process; and as a public officer, he has a personal interest in maintaining the trust and confidence of the public in its system of government.

On the other hand, former Senator Franklin M. Drilon and Tom V. Apacible are candidates in the May 2010 elections running against appointive officials who, in view of the December 1, 2009 Decision, have not yet resigned from their posts and are not likely to resign from their posts. They stand to be directly injured by the assailed Decision, unless it is reversed.

Moreover, the rights or interests of said movants-intervenors cannot be adequately pursued and protected in another proceeding. Clearly, their rights will be foreclosed if this Court’s Decision attains finality and forms part of the laws of the land.

With regard to the IBP – Cebu City Chapter, it anchors its standing on the assertion that "this case involves the constitutionality of elections laws for this coming 2010 National Elections," and that "there is a need for it to be allowed to intervene xxx so that the voice of its members in the legal profession would also be heard before this Highest Tribunal as it resolves issues of transcendental importance."16

Prescinding from our rule and ruling case law, we find that the IBP-Cebu City Chapter has failed to present a specific and substantial interest sufficient to clothe it with standing to intervene in the case at bar. Its invoked interest is, in character, too indistinguishable to justify its intervention.

We now turn to the substantive issues.

II.Substantive IssuesThe assailed Decision struck down Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678, the second proviso in the third paragraph of Section 13 of Republic Act (RA) 9369, and Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, on the following grounds:(1) They violate the equal protection clause of the Constitution because of the differential treatment of persons holding appointive offices and those holding elective positions;(2) They are overbroad insofar as they prohibit the candidacy of all civil servants holding appointive posts: (a) without distinction as to whether or not they occupy high/influential positions in the government, and (b) they limit these civil servants’ activity regardless of whether they be partisan or nonpartisan in character, or whether they be

in the national, municipal or barangay level; and(3) Congress has not shown a compelling state interest to restrict the fundamental right of these public appointive officials.

We grant the motions for reconsideration. We now rule that Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678, Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, and the second proviso in the third paragraph of Section 13 of RA 9369 are not unconstitutional, and accordingly reverse our December 1, 2009 Decision.

III.Section 4(a) of COMELEC Resolution 8678 Compliant with LawSection 4(a) of COMELEC Resolution 8678 is a faithful reflection of the present state of the law and jurisprudence on the matter, viz.:Incumbent Appointive Official. - Under Section 13 of RA 9369, which reiterates Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, any person holding a public appointive office or position, including active members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and officers and employees in government-owned or -controlled corporations, shall be considered ipso facto resigned from his office upon the filing of his certificate of candidacy.

Incumbent Elected Official. – Upon the other hand, pursuant to Section 14 of RA 9006 or the Fair Election Act,17

which repealed Section 67 of the Omnibus Election Code18 and rendered ineffective Section 11 of R.A. 8436 insofar as it considered an elected official as resigned only upon the start of the campaign period corresponding to the positions for which they are running,19 an elected official is not deemed to have resigned from his office upon the filing of his certificate of candidacy for the same or any other elected office or position. In fine, an elected official may run for another position without forfeiting his seat.

These laws and regulations implement Section 2(4), Article IX-B of the 1987 Constitution, which prohibits civil service officers and employees from engaging in any electioneering or partisan political campaign.

The intention to impose a strict limitation on the participation of civil service officers and employees in partisan political campaigns is unmistakable. The exchange between Commissioner Quesada and Commissioner Foz during the deliberations of the Constitutional Commission is instructive:MS. QUESADA.x x x xSecondly, I would like to address the issue here as provided in Section 1 (4), line 12, and I quote: "No officer or employee in the civil service shall engage, directly or indirectly, in any partisan political activity." This is almost the same provision as in the 1973 Constitution. However, we in the government service have actually experienced how this provision has been violated by the direct or indirect partisan political activities of many government officials.

So, is the Committee willing to include certain clauses that would make this provision more strict, and which would deter its violation?

MR. FOZ. Madam President, the existing Civil Service Law and the implementing rules on the matter are more than exhaustive enough to really prevent officers and employees in the public service from engaging in any form of partisan political activity. But the problem really lies in implementation because, if the head of a ministry, and even the superior officers of offices and agencies of government will themselves violate the constitutional injunction against partisan political activity, then no string of words that we may add to what is now here in this draft will really implement the constitutional intent against partisan political activity. x x x20 (italics supplied)

To emphasize its importance, this constitutional ban on civil service officers and employees is presently reflected and implemented by a number of statutes. Section 46(b)(26), Chapter 7 and Section 55, Chapter 8 – both of Subtitle A, Title I, Book V of the Administrative Code of 1987 – respectively provide in relevant part:Section 44. Discipline: General Provisions:x x x x(b) The following shall be grounds for disciplinary action:x x x x(26) Engaging directly or indirectly in partisan political activities by one holding a non-political office.x x x xSection 55. Political Activity. — No officer or employee in the Civil Service including members of the Armed

Forces, shall engage directly or indirectly in any partisan political activity or take part in any election except to vote nor shall he use his official authority or influence to coerce the political activity of any other person or body. Nothing herein provided shall be understood to prevent any officer or employee from expressing his views on current political problems or issues, or from mentioning the names of his candidates for public office whom he supports: Provided, That public officers and employees holding political offices may take part in political and electoral activities but it shall be unlawful for them to solicit contributions from their subordinates or subject them to any of the acts involving subordinates prohibited in the Election Code.

Section 261(i) of Batas Pambansa Blg. 881 (the Omnibus Election Code) further makes intervention by civil service officers and employees in partisan political activities an election offense, viz.:SECTION 261. Prohibited Acts. — The following shall be guilty of an election offense:x x x x(i) Intervention of public officers and employees. — Any officer or employee in the civil service, except those holding political offices; any officer, employee, or member of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, or any police force, special forces, home defense forces, barangay self-defense units and all other para-military units that now exist or which may hereafter be organized who, directly or indirectly, intervenes in any election campaign or engages in any partisan political activity, except to vote or to preserve public order, if he is a peace officer.

The intent of both Congress and the framers of our Constitution to limit the participation of civil service officers and employees in partisan political activities is too plain to be mistaken.

But Section 2(4), Article IX-B of the 1987 Constitution and the implementing statutes apply only to civil servants holding apolitical offices. Stated differently, the constitutional ban does not cover elected officials, notwithstanding the fact that "[t]he civil service embraces all branches, subdivisions, instrumentalities, and agencies of the Government, including government-owned or controlled corporations with original charters."21 This is because elected public officials, by the very nature of their office, engage in partisan political activities almost all year round, even outside of the campaign period.22 Political partisanship is the inevitable essence of a political office, elective positions included.23

The prohibition notwithstanding, civil service officers and employees are allowed to vote, as well as express their views on political issues, or mention the names of certain candidates for public office whom they support. This is crystal clear from the deliberations of the Constitutional Commission, viz.:MS. AQUINO: Mr. Presiding Officer, my proposed amendment is on page 2, Section 1, subparagraph 4, lines 13 and 14. On line 13, between the words "any" and "partisan," add the phrase ELECTIONEERING AND OTHER; and on line 14, delete the word "activity" and in lieu thereof substitute the word CAMPAIGN.

May I be allowed to explain my proposed amendment?

THE PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Treñas): Commissioner Aquino may proceed.

MS. AQUINO: The draft as presented by the Committee deleted the phrase "except to vote" which was adopted in both the 1935 and 1973 Constitutions. The phrase "except to vote" was not intended as a guarantee to the right to vote but as a qualification of the general prohibition against taking part in elections.

Voting is a partisan political activity. Unless it is explicitly provided for as an exception to this prohibition, it will amount to disenfranchisement. We know that suffrage, although plenary, is not an unconditional right. In other words, the Legislature can always pass a statute which can withhold from any class the right to vote in an election, if public interest so required. I would only like to reinstate the qualification by specifying the prohibited acts so that those who may want to vote but who are likewise prohibited from participating in partisan political campaigns or electioneering may vote.

MR. FOZ: There is really no quarrel over this point, but please understand that there was no intention on the part of the Committee to disenfranchise any government official or employee. The elimination of the last clause of this provision was precisely intended to protect the members of the civil service in the sense that they are not being deprived of the freedom of expression in a political contest. The last phrase or clause might have given the impression that a government employee or worker has no right whatsoever in an election campaign except to vote, which is not the case. They are still free to express their views although the intention is not really to allow them to take part actively in a political campaign.24

IV.Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678, Section 13 of RA 9369, and Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code Do Not Violate the Equal Protection Clause

We now hold that Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678, Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, and the second proviso in the third paragraph of Section 13 of RA 9369 are not violative of the equal protection clause of the Constitution.

i. Fariñas, et al. v. Executive Secretary, et al. is ControllingIn truth, this Court has already ruled squarely on whether these deemed-resigned provisions challenged in the case at bar violate the equal protection clause of the Constitution in Fariñas, et al. v. Executive Secretary, et al.25

In Fariñas, the constitutionality of Section 14 of the Fair Election Act, in relation to Sections 66 and 67 of the Omnibus Election Code, was assailed on the ground, among others, that it unduly discriminates against appointive officials. As Section 14 repealed Section 67 (i.e., the deemed-resigned provision in respect of elected officials) of the Omnibus Election Code, elected officials are no longer considered ipso facto resigned from their respective offices upon their filing of certificates of candidacy. In contrast, since Section 66 was not repealed, the limitation on appointive officials continues to be operative – they are deemed resigned when they file their certificates of candidacy.

The petitioners in Fariñas thus brought an equal protection challenge against Section 14, with the end in view of having the deemed-resigned provisions "apply equally" to both elected and appointive officials. We held, however, that the legal dichotomy created by the Legislature is a reasonable classification, as there are material and significant distinctions between the two classes of officials. Consequently, the contention that Section 14 of the Fair Election Act, in relation to Sections 66 and 67 of the Omnibus Election Code, infringed on the equal protection clause of the Constitution, failed muster. We ruled:The petitioners' contention, that the repeal of Section 67 of the Omnibus Election Code pertaining to elective officials gives undue benefit to such officials as against the appointive ones and violates the equal protection clause of the constitution, is tenuous.

The equal protection of the law clause in the Constitution is not absolute, but is subject to reasonable classification. If the groupings are characterized by substantial distinctions that make real differences, one class may be treated and regulated differently from the other. The Court has explained the nature of the equal protection guarantee in this manner:The equal protection of the law clause is against undue favor and individual or class privilege, as well as hostile discrimination or the oppression of inequality. It is not intended to prohibit legislation which is limited either in the object to which it is directed or by territory within which it is to operate. It does not demand absolute equality among residents; it merely requires that all persons shall be treated alike, under like circumstances and conditions both as to privileges conferred and liabilities enforced. The equal protection clause is not infringed by legislation which applies only to those persons falling within a specified class, if it applies alike to all persons within such class, and reasonable grounds exist for making a distinction between those who fall within such class and those who do not.

Substantial distinctions clearly exist between elective officials and appointive officials. The former occupy their office by virtue of the mandate of the electorate. They are elected to an office for a definite term and may be removed therefrom only upon stringent conditions. On the other hand, appointive officials hold their office by virtue of their designation thereto by an appointing authority. Some appointive officials hold their office in a permanent capacity and are entitled to security of tenure while others serve at the pleasure of the appointing authority.

Another substantial distinction between the two sets of officials is that under Section 55, Chapter 8, Title I, Subsection A. Civil Service Commission, Book V of the Administrative Code of 1987 (Executive Order No. 292), appointive officials, as officers and employees in the civil service, are strictly prohibited from engaging in any partisan political activity or take (sic) part in any election except to vote. Under the same provision, elective officials, or officers or employees holding political offices, are obviously expressly allowed to take part in political and electoral activities.

By repealing Section 67 but retaining Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, the legislators deemed it proper to

treat these two classes of officials differently with respect to the effect on their tenure in the office of the filing of the certificates of candidacy for any position other than those occupied by them. Again, it is not within the power of the Court to pass upon or look into the wisdom of this classification.

Since the classification justifying Section 14 of Rep. Act No. 9006, i.e., elected officials vis-à-vis appointive officials, is anchored upon material and significant distinctions and all the persons belonging under the same classification are similarly treated, the equal protection clause of the Constitution is, thus, not infringed.26

The case at bar is a crass attempt to resurrect a dead issue. The miracle is that our assailed Decision gave it new life. We ought to be guided by the doctrine of stare decisis et non quieta movere. This doctrine, which is really "adherence to precedents," mandates that once a case has been decided one way, then another case involving exactly the same point at issue should be decided in the same manner.27 This doctrine is one of policy grounded on the necessity for securing certainty and stability of judicial decisions. As the renowned jurist Benjamin Cardozo stated in his treatise The Nature of the Judicial Process:It will not do to decide the same question one way between one set of litigants and the opposite way between another. "If a group of cases involves the same point, the parties expect the same decision. It would be a gross injustice to decide alternate cases on opposite principles. If a case was decided against me yesterday when I was a defendant, I shall look for the same judgment today if I am plaintiff. To decide differently would raise a feeling of resentment and wrong in my breast; it would be an infringement, material and moral, of my rights." Adherence to precedent must then be the rule rather than the exception if litigants are to have faith in the even-handed administration of justice in the courts.28

Our Fariñas ruling on the equal protection implications of the deemed-resigned provisions cannot be minimalized as mere obiter dictum. It is trite to state that an adjudication on any point within the issues presented by the case cannot be considered as obiter dictum.29 This rule applies to all pertinent questions that are presented and resolved in the regular course of the consideration of the case and lead up to the final conclusion, and to any statement as to the matter on which the decision is predicated.30 For that reason, a point expressly decided does not lose its value as a precedent because the disposition of the case is, or might have been, made on some other ground; or even though, by reason of other points in the case, the result reached might have been the same if the court had held, on the particular point, otherwise than it did.31 As we held in Villanueva, Jr. v. Court of Appeals, et al.:32

… A decision which the case could have turned on is not regarded as obiter dictum merely because, owing to the disposal of the contention, it was necessary to consider another question, nor can an additional reason in a decision, brought forward after the case has been disposed of on one ground, be regarded as dicta. So, also, where a case presents two (2) or more points, any one of which is sufficient to determine the ultimate issue, but the court actually decides all such points, the case as an authoritative precedent as to every point decided, and none of such points can be regarded as having the status of a dictum, and one point should not be denied authority merely because another point was more dwelt on and more fully argued and considered, nor does a decision on one proposition make statements of the court regarding other propositions dicta.33 (italics supplied)

ii. Classification Germane to the Purposes of the Law

The Fariñas ruling on the equal protection challenge stands on solid ground even if reexamined.

To start with, the equal protection clause does not require the universal application of the laws to all persons or things without distinction.34 What it simply requires is equality among equals as determined according to a valid classification.35 The test developed by jurisprudence here and yonder is that of reasonableness,36 which has four requisites:(1) The classification rests on substantial distinctions;(2) It is germane to the purposes of the law;(3) It is not limited to existing conditions only; and(4) It applies equally to all members of the same class.37

Our assailed Decision readily acknowledged that these deemed-resigned provisions satisfy the first, third and fourth requisites of reasonableness. It, however, proffers the dubious conclusion that the differential treatment of appointive officials vis-à-vis elected officials is not germane to the purpose of the law, because "whether one holds an appointive office or an elective one, the evils sought to be prevented by the measure remain," viz.:

… For example, the Executive Secretary, or any Member of the Cabinet for that matter, could wield the same influence as the Vice-President who at the same time is appointed to a Cabinet post (in the recent past, elected Vice-Presidents were appointed to take charge of national housing, social welfare development, interior and local government, and foreign affairs). With the fact that they both head executive offices, there is no valid justification to treat them differently when both file their [Certificates of Candidacy] for the elections. Under the present state of our law, the Vice-President, in the example, running this time, let us say, for President, retains his position during the entire election period and can still use the resources of his office to support his campaign.38

Sad to state, this conclusion conveniently ignores the long-standing rule that to remedy an injustice, the Legislature need not address every manifestation of the evil at once; it may proceed "one step at a time." 39 In addressing a societal concern, it must invariably draw lines and make choices, thereby creating some inequity as to those included or excluded.40 Nevertheless, as long as "the bounds of reasonable choice" are not exceeded, the courts must defer to the legislative judgment.41 We may not strike down a law merely because the legislative aim would have been more fully achieved by expanding the class.42 Stated differently, the fact that a legislative classification, by itself, is underinclusive will not render it unconstitutionally arbitrary or invidious.43 There is no constitutional requirement that regulation must reach each and every class to which it might be applied;44 that the Legislature must be held rigidly to the choice of regulating all or none.

Thus, any person who poses an equal protection challenge must convincingly show that the law creates a classification that is "palpably arbitrary or capricious."45 He must refute all possible rational bases for the differing treatment, whether or not the Legislature cited those bases as reasons for the enactment,46 such that the constitutionality of the law must be sustained even if the reasonableness of the classification is "fairly debatable."47

In the case at bar, the petitioners failed – and in fact did not even attempt – to discharge this heavy burden. Our assailed Decision was likewise silent as a sphinx on this point even while we submitted the following thesis:... [I]t is not sufficient grounds for invalidation that we may find that the statute’s distinction is unfair, underinclusive, unwise, or not the best solution from a public-policy standpoint; rather, we must find that there is no reasonably rational reason for the differing treatment.48

In the instant case, is there a rational justification for excluding elected officials from the operation of the deemed resigned provisions? I submit that there is.

An election is the embodiment of the popular will, perhaps the purest expression of the sovereign power of the people.49 It involves the choice or selection of candidates to public office by popular vote. 50 Considering that elected officials are put in office by their constituents for a definite term, it may justifiably be said that they were excluded from the ambit of the deemed resigned provisions in utmost respect for the mandate of the sovereign will. In other words, complete deference is accorded to the will of the electorate that they be served by such officials until the end of the term for which they were elected. In contrast, there is no such expectation insofar as appointed officials are concerned.

The dichotomized treatment of appointive and elective officials is therefore germane to the purposes of the law. For the law was made not merely to preserve the integrity, efficiency, and discipline of the public service; the Legislature, whose wisdom is outside the rubric of judicial scrutiny, also thought it wise to balance this with the competing, yet equally compelling, interest of deferring to the sovereign will.51 (emphasis in the original)

In fine, the assailed Decision would have us "equalize the playing field" by invalidating provisions of law that seek to restrain the evils from running riot. Under the pretext of equal protection, it would favor a situation in which the evils are unconfined and vagrant, existing at the behest of both appointive and elected officials, over another in which a significant portion thereof is contained. The absurdity of that position is self-evident, to say the least.

The concern, voiced by our esteemed colleague, Mr. Justice Nachura, in his dissent, that elected officials (vis-à-vis appointive officials) have greater political clout over the electorate, is indeed a matter worth exploring – but not by this Court. Suffice it to say that the remedy lies with the Legislature. It is the Legislature that is given the authority, under our constitutional system, to balance competing interests and thereafter make policy choices responsive to the exigencies of the times. It is certainly within the Legislature’s power to make the deemed-resigned provisions applicable to elected officials, should it later decide that the evils sought to be prevented are of such frequency and magnitude as to tilt the balance in favor of expanding the class. This Court cannot and should not arrogate unto itself the power to ascertain and impose on the people the best state of affairs from a public policy standpoint.iii. Mancuso v. Taft Has Been Overruled

Finding no Philippine jurisprudence to prop up its equal protection ruling, our assailed Decision adverted to, and extensively cited, Mancuso v. Taft.52 This was a decision of the First Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals promulgated in March 1973, which struck down as unconstitutional a similar statutory provision. Pathetically, our assailed Decision, relying on Mancuso, claimed:(1) The right to run for public office is "inextricably linked" with two fundamental freedoms – freedom of expression and association;(2) Any legislative classification that significantly burdens this fundamental right must be subjected to strict equal protection review; and(3) While the state has a compelling interest in maintaining the honesty and impartiality of its public work force, the deemed-resigned provisions pursue their objective in a far too heavy-handed manner as to render them unconstitutional.

It then concluded with the exhortation that since "the Americans, from whom we copied the provision in question, had already stricken down a similar measure for being unconstitutional[,] it is high-time that we, too, should follow suit."

Our assailed Decision’s reliance on Mancuso is completely misplaced. We cannot blink away the fact that the United States Supreme Court effectively overruled Mancuso three months after its promulgation by the United States Court of Appeals. In United States Civil Service Commission, et al. v. National Association of Letter Carriers AFL-CIO, et al.53 and Broadrick, et al. v. State of Oklahoma, et al.,54 the United States Supreme Court was faced with the issue of whether statutory provisions prohibiting federal55 and state56 employees from taking an active part in political management or in political campaigns were unconstitutional as to warrant facial invalidation. Violation of these provisions results in dismissal from employment and possible criminal sanctions.

The Court declared these provisions compliant with the equal protection clause. It held that (i) in regulating the speech of its employees, the state as employer has interests that differ significantly from those it possesses in regulating the speech of the citizenry in general; (ii) the courts must therefore balance the legitimate interest of employee free expression against the interests of the employer in promoting efficiency of public services; (iii) if the employees’ expression interferes with the maintenance of efficient and regularly functioning services, the limitation on speech is not unconstitutional; and (iv) the Legislature is to be given some flexibility or latitude in ascertaining which positions are to be covered by any statutory restrictions.57 Therefore, insofar as government employees are concerned, the correct standard of review is an interest-balancing approach, a means-end scrutiny that examines the closeness of fit between the governmental interests and the prohibitions in question.58

Letter Carriers elucidated on these principles, as follows:Until now, the judgment of Congress, the Executive, and the country appears to have been that partisan political activities by federal employees must be limited if the Government is to operate effectively and fairly, elections are to play their proper part in representative government, and employees themselves are to be sufficiently free from improper influences. The restrictions so far imposed on federal employees are not aimed at particular parties, groups, or points of view, but apply equally to all partisan activities of the type described. They discriminate against no racial, ethnic, or religious minorities. Nor do they seek to control political opinions or beliefs, or to interfere with or influence anyone's vote at the polls.

But, as the Court held in Pickering v. Board of Education,59 the government has an interest in regulating the conduct and ‘the speech of its employees that differ(s) significantly from those it possesses in connection with regulation of the speech of the citizenry in general. The problem in any case is to arrive at a balance between the interests of the (employee), as a citizen, in commenting upon matters of public concern and the interest of the (government), as an employer, in promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees.’ Although Congress is free to strike a different balance than it has, if it so chooses, we think the balance it has so far struck is sustainable by the obviously important interests sought to be served by the limitations on partisan political activities now contained in the Hatch Act.

It seems fundamental in the first place that employees in the Executive Branch of the Government, or those working for any of its agencies, should administer the law in accordance with the will of Congress, rather than in accordance with their own or the will of a political party. They are expected to enforce the law and execute the programs of the Government without bias or favoritism for or against any political party or group or the members thereof. A major thesis of the Hatch Act is that to serve this great end of Government-the impartial execution of the laws-it is essential that federal employees, for example, not take formal positions in political parties, not undertake

to play substantial roles in partisan political campaigns, and not run for office on partisan political tickets. Forbidding activities like these will reduce the hazards to fair and effective government.

There is another consideration in this judgment: it is not only important that the Government and its employees in fact avoid practicing political justice, but it is also critical that they appear to the public to be avoiding it, if confidence in the system of representative Government is not to be eroded to a disastrous extent.

Another major concern of the restriction against partisan activities by federal employees was perhaps the immediate occasion for enactment of the Hatch Act in 1939. That was the conviction that the rapidly expanding Government work force should not be employed to build a powerful, invincible, and perhaps corrupt political machine. The experience of the 1936 and 1938 campaigns convinced Congress that these dangers were sufficiently real that substantial barriers should be raised against the party in power-or the party out of power, for that matter-using the thousands or hundreds of thousands of federal employees, paid for at public expense, to man its political structure and political campaigns.

A related concern, and this remains as important as any other, was to further serve the goal that employment and advancement in the Government service not depend on political performance, and at the same time to make sure that Government employees would be free from pressure and from express or tacit invitation to vote in a certain way or perform political chores in order to curry favor with their superiors rather than to act out their own beliefs. It may be urged that prohibitions against coercion are sufficient protection; but for many years the joint judgment of the Executive and Congress has been that to protect the rights of federal employees with respect to their jobs and their political acts and beliefs it is not enough merely to forbid one employee to attempt to influence or coerce another. For example, at the hearings in 1972 on proposed legislation for liberalizing the prohibition against political activity, the Chairman of the Civil Service Commission stated that ‘the prohibitions against active participation in partisan political management and partisan political campaigns constitute the most significant safeguards against coercion . . ..’ Perhaps Congress at some time will come to a different view of the realities of political life and Government service; but that is its current view of the matter, and we are not now in any position to dispute it. Nor, in our view, does the Constitution forbid it.

Neither the right to associate nor the right to participate in political activities is absolute in any event.60 x x xx x x xAs we see it, our task is not to destroy the Act if we can, but to construe it, if consistent with the will of Congress, so as to comport with constitutional limitations. (italics supplied)

Broadrick likewise definitively stated that the assailed statutory provision is constitutionally permissible, viz.:Appellants do not question Oklahoma's right to place even-handed restrictions on the partisan political conduct of state employees. Appellants freely concede that such restrictions serve valid and important state interests, particularly with respect to attracting greater numbers of qualified people by insuring their job security, free from the vicissitudes of the elective process, and by protecting them from ‘political extortion.’ Rather, appellants maintain that however permissible, even commendable, the goals of s 818 may be, its language is unconstitutionally vague and its prohibitions too broad in their sweep, failing to distinguish between conduct that may be proscribed and conduct that must be permitted. For these and other reasons, appellants assert that the sixth and seventh paragraphs of s 818 are void in toto and cannot be enforced against them or anyone else.

We have held today that the Hatch Act is not impermissibly vague.61 We have little doubt that s 818 is similarly not so vague that ‘men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at its meaning.’62 Whatever other problems there are with s 818, it is all but frivolous to suggest that the section fails to give adequate warning of what activities it proscribes or fails to set out ‘explicit standards' for those who must apply it. In the plainest language, it prohibits any state classified employee from being ‘an officer or member’ of a ‘partisan political club’ or a candidate for ‘any paid public office.’ It forbids solicitation of contributions ‘for any political organization, candidacy or other political purpose’ and taking part ‘in the management or affairs of any political party or in any political campaign.’ Words inevitably contain germs of uncertainty and, as with the Hatch Act, there may be disputes over the meaning of such terms in s 818 as ‘partisan,’ or ‘take part in,’ or ‘affairs of’ political parties. But what was said in Letter Carriers, is applicable here: ‘there are limitations in the English language with respect to being both specific and manageably brief, and it seems to us that although the prohibitions may not satisfy those intent on finding fault at any cost, they are set out in terms that the ordinary person exercising ordinary common sense can sufficiently understand and comply with, without sacrifice to the public interest.' x x xx x x x

[Appellants] nevertheless maintain that the statute is overbroad and purports to reach protected, as well as unprotected conduct, and must therefore be struck down on its face and held to be incapable of any constitutional application. We do not believe that the overbreadth doctrine may appropriately be invoked in this manner here.x x x xThe consequence of our departure from traditional rules of standing in the First Amendment area is that any enforcement of a statute thus placed at issue is totally forbidden until and unless a limiting construction or partial invalidation so narrows it as to remove the seeming threat or deterrence to constitutionally protected expression. Application of the overbreadth doctrine in this manner is, manifestly, strong medicine. It has been employed by the Court sparingly and only as a last resort. x x xx x x But the plain import of our cases is, at the very least, that facial over-breadth adjudication is an exception to our traditional rules of practice and that its function, a limited one at the outset, attenuates as the otherwise unprotected behavior that it forbids the State to sanction moves from ‘pure speech’ toward conduct and that conduct-even if expressive-falls within the scope of otherwise valid criminal laws that reflect legitimate state interests in maintaining comprehensive controls over harmful, constitutionally unprotected conduct. Although such laws, if too broadly worded, may deter protected speech to some unknown extent, there comes a point where that effect-at best a prediction-cannot, with confidence, justify invalidating a statute on its face and so prohibiting a State from enforcing the statute against conduct that is admittedly within its power to proscribe. To put the matter another way, particularly where conduct and not merely speech is involved, we believe that the overbreadth of a statute must not only be real, but substantial as well, judged in relation to the statute's plainly legitimate sweep. It is our view that s 818 is not substantially overbroad and that whatever overbreadth may exist should be cured through case-by-case analysis of the fact situations to which its sanctions, assertedly, may not be applied.

Unlike ordinary breach-of-the peace statutes or other broad regulatory acts, s 818 is directed, by its terms, at political expression which if engaged in by private persons would plainly be protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments. But at the same time, s 818 is not a censorial statute, directed at particular groups or viewpoints. The statute, rather, seeks to regulate political activity in an even-handed and neutral manner. As indicted, such statutes have in the past been subject to a less exacting overbreadth scrutiny. Moreover, the fact remains that s 818 regulates a substantial spectrum of conduct that is as manifestly subject to state regulation as the public peace or criminal trespass. This much was established in United Public Workers v. Mitchell, and has been unhesitatingly reaffirmed today in Letter Carriers. Under the decision in Letter Carriers, there is no question that s 818 is valid at least insofar as it forbids classified employees from: soliciting contributions for partisan candidates, political parties, or other partisan political purposes; becoming members of national, state, or local committees of political parties, or officers or committee members in partisan political clubs, or candidates for any paid public office; taking part in the management or affairs of any political party's partisan political campaign; serving as delegates or alternates to caucuses or conventions of political parties; addressing or taking an active part in partisan political rallies or meetings; soliciting votes or assisting voters at the polls or helping in a partisan effort to get voters to the polls; participating in the distribution of partisan campaign literature; initiating or circulating partisan nominating petitions; or riding in caravans for any political party or partisan political candidate.

x x x It may be that such restrictions are impermissible and that s 818 may be susceptible of some other improper applications. But, as presently construed, we do not believe that s 818 must be discarded in toto because some persons’ arguably protected conduct may or may not be caught or chilled by the statute. Section 818 is not substantially overbroad and it not, therefore, unconstitutional on its face. (italics supplied)

It bears stressing that, in his Dissenting Opinion, Mr. Justice Nachura does not deny the principles enunciated in Letter Carriers and Broadrick. He would hold, nonetheless, that these cases cannot be interpreted to mean a reversal of Mancuso, since they "pertain to different types of laws and were decided based on a different set of facts," viz.:In Letter Carriers, the plaintiffs alleged that the Civil Service Commission was enforcing, or threatening to enforce, the Hatch Act’s prohibition against "active participation in political management or political campaigns." The plaintiffs desired to campaign for candidates for public office, to encourage and get federal employees to run for state and local offices, to participate as delegates in party conventions, and to hold office in a political club.

In Broadrick, the appellants sought the invalidation for being vague and overbroad a provision in the (sic) Oklahoma’s Merit System of Personnel Administration Act restricting the political activities of the State’s classified civil servants, in much the same manner as the Hatch Act proscribed partisan political activities of federal employees. Prior to the commencement of the action, the appellants actively participated in the 1970 reelection campaign of their superior, and were administratively charged for asking other Corporation Commission

employees to do campaign work or to give referrals to persons who might help in the campaign, for soliciting money for the campaign, and for receiving and distributing campaign posters in bulk.

Mancuso, on the other hand, involves, as aforesaid, an automatic resignation provision. Kenneth Mancuso, a full time police officer and classified civil service employee of the City of Cranston, filed as a candidate for nomination as representative to the Rhode Island General Assembly. The Mayor of Cranston then began the process of enforcing the resign-to-run provision of the City Home Rule Charter.

Clearly, as the above-cited US cases pertain to different types of laws and were decided based on a different set of facts, Letter Carriers and Broadrick cannot be interpreted to mean a reversal of Mancuso. x x x (italics in the original)We hold, however, that his position is belied by a plain reading of these cases. Contrary to his claim, Letter Carriers, Broadrick and Mancuso all concerned the constitutionality of resign-to-run laws, viz.:(1) Mancuso involved a civil service employee who filed as a candidate for nomination as representative to the Rhode Island General Assembly. He assailed the constitutionality of §14.09(c) of the City Home Rule Charter, which prohibits "continuing in the classified service of the city after becoming a candidate for nomination or election to any public office."(2) Letter Carriers involved plaintiffs who alleged that the Civil Service Commission was enforcing, or threatening to enforce, the Hatch Act’s prohibition against "active participation in political management or political campaigns"63

with respect to certain defined activities in which they desired to engage. The plaintiffs relevant to this discussion are:(a) The National Association of Letter Carriers, which alleged that its members were desirous of, among others, running in local elections for offices such as school board member, city council member or mayor;(b) Plaintiff Gee, who alleged that he desired to, but did not, file as a candidate for the office of Borough Councilman in his local community for fear that his participation in a partisan election would endanger his job; and(c) Plaintiff Myers, who alleged that he desired to run as a Republican candidate in the 1971 partisan election for the mayor of West Lafayette, Indiana, and that he would do so except for fear of losing his job by reason of violation of the Hatch Act.

The Hatch Act defines "active participation in political management or political campaigns" by cross-referring to the rules made by the Civil Service Commission. The rule pertinent to our inquiry states:30. Candidacy for local office: Candidacy for a nomination or for election to any National, State, county, or municipal office is not permissible. The prohibition against political activity extends not merely to formal announcement of candidacy but also to the preliminaries leading to such announcement and to canvassing or soliciting support or doing or permitting to be done any act in furtherance of candidacy. The fact that candidacy, is merely passive is immaterial; if an employee acquiesces in the efforts of friends in furtherance of such candidacy such acquiescence constitutes an infraction of the prohibitions against political activity. (italics supplied)

Section 9(b) requires the immediate removal of violators and forbids the use of appropriated funds thereafter to pay compensation to these persons.64

(3) Broadrick was a class action brought by certain Oklahoma state employees seeking a declaration of unconstitutionality of two sub-paragraphs of Section 818 of Oklahoma’s Merit System of Personnel Administration Act. Section 818 (7), the paragraph relevant to this discussion, states that "[n]o employee in the classified service shall be … a candidate for nomination or election to any paid public office…" Violation of Section 818 results in dismissal from employment, possible criminal sanctions and limited state employment ineligibility.

Consequently, it cannot be denied that Letter Carriers and Broadrick effectively overruled Mancuso. By no stretch of the imagination could Mancuso still be held operative, as Letter Carriers and Broadrick (i) concerned virtually identical resign-to-run laws, and (ii) were decided by a superior court, the United States Supreme Court. It was thus not surprising for the First Circuit Court of Appeals – the same court that decided Mancuso – to hold categorically and emphatically in Magill v. Lynch65 that Mancuso is no longer good law. As we priorly explained:Magill involved Pawtucket, Rhode Island firemen who ran for city office in 1975. Pawtucket’s "Little Hatch Act" prohibits city employees from engaging in a broad range of political activities. Becoming a candidate for any city office is specifically proscribed,66 the violation being punished by removal from office or immediate dismissal. The firemen brought an action against the city officials on the ground that that the provision of the city charter was unconstitutional. However, the court, fully cognizant of Letter Carriers and Broadrick, took the position that Mancuso had since lost considerable vitality. It observed that the view that political candidacy was a fundamental

interest which could be infringed upon only if less restrictive alternatives were not available, was a position which was no longer viable, since the Supreme Court (finding that the government’s interest in regulating both the conduct and speech of its employees differed significantly from its interest in regulating those of the citizenry in general) had given little weight to the argument that prohibitions against the coercion of government employees were a less drastic means to the same end, deferring to the judgment of Congress, and applying a "balancing" test to determine whether limits on political activity by public employees substantially served government interests which were "important" enough to outweigh the employees’ First Amendment rights.67

It must be noted that the Court of Appeals ruled in this manner even though the election in Magill was characterized as nonpartisan, as it was reasonable for the city to fear, under the circumstances of that case, that politically active bureaucrats might use their official power to help political friends and hurt political foes. Ruled the court:The question before us is whether Pawtucket's charter provision, which bars a city employee's candidacy in even a nonpartisan city election, is constitutional. The issue compels us to extrapolate two recent Supreme Court decisions, Civil Service Comm'n v. Nat'l Ass'n of Letter Carriers and Broadrick v. Oklahoma. Both dealt with laws barring civil servants from partisan political activity. Letter Carriers reaffirmed United Public Workers v. Mitchell, upholding the constitutionality of the Hatch Act as to federal employees. Broadrick sustained Oklahoma's "Little Hatch Act" against constitutional attack, limiting its holding to Oklahoma's construction that the Act barred only activity in partisan politics. In Mancuso v. Taft, we assumed that proscriptions of candidacy in nonpartisan elections would not be constitutional. Letter Carriers and Broadrick compel new analysis.x x x xWhat we are obligated to do in this case, as the district court recognized, is to apply the Court’s interest balancing approach to the kind of nonpartisan election revealed in this record. We believe that the district court found more residual vigor in our opinion in Mancuso v. Taft than remains after Letter Carriers. We have particular reference to our view that political candidacy was a fundamental interest which could be trenched upon only if less restrictive alternatives were not available. While this approach may still be viable for citizens who are not government employees, the Court in Letter Carriers recognized that the government's interest in regulating both the conduct and speech of its employees differs significantly from its interest in regulating those of the citizenry in general. Not only was United Public Workers v. Mitchell "unhesitatingly" reaffirmed, but the Court gave little weight to the argument that prohibitions against the coercion of government employees were a less drastic means to the same end, deferring to the judgment of the Congress. We cannot be more precise than the Third Circuit in characterizing the Court's approach as "some sort of 'balancing' process".68 It appears that the government may place limits on campaigning by public employees if the limits substantially serve government interests that are "important" enough to outweigh the employees' First Amendment rights. x x x (italics supplied)

Upholding thus the constitutionality of the law in question, the Magill court detailed the major governmental interests discussed in Letter Carriers and applied them to the Pawtucket provision as follows:In Letter Carriers[,] the first interest identified by the Court was that of an efficient government, faithful to the Congress rather than to party. The district court discounted this interest, reasoning that candidates in a local election would not likely be committed to a state or national platform. This observation undoubtedly has substance insofar as allegiance to broad policy positions is concerned. But a different kind of possible political intrusion into efficient administration could be thought to threaten municipal government: not into broad policy decisions, but into the particulars of administration favoritism in minute decisions affecting welfare, tax assessments, municipal contracts and purchasing, hiring, zoning, licensing, and inspections. Just as the Court in Letter Carriers identified a second governmental interest in the avoidance of the appearance of "political justice" as to policy, so there is an equivalent interest in avoiding the appearance of political preferment in privileges, concessions, and benefits. The appearance (or reality) of favoritism that the charter's authors evidently feared is not exorcised by the nonpartisan character of the formal election process. Where, as here, party support is a key to successful campaigning, and party rivalry is the norm, the city might reasonably fear that politically active bureaucrats would use their official power to help political friends and hurt political foes. This is not to say that the city's interest in visibly fair and effective administration necessarily justifies a blanket prohibition of all employee campaigning; if parties are not heavily involved in a campaign, the danger of favoritism is less, for neither friend nor foe is as easily identified.

A second major governmental interest identified in Letter Carriers was avoiding the danger of a powerful political machine. The Court had in mind the large and growing federal bureaucracy and its partisan potential. The district court felt this was only a minor threat since parties had no control over nominations. But in fact candidates sought party endorsements, and party endorsements proved to be highly effective both in determining who would emerge from the primary election and who would be elected in the final election. Under the prevailing customs, known

party affiliation and support were highly significant factors in Pawtucket elections. The charter's authors might reasonably have feared that a politically active public work force would give the incumbent party, and the incumbent workers, an unbreakable grasp on the reins of power. In municipal elections especially, the small size of the electorate and the limited powers of local government may inhibit the growth of interest groups powerful enough to outbalance the weight of a partisan work force. Even when nonpartisan issues and candidacies are at stake, isolated government employees may seek to influence voters or their co-workers improperly; but a more real danger is that a central party structure will mass the scattered powers of government workers behind a single party platform or slate. Occasional misuse of the public trust to pursue private political ends is tolerable, especially because the political views of individual employees may balance each other out. But party discipline eliminates this diversity and tends to make abuse systematic. Instead of a handful of employees pressured into advancing their immediate superior's political ambitions, the entire government work force may be expected to turn out for many candidates in every election. In Pawtucket, where parties are a continuing presence in political campaigns, a carefully orchestrated use of city employees in support of the incumbent party's candidates is possible. The danger is scarcely lessened by the openness of Pawtucket's nominating procedure or the lack of party labels on its ballots.

The third area of proper governmental interest in Letter Carriers was ensuring that employees achieve advancement on their merits and that they be free from both coercion and the prospect of favor from political activity. The district court did not address this factor, but looked only to the possibility of a civil servant using his position to influence voters, and held this to be no more of a threat than in the most nonpartisan of elections. But we think that the possibility of coercion of employees by superiors remains as strong a factor in municipal elections as it was in Letter Carriers. Once again, it is the systematic and coordinated exploitation of public servants for political ends that a legislature is most likely to see as the primary threat of employees' rights. Political oppression of public employees will be rare in an entirely nonpartisan system. Some superiors may be inclined to ride herd on the politics of their employees even in a nonpartisan context, but without party officials looking over their shoulders most supervisors will prefer to let employees go their own ways.

In short, the government may constitutionally restrict its employees' participation in nominally nonpartisan elections if political parties play a large role in the campaigns. In the absence of substantial party involvement, on the other hand, the interests identified by the Letter Carriers Court lose much of their force. While the employees' First Amendment rights would normally outbalance these diminished interests, we do not suggest that they would always do so. Even when parties are absent, many employee campaigns might be thought to endanger at least one strong public interest, an interest that looms larger in the context of municipal elections than it does in the national elections considered in Letter Carriers. The city could reasonably fear the prospect of a subordinate running directly against his superior or running for a position that confers great power over his superior. An employee of a federal agency who seeks a Congressional seat poses less of a direct challenge to the command and discipline of his agency than a fireman or policeman who runs for mayor or city council. The possibilities of internal discussion, cliques, and political bargaining, should an employee gather substantial political support, are considerable. (citations omitted)

The court, however, remanded the case to the district court for further proceedings in respect of the petitioners’ overbreadth charge. Noting that invalidating a statute for being overbroad is "not to be taken lightly, much less to be taken in the dark," the court held:The governing case is Broadrick, which introduced the doctrine of "substantial" overbreadth in a closely analogous case. Under Broadrick, when one who challenges a law has engaged in constitutionally unprotected conduct (rather than unprotected speech) and when the challenged law is aimed at unprotected conduct, "the overbreadth of a statute must not only be real, but substantial as well, judged in relation to the statute's plainly legitimate sweep." Two major uncertainties attend the doctrine: how to distinguish speech from conduct, and how to define "substantial" overbreadth. We are spared the first inquiry by Broadrick itself. The plaintiffs in that case had solicited support for a candidate, and they were subject to discipline under a law proscribing a wide range of activities, including soliciting contributions for political candidates and becoming a candidate. The Court found that this combination required a substantial overbreadth approach. The facts of this case are so similar that we may reach the same result without worrying unduly about the sometimes opaque distinction between speech and conduct.

The second difficulty is not so easily disposed of. Broadrick found no substantial overbreadth in a statute restricting partisan campaigning. Pawtucket has gone further, banning participation in nonpartisan campaigns as well. Measuring the substantiality of a statute's overbreadth apparently requires, inter alia, a rough balancing of the number of valid applications compared to the number of potentially invalid applications. Some sensitivity to reality is needed; an invalid application that is far-fetched does not deserve as much weight as one that is probable. The

question is a matter of degree; it will never be possible to say that a ratio of one invalid to nine valid applications makes a law substantially overbroad. Still, an overbreadth challenger has a duty to provide the court with some idea of the number of potentially invalid applications the statute permits. Often, simply reading the statute in the light of common experience or litigated cases will suggest a number of probable invalid applications. But this case is different. Whether the statute is overbroad depends in large part on the number of elections that are insulated from party rivalry yet closed to Pawtucket employees. For all the record shows, every one of the city, state, or federal elections in Pawtucket is actively contested by political parties. Certainly the record suggests that parties play a major role even in campaigns that often are entirely nonpartisan in other cities. School committee candidates, for example, are endorsed by the local Democratic committee.

The state of the record does not permit us to find overbreadth; indeed such a step is not to be taken lightly, much less to be taken in the dark. On the other hand, the entire focus below, in the short period before the election was held, was on the constitutionality of the statute as applied. Plaintiffs may very well feel that further efforts are not justified, but they should be afforded the opportunity to demonstrate that the charter forecloses access to a significant number of offices, the candidacy for which by municipal employees would not pose the possible threats to government efficiency and integrity which Letter Carriers, as we have interpreted it, deems significant. Accordingly, we remand for consideration of plaintiffs' overbreadth claim. (italics supplied, citations omitted)

Clearly, Letter Carriers, Broadrick, and Magill demonstrate beyond doubt that Mancuso v. Taft, heavily relied upon by the ponencia, has effectively been overruled.69 As it is no longer good law, the ponencia’s exhortation that "[since] the Americans, from whom we copied the provision in question, had already stricken down a similar measure for being unconstitutional[,] it is high-time that we, too, should follow suit" is misplaced and unwarranted.70

Accordingly, our assailed Decision’s submission that the right to run for public office is "inextricably linked" with two fundamental freedoms – those of expression and association – lies on barren ground. American case law has in fact never recognized a fundamental right to express one’s political views through candidacy, 71 as to invoke a rigorous standard of review.72 Bart v. Telford73 pointedly stated that "[t]he First Amendment does not in terms confer a right to run for public office, and this court has held that it does not do so by implication either." Thus, one’s interest in seeking office, by itself, is not entitled to constitutional protection.74 Moreover, one cannot bring one’s action under the rubric of freedom of association, absent any allegation that, by running for an elective position, one is advancing the political ideas of a particular set of voters.75

Prescinding from these premises, it is crystal clear that the provisions challenged in the case at bar, are not violative of the equal protection clause. The deemed-resigned provisions substantially serve governmental interests (i.e., (i) efficient civil service faithful to the government and the people rather than to party; (ii) avoidance of the appearance of "political justice" as to policy; (iii) avoidance of the danger of a powerful political machine; and (iv) ensuring that employees achieve advancement on their merits and that they be free from both coercion and the prospect of favor from political activity). These are interests that are important enough to outweigh the non-fundamental right of appointive officials and employees to seek elective office.

En passant, we find it quite ironic that Mr. Justice Nachura cites Clements v. Fashing 76 and Morial, et al. v. Judiciary Commission of the State of Louisiana, et al.77 to buttress his dissent. Maintaining that resign-to-run provisions are valid only when made applicable to specified officials, he explains:…U.S. courts, in subsequent cases, sustained the constitutionality of resign-to-run provisions when applied to specified or particular officials, as distinguished from all others,78 under a classification that is germane to the purposes of the law. These resign-to-run legislations were not expressed in a general and sweeping provision, and thus did not violate the test of being germane to the purpose of the law, the second requisite for a valid classification. Directed, as they were, to particular officials, they were not overly encompassing as to be overbroad. (emphasis in the original)

This reading is a regrettable misrepresentation of Clements and Morial. The resign-to-run provisions in these cases were upheld not because they referred to specified or particular officials (vis-à-vis a general class); the questioned provisions were found valid precisely because the Court deferred to legislative judgment and found that a regulation is not devoid of a rational predicate simply because it happens to be incomplete. In fact, the equal protection challenge in Clements revolved around the claim that the State of Texas failed to explain why some public officials are subject to the resign-to-run provisions, while others are not. Ruled the United States Supreme Court:Article XVI, § 65, of the Texas Constitution provides that the holders of certain offices automatically resign their

positions if they become candidates for any other elected office, unless the unexpired portion of the current term is one year or less. The burdens that § 65 imposes on candidacy are even less substantial than those imposed by § 19. The two provisions, of course, serve essentially the same state interests. The District Court found § 65 deficient, however, not because of the nature or extent of the provision's restriction on candidacy, but because of the manner in which the offices are classified. According to the District Court, the classification system cannot survive equal protection scrutiny, because Texas has failed to explain sufficiently why some elected public officials are subject to § 65 and why others are not. As with the case of § 19, we conclude that § 65 survives a challenge under the Equal Protection Clause unless appellees can show that there is no rational predicate to the classification scheme.

The history behind § 65 shows that it may be upheld consistent with the "one step at a time" approach that this Court has undertaken with regard to state regulation not subject to more vigorous scrutiny than that sanctioned by the traditional principles. Section 65 was enacted in 1954 as a transitional provision applying only to the 1954 election. Section 65 extended the terms of those offices enumerated in the provision from two to four years. The provision also staggered the terms of other offices so that at least some county and local offices would be contested at each election. The automatic resignation proviso to § 65 was not added until 1958. In that year, a similar automatic resignation provision was added in Art. XI, § 11, which applies to officeholders in home rule cities who serve terms longer than two years. Section 11 allows home rule cities the option of extending the terms of municipal offices from two to up to four years.

Thus, the automatic resignation provision in Texas is a creature of the State's electoral reforms of 1958. That the State did not go further in applying the automatic resignation provision to those officeholders whose terms were not extended by § 11 or § 65, absent an invidious purpose, is not the sort of malfunctioning of the State's lawmaking process forbidden by the Equal Protection Clause. A regulation is not devoid of a rational predicate simply because it happens to be incomplete. The Equal Protection Clause does not forbid Texas to restrict one elected officeholder's candidacy for another elected office unless and until it places similar restrictions on other officeholders. The provision's language and its history belie any notion that § 65 serves the invidious purpose of denying access to the political process to identifiable classes of potential candidates. (citations omitted and italics supplied)

Furthermore, it is unfortunate that the dissenters took the Morial line that "there is no blanket approval of restrictions on the right of public employees to become candidates for public office" out of context. A correct reading of that line readily shows that the Court only meant to confine its ruling to the facts of that case, as each equal protection challenge would necessarily have to involve weighing governmental interests vis-à-vis the specific prohibition assailed. The Court held:The interests of public employees in free expression and political association are unquestionably entitled to the protection of the first and fourteenth amendments. Nothing in today's decision should be taken to imply that public employees may be prohibited from expressing their private views on controversial topics in a manner that does not interfere with the proper performance of their public duties. In today's decision, there is no blanket approval of restrictions on the right of public employees to become candidates for public office. Nor do we approve any general restrictions on the political and civil rights of judges in particular. Our holding is necessarily narrowed by the methodology employed to reach it. A requirement that a state judge resign his office prior to becoming a candidate for non-judicial office bears a reasonably necessary relation to the achievement of the state's interest in preventing the actuality or appearance of judicial impropriety. Such a requirement offends neither the first amendment's guarantees of free expression and association nor the fourteenth amendment's guarantee of equal protection of the laws. (italics supplied)

Indeed, the Morial court even quoted Broadrick and stated that:In any event, the legislature must have some leeway in determining which of its employment positions require restrictions on partisan political activities and which may be left unregulated. And a State can hardly be faulted for attempting to limit the positions upon which such restrictions are placed. (citations omitted)

V.Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678, Section 13 of RA 9369, and Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code Do Not Suffer from Overbreadth

Apart from nullifying Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678, Section 13 of RA 9369, and Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code on equal protection ground, our assailed Decision struck them down for being overbroad in two

respects, viz.:(1) The assailed provisions limit the candidacy of all civil servants holding appointive posts without due regard for the type of position being held by the employee seeking an elective post and the degree of influence that may be attendant thereto;79 and(2) The assailed provisions limit the candidacy of any and all civil servants holding appointive positions without due regard for the type of office being sought, whether it be partisan or nonpartisan in character, or in the national, municipal or barangay level.

Again, on second look, we have to revise our assailed Decision.i. Limitation on Candidacy Regardless of Incumbent Appointive Official’s Position, ValidAccording to the assailed Decision, the challenged provisions of law are overly broad because they apply indiscriminately to all civil servants holding appointive posts, without due regard for the type of position being held by the employee running for elective office and the degree of influence that may be attendant thereto.

Its underlying assumption appears to be that the evils sought to be prevented are extant only when the incumbent appointive official running for elective office holds an influential post.

Such a myopic view obviously fails to consider a different, yet equally plausible, threat to the government posed by the partisan potential of a large and growing bureaucracy: the danger of systematic abuse perpetuated by a "powerful political machine" that has amassed "the scattered powers of government workers" so as to give itself and its incumbent workers an "unbreakable grasp on the reins of power."80 As elucidated in our prior exposition:81

Attempts by government employees to wield influence over others or to make use of their respective positions (apparently) to promote their own candidacy may seem tolerable – even innocuous – particularly when viewed in isolation from other similar attempts by other government employees. Yet it would be decidedly foolhardy to discount the equally (if not more) realistic and dangerous possibility that such seemingly disjointed attempts, when taken together, constitute a veiled effort on the part of an emerging central party structure to advance its own agenda through a "carefully orchestrated use of [appointive and/or elective] officials" coming from various levels of the bureaucracy.

…[T]he avoidance of such a "politically active public work force" which could give an emerging political machine an "unbreakable grasp on the reins of power" is reason enough to impose a restriction on the candidacies of all appointive public officials without further distinction as to the type of positions being held by such employees or the degree of influence that may be attendant thereto. (citations omitted)

ii. Limitation on Candidacy Regardless of Type of Office Sought, ValidThe assailed Decision also held that the challenged provisions of law are overly broad because they are made to apply indiscriminately to all civil servants holding appointive offices, without due regard for the type of elective office being sought, whether it be partisan or nonpartisan in character, or in the national, municipal or barangay level.

This erroneous ruling is premised on the assumption that "the concerns of a truly partisan office and the temptations it fosters are sufficiently different from those involved in an office removed from regular party politics [so as] to warrant distinctive treatment,"82 so that restrictions on candidacy akin to those imposed by the challenged provisions can validly apply only to situations in which the elective office sought is partisan in character. To the extent, therefore, that such restrictions are said to preclude even candidacies for nonpartisan elective offices, the challenged restrictions are to be considered as overbroad.

Again, a careful study of the challenged provisions and related laws on the matter will show that the alleged overbreadth is more apparent than real. Our exposition on this issue has not been repudiated, viz.:A perusal of Resolution 8678 will immediately disclose that the rules and guidelines set forth therein refer to the filing of certificates of candidacy and nomination of official candidates of registered political parties, in connection with the May 10, 2010 National and Local Elections.83 Obviously, these rules and guidelines, including the restriction in Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678, were issued specifically for purposes of the May 10, 2010 National and Local Elections, which, it must be noted, are decidedly partisan in character. Thus, it is clear that the restriction in Section 4(a) of RA 8678 applies only to the candidacies of appointive officials vying for partisan elective posts in the May 10, 2010 National and Local Elections. On this score, the overbreadth challenge leveled against Section 4(a) is clearly unsustainable.

Similarly, a considered review of Section 13 of RA 9369 and Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, in conjunction with other related laws on the matter, will confirm that these provisions are likewise not intended to apply to elections for nonpartisan public offices.

The only elections which are relevant to the present inquiry are the elections for barangay offices, since these are the only elections in this country which involve nonpartisan public offices.84

In this regard, it is well to note that from as far back as the enactment of the Omnibus Election Code in 1985, Congress has intended that these nonpartisan barangay elections be governed by special rules, including a separate rule on deemed resignations which is found in Section 39 of the Omnibus Election Code. Said provision states:Section 39. Certificate of Candidacy. – No person shall be elected punong barangay or kagawad ng sangguniang barangay unless he files a sworn certificate of candidacy in triplicate on any day from the commencement of the election period but not later than the day before the beginning of the campaign period in a form to be prescribed by the Commission. The candidate shall state the barangay office for which he is a candidate.

x x x xAny elective or appointive municipal, city, provincial or national official or employee, or those in the civil or military service, including those in government-owned or-controlled corporations, shall be considered automatically resigned upon the filing of certificate of candidacy for a barangay office.

Since barangay elections are governed by a separate deemed resignation rule, under the present state of law, there would be no occasion to apply the restriction on candidacy found in Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, and later reiterated in the proviso of Section 13 of RA 9369, to any election other than a partisan one. For this reason, the overbreadth challenge raised against Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code and the pertinent proviso in Section 13 of RA 9369 must also fail. 85

In any event, even if we were to assume, for the sake of argument, that Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code and the corresponding provision in Section 13 of RA 9369 are general rules that apply also to elections for nonpartisan public offices, the overbreadth challenge would still be futile. Again, we explained:In the first place, the view that Congress is limited to controlling only partisan behavior has not received judicial imprimatur, because the general proposition of the relevant US cases on the matter is simply that the government has an interest in regulating the conduct and speech of its employees that differs significantly from those it possesses in connection with regulation of the speech of the citizenry in general.86

Moreover, in order to have a statute declared as unconstitutional or void on its face for being overly broad, particularly where, as in this case, "conduct" and not "pure speech" is involved, the overbreadth must not only be real, but substantial as well, judged in relation to the statute’s plainly legitimate sweep.87

In operational terms, measuring the substantiality of a statute’s overbreadth would entail, among other things, a rough balancing of the number of valid applications compared to the number of potentially invalid applications.88 In this regard, some sensitivity to reality is needed; an invalid application that is far-fetched does not deserve as much weight as one that is probable.89 The question is a matter of degree.90 Thus, assuming for the sake of argument that the partisan-nonpartisan distinction is valid and necessary such that a statute which fails to make this distinction is susceptible to an overbreadth attack, the overbreadth challenge presently mounted must demonstrate or provide this Court with some idea of the number of potentially invalid elections (i.e. the number of elections that were insulated from party rivalry but were nevertheless closed to appointive employees) that may in all probability result from the enforcement of the statute.91

The state of the record, however, does not permit us to find overbreadth. Borrowing from the words of Magill v. Lynch, indeed, such a step is not to be taken lightly, much less to be taken in the dark, 92 especially since an overbreadth finding in this case would effectively prohibit the State from ‘enforcing an otherwise valid measure against conduct that is admittedly within its power to proscribe.’93

This Court would do well to proceed with tiptoe caution, particularly when it comes to the application of the overbreadth doctrine in the analysis of statutes that purportedly attempt to restrict or burden the exercise of the right to freedom of speech, for such approach is manifestly strong medicine that must be used sparingly, and only

as a last resort.94

In the United States, claims of facial overbreadth have been entertained only where, in the judgment of the court, the possibility that protected speech of others may be muted and perceived grievances left to fester (due to the possible inhibitory effects of overly broad statutes) outweighs the possible harm to society in allowing some unprotected speech or conduct to go unpunished.95 Facial overbreadth has likewise not been invoked where a limiting construction could be placed on the challenged statute, and where there are readily apparent constructions that would cure, or at least substantially reduce, the alleged overbreadth of the statute.96

In the case at bar, the probable harm to society in permitting incumbent appointive officials to remain in office, even as they actively pursue elective posts, far outweighs the less likely evil of having arguably protected candidacies blocked by the possible inhibitory effect of a potentially overly broad statute.

In this light, the conceivably impermissible applications of the challenged statutes – which are, at best, bold predictions – cannot justify invalidating these statutes in toto and prohibiting the State from enforcing them against conduct that is, and has for more than 100 years been, unquestionably within its power and interest to proscribe.97

Instead, the more prudent approach would be to deal with these conceivably impermissible applications through case-by-case adjudication rather than through a total invalidation of the statute itself.

Indeed, the anomalies spawned by our assailed Decision have taken place. In his Motion for Reconsideration, intervenor Drilon stated that a number of high-ranking Cabinet members had already filed their Certificates of Candidacy without relinquishing their posts.99 Several COMELEC election officers had likewise filed their Certificates of Candidacy in their respective provinces.100 Even the Secretary of Justice had filed her certificate of substitution for representative of the first district of Quezon province last December 14, 2009 101 – even as her position as Justice Secretary includes supervision over the City and Provincial Prosecutors,102 who, in turn, act as Vice-Chairmen of the respective Boards of Canvassers.103 The Judiciary has not been spared, for a Regional Trial Court Judge in the South has thrown his hat into the political arena. We cannot allow the tilting of our electoral playing field in their favor.For the foregoing reasons, we now rule that Section 4(a) of Resolution 8678 and Section 13 of RA 9369, which merely reiterate Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, are not unconstitutionally overbroad.

IN VIEW WHEREOF, the Court RESOLVES to GRANT the respondent’s and the intervenors’ Motions for Reconsideration; REVERSE and SET ASIDE this Court’s December 1, 2009 Decision; DISMISS the Petition; and ISSUE this Resolution declaring as not UNCONSTITUTIONAL (1) Section 4(a) of COMELEC Resolution No. 8678, (2) the second proviso in the third paragraph of Section 13 of Republic Act No. 9369, and (3) Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code.

SO ORDERED.

G.R. No. 193261               April 24, 2012MEYNARDO SABILI, Petitioner,

vs.COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS and FLORENCIO LIBREA, Respondents.

D E C I S I O N

SERENO, J.:Before us is a Petition for Certiorari under Rule 64 in relation to Rule 65 of the Rules of Court, seeking to annul the Resolutions in SPA No. 09-047 (DC) dated 26 January 2010 and 17 August 2010 of the Commission on Elections (COMELEC), which denied due course to and canceled the Certificate of Candidacy (COC) of petitioner Meynardo Sabili (petitioner) for the position of Mayor of Lipa City for the May 2010 elections. At the heart of the controversy is whether petitioner Sabili had complied with the one-year residency requirement for local elective officials.

When petitioner filed his COC1 for mayor of Lipa City for the 2010 elections, he stated therein that he had been a resident of the city for two (2) years and eight (8) months. Prior to the 2010 elections, he had been twice elected (in 1995 and in 1998) as Provincial Board Member representing the 4th District of Batangas. During the 2007 elections, petitioner ran for the position of Representative of the 4th District of Batangas, but lost. The 4th District of Batangas includes Lipa City.2 However, it is undisputed that when petitioner filed his COC during the 2007 elections, he and his family were then staying at his ancestral home in Barangay (Brgy.) Sico, San Juan, Batangas.

Private respondent Florencio Librea (private respondent) filed a "Petition to Deny Due Course and to Cancel Certificate of Candidacy and to Disqualify a Candidate for Possessing Some Grounds for Disqualification" 3 against him before the COMELEC, docketed as SPA No. 09-047 (DC). Citing Section 78 in relation to Section 74 of the Omnibus Election Code,4 private respondent alleged that petitioner made material misrepresentations of fact in the latter’s COC and likewise failed to comply with the one-year residency requirement under Section 39 of the Local Government Code. 5 Allegedly, petitioner falsely declared under oath in his COC that he had already been a resident of Lipa City for two years and eight months prior to the scheduled 10 May 2010 local elections.

In support of his allegation, private respondent presented the following:1. Petitioner’s COC for the 2010 elections filed on 1 December 20096

2. 2009 Tax Declarations for a house and lot (TCT Nos. 173355, 173356 and buildings thereon) in Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City registered under the name of Bernadette Palomares, petitioner’s common-law wife7

3. Lipa City Assessor Certification of Property Holdings of properties under the name of Bernadette Palomares8

4. Affidavit executed by private respondent Florencio Librea9

5. Sinumpaang Salaysay executed by Eladio de Torres10

6. Voter Certification on petitioner issued by COMELEC Election Officer Juan D. Aguila, Jr.11

7. 1997 Voter Registration Record of petitioner12

8. National Statistics Office (NSO) Advisory on Marriages regarding petitioner13

9. Lipa City Assessor Certificate of No Improvement on Block 2, Lot 3, Brgy. Lood, Lipa City registered in the name of petitioner14

10. NSO Certificate of No Marriage of Bernadette Palomares15

11. Lipa City Assessor Certificate of No Improvement on Block 2, Lot 5, Brgy. Lood, Lipa City registered in the name of petitioner16

12. Lipa City Permits and Licensing Office Certification that petitioner has no business therein17

13. Apparent printout of a Facebook webpage of petitioner’s daughter, Mey Bernadette Sabili18

14. Department of Education (DepEd) Lipa City Division Certification that the names Bernadette Palomares, Mey Bernadette Sabili and Francis Meynard Sabili (petitioner’s son) do not appear on its list of graduates19

15. Certification from the Office of the Election Officer of Lipa City that Bernadette Palomares, Mey Bernadette Sabili and Francis Meynard Sabili do not appear in its list of voters20

16. Affidavit executed by Violeta Fernandez21

17. Affidavit executed by Rodrigo Macasaet22

18. Affidavit Executed by Pablo Lorzano23

19. Petitioner’s 2007 COC for Member of House of Representative24

For ease of later discussion, private respondent’s evidence shall be grouped as follows: (1) Certificates regarding ownership of real property; (2) petitioner’s Voter Registration and Certification (common exhibits of the parties); (3) petitioner’s COCs in previous elections; (3) Certifications regarding petitioner’s family members; and (4) Affidavits of Lipa City residents.

On the other hand, petitioner presented the following evidence to establish the fact of his residence in Lipa City:1. Affidavit executed by Bernadette Palomares25

2. Birth Certificate of Francis Meynard Sabili26

3. Affidavit of Leonila Suarez (Suarez)27

4. Certification of Residency issued by Pinagtong-ulan Barangay Captain, Dominador Honrade28

5. Affidavit executed by Rosalinda Macasaet29

6. Certificate of Appreciation issued to petitioner by the parish of Sto. Nino of Pinagtong-ulan30

7. Designation of petitioner in the Advisory Body (AB) of Pinagtong-ulan, San Jose/Lipa City Chapter of Guardians Brotherhood, Inc.31

8. COMELEC Voter Certification on petitioner issued by Election Officer Juan Aguila, Jr.32

9. COMELEC Application for Transfer/Transfer with Reactivation dated 6 June 2009 signed by Election Officer Juan Aguila, Jr.33

10. Petitioner’s Income Tax Return for 200734

11. Official Receipt for petitioner’s income tax payment for 200735

12. Petitioner’s Income Tax Return for 200836

13. Official Receipt for petitioner’s income tax payment for 200837

14. Birth Certificate of Mey Bernadette Sabili38

15. Affidavit executed by Jacinto Cornejo, Sr.39

16. Joint Affidavit of twenty-one (21) Pinagtong-ulan residents, including past and incumbent Pinagtong-ulan officials.40

For ease of later discussion, petitioner’s evidence shall be grouped as follows: (1) his Income Tax Returns and corresponding Official Receipts for the years 2007 and 2008; (2) Certification from the barangay captain of Pinagtong-ulan; (3) Affidavit of his common-law wife, Bernadette Palomares; and (4) Affidavits from a previous property owner, neighbors, Certificate of Appreciation from the barangay parish and Memorandum from the local chapter of Guardians Brotherhood, Inc.

The COMELEC RulingIn its Resolution dated 26 January 2010,41 the COMELEC Second Division granted the Petition of private respondent, declared petitioner as disqualified from seeking the mayoralty post in Lipa City, and canceled his Certificate of Candidacy for his not being a resident of Lipa City and for his failure to meet the statutory one-year residency requirement under the law.

Petitioner moved for reconsideration of the 26 January 2010 Resolution of the COMELEC, during the pendency of which the 10 May 2010 local elections were held. The next day, he was proclaimed the duly elected mayor of Lipa City after garnering the highest number of votes cast for the said position. He accordingly filed a Manifestation 42

with the COMELEC en banc to reflect this fact.

In its Resolution dated 17 August 2010,43 the COMELEC en banc denied the Motion for Reconsideration of petitioner. Although he was able to receive his copy of the Resolution, no prior notice setting the date of promulgation of the said Resolution was received by him. Meanwhile, Section 6 of COMELEC Resolution No. 8696 (Rules on Disqualification Cases Filed in Connection with the May 10, 2012 Automated National and Local Elections) requires the parties to be notified in advance of the date of the promulgation of the Resolution.

SEC. 6. Promulgation. – The promulgation of a Decision or Resolution of the Commission or a Division shall be made on a date previously fixed, notice of which shall be served in advance upon the parties or their attorneys personally, or by registered mail, telegram, fax, or thru the fastest means of communication.

Hence, petitioner filed with this Court a Petition (Petition for Certiorari with Extremely Urgent Application for the Issuance of a Status Quo Order and for the Conduct of a Special Raffle of this Case) under Rule 64 in relation to Rule 65 of the Rules of Court, seeking the annulment of the 26 January 2010 and 17 August 2010 Resolutions of the COMELEC. Petitioner attached to his Petition a Certificate of Canvass of Votes and proclamation of Winning Candidates for Lipa City Mayor and Vice-Mayor issued by the City/Municipal Board of Canvassers,44 as well as a copy of his Oath of Office.45 He also attached to his Petition another Certification of Residency46 issued by Pinagtong-ulan Barangay Captain Dominador Honrade and sworn to before a notary public.On 7 September 2010, this Court issued a Status Quo Ante Order47 requiring the parties to observe the status quo prevailing before the issuance of the assailed COMELEC Resolutions. Thereafter, the parties filed their responsive

pleadings.

IssuesThe following are the issues for resolution:1. Whether the COMELEC acted with grave abuse of discretion when it failed to promulgate its Resolution dated 17 August 2010 in accordance with its own Rules of Procedure; and2. Whether the COMELEC committed grave abuse of discretion in holding that Sabili failed to prove compliance with the one-year residency requirement for local elective officials.

The Court’s Ruling1. On whether the COMELEC acted with grave abuse of discretion when it failed to promulgate its Resolution dated 17 August 2010 in accordance with its own Rules of Procedure

Petitioner argues that the assailed 17 August 2010 COMELEC Resolution, which denied petitioner’s Motion for Reconsideration, is null and void. The Resolution was allegedly not promulgated in accordance with the COMELEC’s own Rules of Procedure and, hence, violated petitioner’s right to due process of law.

The rules governing the Petition for Cancellation of COC in this case is COMELEC Resolution No. 8696 (Rules on Disqualification of Cases Filed in Connection with the May 10, 2010 Automated National and Local Elections), which was promulgated on 11 November 2009. Sections 6 and 7 thereof provide as follows:SEC. 6. Promulgation. - The promulgation of a Decision or Resolution of the Commission or a Division shall be made on a date previously fixed, notice of which shall be served in advance upon the parties or their attorneys personally, or by registered mail, telegram, fax or thru the fastest means of communication.

SEC. 7. Motion for Reconsideration. - A motion to reconsider a Decision, Resolution, Order or Ruling of a Division shall be filed within three (3) days from the promulgation thereof. Such motion, if not pro-forma, suspends the execution for implementation of the Decision, Resolution, Order or Ruling.

Within twenty-four (24) hours from the filing thereof, the Clerk of the Commission shall notify the Presiding Commissioner. The latter shall within two (2) days thereafter certify the case to the Commission en banc.

The Clerk of the Commission shall calendar the Motion for Reconsideration for the resolution of the Commission en banc within three (3) days from the certification thereof.

However, the COMELEC Order dated 4 May 201048 suspended Section 6 of COMELEC Resolution No. 8696 by ordering that "all resolutions be delivered to the Clerk of the Commission for immediate promulgation" in view of "the proximity of the Automated National and Local Elections and lack of material time." The Order states:ORDERConsidering the proximity of the Automated National and Local Elections and lack of material time, the Commission hereby suspends Sec. 6 of Resolution No. 8696 promulgated on November 11, 2009, which reads:Sec. 6. Promulgation. – The promulgation of a Decision or Resolution of the Commission or a Division shall be made on a date previously fixed, notice of which shall be served upon the parties or their attorneys personally, or by registered mail, telegram, fax or thru the fastest means of communication."

Let all resolutions be delivered to the Clerk of the Commission for immediate promulgation.SO ORDERED.

Petitioner claims that he did not receive notice of the said suspension of Section 6 of COMELEC Resolution No. 8696. Thus, his right to due process was still violated. On the other hand, the COMELEC claims that it has the power to suspend its own rules of procedure and invokes Section 6, Article IX-A of the Constitution, which gives it the power "to promulgate its own rules concerning pleadings and practice before it or before any of its offices."

We agree with the COMELEC on this issue.

In Lindo v. Commission on Elections,49 petitioner claimed that there was no valid promulgation of a Decision in an election protest case when a copy thereof was merely furnished the parties, instead of first notifying the parties of a set date for the promulgation thereof, in accordance with Section 20 of Rule 35 of the COMELEC’s own Rules of Procedure, as follows:

Sec. 20. Promulgation and Finality of Decision. — The decision of the court shall be promulgated on a date set by it of which due notice must be given the parties. It shall become final five (5) days after promulgation. No motion for reconsideration shall be entertained.

Rejecting petitioner’s argument, we held therein that the additional rule requiring notice to the parties prior to promulgation of a decision is not part of the process of promulgation. Since lack of such notice does not prejudice the rights of the parties, noncompliance with this rule is a procedural lapse that does not vitiate the validity of the decision. Thus:This contention is untenable. Promulgation is the process by which a decision is published, officially announced, made known to the public or delivered to the clerk of court for filing, coupled with notice to the parties or their counsel (Neria v. Commissioner of Immigration, L-24800, May 27, 1968, 23 SCRA 812). It is the delivery of a court decision to the clerk of court for filing and publication (Araneta v. Dinglasan, 84 Phil. 433). It is the filing of the signed decision with the clerk of court (Sumbing v. Davide, G.R. Nos. 86850-51, July 20, 1989, En Banc Minute Resolution). The additional requirement imposed by the COMELEC rules of notice in advance of promulgation is not part of the process of promulgation. Hence, We do not agree with petitioner’s contention that there was no promulgation of the trial court's decision. The trial court did not deny that it had officially made the decision public. From the recital of facts of both parties, copies of the decision were sent to petitioner's counsel of record and petitioner’s (sic) himself. Another copy was sent to private respondent.

What was wanting and what the petitioner apparently objected to was not the promulgation of the decision but the failure of the trial court to serve notice in advance of the promulgation of its decision as required by the COMELEC rules. The failure to serve such notice in advance of the promulgation may be considered a procedural lapse on the part of the trial court which did not prejudice the rights of the parties and did not vitiate the validity of the decision of the trial court nor (sic) of the promulgation of said decision.

Moreover, quoting Pimping v. COMELEC,50 citing Macabingkil v. Yatco,51 we further held in the same case that failure to receive advance notice of the promulgation of a decision is not sufficient to set aside the COMELEC’s judgment, as long as the parties have been afforded an opportunity to be heard before judgment is rendered, viz:The fact that petitioners were not served notice in advance of the promulgation of the decision in the election protest cases, in Our view, does not constitute reversible error or a reason sufficient enough to compel and warrant the setting aside of the judgment rendered by the Comelec. Petitioners anchor their argument on an alleged denial to them (sic) due process to the deviation by the Comelec from its own made rules. However, the essence of due process is that, the parties in the case were afforded an opportunity to be heard.

In the present case, we read from the COMELEC Order that the exigencies attendant to the holding of the country’s first automated national elections had necessitated that the COMELEC suspend the rule on notice prior to promulgation, and that it instead direct the delivery of all resolutions to the Clerk of the Commission for immediate promulgation. Notably, we see no prejudice to the parties caused thereby. The COMELEC’s Order did not affect the right of the parties to due process. They were still furnished a copy of the COMELEC Decision and were able to reckon the period for perfecting an appeal. In fact, petitioner was able to timely lodge a Petition with this Court.

Clearly, the COMELEC validly exercised its constitutionally granted power to make its own rules of procedure when it issued the 4 May 2010 Order suspending Section 6 of COMELEC Resolution No. 8696. Consequently, the second assailed Resolution of the COMELEC cannot be set aside on the ground of COMELEC’s failure to issue to petitioner a notice setting the date of the promulgation thereof.

2. On whether the COMELEC committed grave abuse of discretion in holding that Sabili failed to prove compliance with the one-year residency requirement for local elective officials

As a general rule, the Court does not ordinarily review the COMELEC’s appreciation and evaluation of evidence. However, exceptions thereto have been established, including when the COMELEC's appreciation and evaluation of evidence become so grossly unreasonable as to turn into an error of jurisdiction. In these instances, the Court is compelled by its bounden constitutional duty to intervene and correct the COMELEC's error.52

In Mitra v. Commission on Elections, (G.R. No. 191938, 2 July 2010), we explained that the COMELEC’s use of wrong or irrelevant considerations in deciding an issue is sufficient to taint its action with grave abuse of discretion -

As a concept, "grave abuse of discretion" defies exact definition; generally, it refers to "capricious or whimsical exercise of judgment as is equivalent to lack of jurisdiction;" the abuse of discretion must be patent and gross as to amount to an evasion of a positive duty or a virtual refusal to perform a duty enjoined by law, or to act at all in contemplation of law, as where the power is exercised in an arbitrary and despotic manner by reason of passion and hostility. Mere abuse of discretion is not enough; it must be grave. We have held, too, that the use of wrong or irrelevant considerations in deciding an issue is sufficient to taint a decision-maker's action with grave abuse of discretion.

Closely related with the limited focus of the present petition is the condition, under Section 5, Rule 64 of the Rules of Court, that findings of fact of the COMELEC, supported by substantial evidence, shall be final and non-reviewable. Substantial evidence is that degree of evidence that a reasonable mind might accept to support a conclusion.

In light of our limited authority to review findings of fact, we do not ordinarily review in a certiorari case the COMELEC's appreciation and evaluation of evidence. Any misstep by the COMELEC in this regard generally involves an error of judgment, not of jurisdiction.

In exceptional cases, however, when the COMELEC's action on the appreciation and evaluation of evidence oversteps the limits of its discretion to the point of being grossly unreasonable, the Court is not only obliged, but has the constitutional duty to intervene. When grave abuse of discretion is present, resulting errors arising from the grave abuse mutate from error of judgment to one of jurisdiction.

Before us, petitioner has alleged and shown the COMELEC’s use of wrong or irrelevant considerations in deciding the issue of whether petitioner made a material misrepresentation of his residency qualification in his COC as to order its cancellation. Among others, petitioner pointed to the COMELEC’s inordinate emphasis on the issue of property ownership of petitioner’s declared residence in Lipa City, its inconsistent stance regarding Palomares’s relationship to the Pinagtong-ulan property, and its failure to consider in the first instance the certification of residence issued by the barangay captain of Pinagtong-ulan. Petitioner bewails that the COMELEC required "more" evidence to show the change in his residence, notwithstanding the various pieces of evidence he presented and the fact that under the law, the quantum of evidence required in these cases is merely substantial evidence and not clear and convincing evidence. Petitioner further ascribes grave abuse of discretion in the COMELEC’s brushing aside of the fact that he has been filing his ITR in Lipa City (where he indicates that he is a resident of Pinagtong-ulan) on the mere expedient that the law allows the filing of the ITR not only in the place of legal residence but, alternately, in his place of business. Petitioner notes that private respondent’s own evidence shows that petitioner has no business in Lipa City, leaving only his residence therein as basis for filing his ITR therein.

Hence, in resolving the issue of whether the COMELEC gravely abused its discretion in ruling that petitioner had not sufficiently shown that he had resided in Lipa City for at least one year prior to the May 2010 elections, we examine the evidence adduced by the parties and the COMELEC’s appreciation thereof.

In the present case, the parties are in agreement that the domicile of origin of Sabili was Brgy. Sico, San Juan, Batangas. He claims that he abandoned his domicile of origin and established his domicile of choice in Brgy. Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City, thereby making him qualified to run for Lipa City mayor. On the other hand, respondent COMELEC held that no such change in domicile or residence took place and, hence, the entry in his Certificate of Candidacy showing that he was a resident of Brgy. Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City constituted a misrepresentation that disqualified him from running for Lipa City mayor.

To establish a new domicile of choice, personal presence in the place must be coupled with conduct indicative of the intention to make it one's fixed and permanent place of abode.53 As in all administrative cases, the quantum of proof necessary in election cases is substantial evidence, or such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind will accept as adequate to support a conclusion.54

The ruling on private respondent’s evidence.We begin with an evaluation of the COMELEC’s appreciation of private respondent’s evidence.

a) Petitioner’s Voter Certification, Registration and COCs in previous electionsPetitioner’s Voter Certification is a common exhibit of the parties. It states, among others, that petitioner is a resident of Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City, Batangas; that he had been a resident of Lipa City for two (2) years and

three (3) months; and that he was so registered on 31 October 2009. The information therein was "certified correct" by COMELEC Election Officer Juan B. Aguila, Jr.

Private respondent presented this document as proof that petitioner misrepresented that he is a resident of Lipa City. On the other hand, the latter presented this document as proof of his residency.

The COMELEC correctly ruled that the Voter Certification issued by the COMELEC Election Officer, Atty. Juan B. Aguila, Jr., was not conclusive proof that petitioner had been a resident of Lipa City since April 2007. It noted that Aguila is not the competent public officer to certify the veracity of this claim, particularly because petitioner’s COMELEC registration was approved only in October 2009.

The Voter Registration Record of petitioner accomplished on 21 June 1997 showing that he was a resident of Sico, San Juan, Batangas, as well as his various COCs dated 21 June 1997 and March 2007 indicating the same thing, were no longer discussed by the COMELEC – and rightly so. These pieces of evidence showing that he was a resident of Sico, San Juan, Batangas on the said dates are irrelevant as, prior to April 2007, petitioner was admittedly a resident of Sico, San Juan Batangas. Rather, the relevant time period for consideration is that from April 2007 onwards, after petitioner’s alleged change of domicile.

b) Certificates regarding ownership of real propertyThe various certificates and tax declarations adduced by private respondent showed that the Lipa property was solely registered in the name of petitioner’s common-law wife, Bernadette Palomares. In discussing the import of this document, the COMELEC reasoned that, being a "seasoned politician," he should have registered the Lipa property (which he claimed to have purchased with his personal funds) in his own name. Such action "would have offered positive proof of intent to change actual residence" from San Juan, Batangas to Lipa City, considering that he had previously declared his ancestral home in San Juan, Batangas as his domicile. Since Palomares and petitioner are common-law spouses not capacitated to marry each other, the property relation between them is governed by Article 148 of the Family Code,55 where only the parties’ actual contributions are recognized. Hence, petitioner cannot prove ownership of a property and residence in Lipa City through the registered ownership of the common-law wife of the property in Lipa City.

On the other hand, petitioner bewails the inordinate emphasis that the COMELEC bestowed upon the question of whether the Lipa property could be considered as his residence, for the reason that it was not registered in his name. He stresses that the issue should be residence, not property ownership.

It is true that property ownership is not among the qualifications required of candidates for local election.56 Rather, it is a candidate’s residence in a locality through actual residence in whatever capacity. Indeed, we sustained the COMELEC when it considered as evidence tending to establish a candidate’s domicile of choice the mere lease (rather than ownership) of an apartment by a candidate in the same province where he ran for the position of governor.57 In the more recent case of Mitra v. Commission on Elections,58 we reversed the COMELEC ruling that a candidate’s sparsely furnished, leased room on the mezzanine of a feedmill could not be considered as his residence for the purpose of complying with the residency requirement of Section 78 of the Omnibus Election Code.59

The Dissent claims that the registration of the property in Palomares’s name does not prove petitioner’s residence as it merely showed "donative intent" without the necessary formalities or payment of taxes.

However, whatever the nature of the transaction might be, this point is immaterial for the purpose of ascertaining petitioner’s residence. We have long held that it is not required that a candidate should have his own house in order to establish his residence or domicile in a place. It is enough that he should live in the locality, even in a rented house or that of a friend or relative.60 What is of central concern then is that petitioner identified and established a place in Lipa City where he intended to live in and return to for an indefinite period of time.

Hence, while the COMELEC correctly ruled that, of itself, Palomares’ ownership of the Lipa property does not prove that she or – and in view of their common-law relations, petitioner – resides in Lipa City, nevertheless, the existence of a house and lot apparently owned by petitioner’s common-law wife, with whom he has been living for over two decades, makes plausible petitioner’s allegation of bodily presence and intent to reside in the area.

c) Certifications regarding the family members of petitioner

Private respondent presented a Certification from the DepEd, Lipa City Division, indicating that the names Bernadette Palomares, Mey Bernadette Sabili (petitioner’s daughter) and Francis Meynard Sabili (petitioner’s son) do not appear on the list of graduates of Lipa City. Private respondent also presented a Certification from the Office of the Election Officer of Lipa City that the names of these family members of petitioner do not appear in its list of voters.

As the issue at hand is petitioner’s residence, and not the educational or voting record of his family, the COMELEC properly did not consider these pieces of evidence in arriving at its Resolution.

The Dissent nevertheless asserts that because his children do not attend educational institutions in Lipa and are not registered voters therein, and because petitioner does not maintain a business therein nor has property in his name, petitioner is unable to show the existence of real and substantial reason for his stay in Lipa City.

As to the Dissent’s first assertion, it must be stressed that the children, like the wife, do not dictate the family domicile. Even in the context of marriage, the family domicile is jointly decided by both husband and wife. 61 In addition, we note that the transfer to Lipa City occurred in 2007, when petitioner’s children were already well into college and could very well have chosen to study elsewhere than in Lipa City.

Also, it is petitioner’s domicile which is at issue, and not that of his children. But even assuming that it was petitioner himself (rather than his children) who attended educational institutions or who registered as a voter in a place other than Lipa City, we have held that "absence from residence to pursue studies or practice a profession or registration as a voter other than in the place where one is elected, does not constitute loss of residence." 62 In fact, Section 117 of the Omnibus Election Code provides that transfer of residence to any other place by reason of one's "occupation; profession; employment in private and public service; educational activities; work in military or naval reservations; service in the army, navy or air force, the constabulary or national police force; or confinement or detention in government institutions in accordance with law" is not deemed as loss of residence.

As to the Dissent’s second assertion, petitioner apparently does not maintain a business in Lipa City. However, apart from the Pinagtong-ulan property which both Suarez (the previous property owner) and Palomares swear was purchased with petitioner’s own funds, the records also indicate that there are two other lots in Lipa City, particularly in Barangay Lodlod, Lipa City63 which are registered jointly in the name of petitioner and Palomares. In fact, it was private respondent who presented the Lipa City Assessor’s Certificate to this effect. Even assuming that this Court were to disregard the two Lodlod lots, it is well-established that property ownership (and similarly, business interest) in the locality where one intends to run for local elective post is not requirement of the Constitution.64

More importantly, we have gone so far as to rule that there is nothing "wrong in an individual changing residences so he could run for an elective post, for as long as he is able to prove with reasonable certainty that he has effected a change of residence for election law purposes for the period required by law."65

d) Affidavits of Lipa City residentsPrivate respondent also presented the affidavits of Violeta Fernandez66 and Rodrigo Macasaet,67 who were also residents of Pinagtong-ulan. Both stated that petitioner did not reside in Pinagtong-ulan, as they had "rarely seen" him in the area. Meanwhile, Pablo Lorzano,68 in his Affidavit, attested that although the Lipa property was sometimes used for gatherings, he did "not recall having seen" petitioner in their barangay. On the other hand, private respondent69 and Eladio de Torres,70 both residents of Brgy. Calamias, reasoned that petitioner was not a resident of Lipa City because he has no work or family there.

The COMELEC did not discuss these Affidavits in its assailed Resolution. It was correct in doing so, particularly considering that these Affidavits were duly controverted by those presented by petitioner.

Moreover, even assuming the truth of the allegation in the Affidavits that petitioner was "rarely seen" in the area, this does not preclude the possibility of his residence therein. In Fernandez v. House of Representatives Electoral Tribunal,71 we held that the averments of certain barangay health workers – that they failed to see a particular candidate whenever they made rounds of the locality of which he was supposed to be a resident – is of no moment. It is possible that the candidate was out of the house to attend to his own business at the time. The law does not require a person to be in his home twenty-four (24) hours a day, seven (7) days a week, to fulfill the residency requirement.

The ruling on petitioner’s evidenceWe now evaluate how the COMELEC appreciated petitioner’s evidence:a) Petitioner’s Income Tax Returns for 2007 and 2008The Income Tax Returns of petitioner presented below showed that petitioner had been paying his Income Tax (2007 and 2008) to the Revenue District Office of Lipa City. In waving aside his Income Tax Returns, the COMELEC held that these were not indications of residence since Section 51(B) of the National Internal Revenue Code does not only state that it shall be filed in a person’s legal residence, but that it may alternatively be filed in a person’s principal place of business.

In particular, Section 51(B) of the National Internal Revenue Code72 provides that the Income Tax Return shall be filed either in the place where a person resides or where his principal place of business is located. However, private respondent’s own evidence – a Certification from the City Permits and Licensing Office of Lipa City– showed that there was no business registered in the City under petitioner’s name.

Thus, COMELEC failed to appreciate that precisely because an individual income tax return may only be filed either in the legal residence OR the principal place of business, as prescribed under the law, the fact that Sabili was filing his Income Tax Returns in Lipa City notwithstanding that he had no business therein showed that he had actively elected to establish his residence in that city.

The Dissent claims that since the jurisdiction of RDO Lipa City includes both San Juan and Lipa City, petitioner’s filing of his ITR therein can also support an intent to remain in San Juan, Batangas - petitioner’s domicile of origin.

However, a simple perusal of the Income Tax Returns and Revenue Official Receipts for 2007 and 2008 shows that petitioner invariably declares his residence to be Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City, rather than San Juan, Batangas.73

Hence, while petitioner may be submitting his income tax return in the same RDO, the declaration therein is unmistakable. Petitioner considers Lipa City to be his domicile.

b) Certification from the Barangay Captain of Pinagtong-ulanThe COMELEC did not consider in the first instance the Certification issued by Pinagtong-ulan Barangay Captain Dominador Honrade74 (Honrade) that petitioner had been residing in Brgy Pinagtong-ulan since 2007. When this oversight was raised as an issue in petitioner’s Motion for Reconsideration, the COMELEC brushed it aside on the ground that the said Certification was not sworn to before a notary public and, hence, "cannot be relied on." Subsequently, petitioner presented another, substantially identical, Certification from the said Pinagtong-ulan Barangay Captain, save for the fact that it had now been sworn to before a notary public.

We disagree with the COMELEC’s treatment of the Barangay Captain’s Certification and find the same tainted with grave abuse of discretion.

Even without being sworn to before a notary public, Honrade’s Certification would not only be admissible in evidence, but would also be entitled to due consideration.

Rule 130, Section 44 of the Rules of Court provides:SEC. 44. Entries in official records.—Entries in official records made in the performance of his duty by a public officer of the Philippines, or by a person in the performance of a duty specially enjoined by law, are prima facie evidence of the facts therein stated.

In Country Bankers Insurance Corporation v. Lianga Bay and Community Multi-purpose Cooperative, Inc., 75 we explained that the following three (3) requisites must concur for entries in official records to be admissible in evidence:(a) The entry was made by a public officer, or by another person specially enjoined by law to do so;(b) It was made by the public officer in the performance of his duties, or by such other person in the performance of a duty specially enjoined by law; and(c) The public officer or other person had sufficient knowledge of the facts stated by him, which facts must have been acquired by him personally or through official information.As to the first requisite, the Barangay Secretary is required by the Local Government Code to "keep an updated record of all inhabitants of the barangay."76 Regarding the second requisite, we have explicitly recognized in Mitra v. Commission on Elections,77 that "it is the business of a punong barangay to know who the residents are in his

own barangay." Anent the third requisite, the Barangay Captain’s exercise of powers and duties 78 concomitant to his position requires him to be privy to these records kept by the Barangay Secretary.

Accordingly, there is basis in faulting the COMELEC for its failure to consider Honrade’s Certification on the sole ground that it was initially not notarized.

Meanwhile, the Dissent opines that the sworn affidavit of the barangay chair of Pinagtong-ulan that petitioner is a resident of Lipa City does not help petitioner’s case because it was not shown that the term "resident" as used therein carries the same meaning as domicile, that is, not merely bodily presence but also, animus manendi or intent to return. This Court has ruled otherwise.

In Mitra v. Commission on Elections,79 the declaration of Aborlan’s punong barangay that petitioner resides in his barangay was taken to have the same meaning as domicile, inasmuch as the said declaration was made in the face of the Court’s recognition that Mitra "might not have stayed in Aborlan nor in Palawan for most of 2008 and 2009 because his office and activities as a Representative were in Manila."

Assuming that the barangay captain’s certification only pertains to petitioner’s bodily presence in Pinagtong-ulan, still, the COMELEC cannot deny the strength of this evidence in establishing petitioner’s bodily presence in Pinagtong-ulan since 2007.

c) Affidavit of petitioner’s common law wifeTo substantiate his claim of change of domicile, petitioner also presented the affidavit of Palomares, wherein the latter swore that she and petitioner began residing in Lipa City in 2007, and that the funds used to purchase the Lipa property were petitioner’s personal funds. The COMELEC ruled that the Affidavit was self-serving for having been executed by petitioner’s common-law wife. Also, despite the presentation by petitioner of other Affidavits stating that he and Palomares had lived in Brgy. Pinagtong-ulan since 2007, the latter’s Affidavit was rejected by the COMELEC for having no independent collaboration.

Petitioner faults the COMELEC’s stand, which it claims to be inconsistent. He argues that since the property regime between him and Palomares is governed by Article 148 of the Family Code (based on the parties’ actual contribution) as the COMELEC stressed, then Palomares’s Affidavit expressly stating that petitioner’s money alone had been used to purchase the Lipa property (notwithstanding that it was registered in her name) was not self-serving, but was in fact, a declaration against interest.

Petitioner’s argument that Palomares’s affidavit was a "declaration against interest" is, strictly speaking, inaccurate and irrelevant. A declaration against interest, under the Rules of Civil Procedure, refers to a "declaration made by a person deceased, or unable to testify against the interest of a declarant, if the fact asserted in the declaration was at the time it was made so far contrary to declarant’s own interest, that a reasonable man in his position would not have made the declaration unless he believed it to be true."80 A declaration against interest is an exception to the hearsay rule.81 As such, it pertains only to the admissibility of, not the weight accorded to, testimonial evidence.82

Nevertheless, we see the logic in petitioner’s claim that the COMELEC had committed grave abuse of discretion in being inconsistent in its stand regarding Palomares, particularly regarding her assertion that the Lipa property had been purchased solely with petitioner’s money. If the COMELEC accepts the registration of the Lipa property in her name to be accurate, her affidavit disavowing ownership thereof in favor of petitioner was far from self-serving as it ran counter to her (and her children’s) property interest.

The Dissent states that it was not unreasonable for the COMELEC to believe that Palomares may have committed misrepresentations in her affidavit considering that she had perjured herself as an informant on the birth certificates of her children with respect to the supposed date and place of her marriage to petitioner. However, this was not the reason propounded by the COMELEC when it rejected Palomares’ affidavit.

Moreover, it is notable that Palomares’ assertion in her affidavit that she and petitioner have been living in the Pinagtong-ulan property since April 2007 is corroborated by other evidence, including the affidavits of Pinagtong-ulan barangay officials and neighbors.

d) Affidavits from a previous property owner, neighbors, certificate from parish and designation from socio-civic organization

The Affidavit issued by Leonila Suarez83 (erstwhile owner of the Lipa house and lot) states that in April 2007, after she received the down payment for the Lipa property and signed an agreement that petitioner would settle her bank obligations in connection with the said transaction, he and Palomares actually started residing at Pinagtong-ulan. The COMELEC brushed this Affidavit aside as one that "merely narrates the circumstances surrounding the sale of the property and mentions in passing that Sabili and Palomares lived in Pinagtong-ulan since April 2007 up to the present."84

We disagree with the COMELEC’s appreciation of the Suarez Affidavit. Since she was its owner, transactions for the purchase of the Lipa property was within her personal knowledge. Ordinarily, this includes the arrangement regarding who shall pay for the property and when, if ever, it shall be occupied by the buyers. We thus consider that her statements impact positively on petitioner’s claim of residence.

The Dissent on the other hand argues that the claim that petitioner started living in the Lipa house and lot in April 2007 is made dubious by the fact that (1) there might not be enough time to effect an actual and physical change in residence a month before the May 2007 elections when petitioner ran for representative of the 4th District of Batangas; and (2) the Deed of Absolute Sale was notarized, and the subsequent transfer of ownership in the tax declaration was made, only in August 2008.

Before further discussing this, it is pertinent to point out that these were not the reasons adduced by the COMELEC in the assailed Resolutions. Assuming that the above reasons were the unuttered considerations of the COMELEC in coming up with its conclusions, such reasoning still exhibits grave abuse of discretion.

As to the Dissent’s first argument, it must be remembered that a transfer of domicile/residence need not be completed in one single instance. Thus, in Mitra v. Commission on Elections,85 where the evidence showed that in 2008, petitioner Mitra had leased a small room at Maligaya Feedmills located in Aborlan and, in 2009 purchased in the same locality a lot where he began constructing his house, we recognized that petitioner "transferred by incremental process to Aborlan beginning 2008 and concluded his transfer in early 2009" and thus, he transferred his residence from Puerto Princesa City to Aborlan within the period required by law. We cannot treat the transfer to the Pinagtong-ulan house any less than we did Mitra’s transfer to the Maligaya Feedmills room.

Moreover, the Joint Affidavit of twenty-one (21) Pinagtong-ulan residents, including former and incumbent barangay officials, attests that petitioner had begun living in the Pinagtong-ulan house and lot before the May 2007 elections such that it was where his coordinators for the May 2007 elections went to meet him.86 Jacinto Cornejo Sr., the contractor who renovated the Pinagtong-ulan house when it was bought by petitioner, also swore that petitioner and his family began living therein even while it was being renovated. 87 Another Affidavit petitioner adduced was that of Rosalinda Macasaet, a resident of Brgy. Pinagtong-ulan,88 who stated that she also sold a lot she owned in favor of petitioner and Palomares. The latter bought her lot since it was adjacent to the Lipa house and lot they had earlier acquired. Macasaet also swore that the couple had actually resided in the house located in Pinagtong-ulan since April 2007, and that she knew this because her own house was very near the couple’s own. Macasaet’s Affidavit is a positive assertion of petitioner’s actual physical presence in Brgy. Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City.

While private respondent had adduced affidavits of two Pinagtong-ulan residents (that of Violeta Fernandez 89 and Rodrigo Macasaet)90 attesting that petitioner could not be a resident of Pinagtong-ulan as he was "rarely seen" in the area, these affidavits were controverted by the Joint affidavit of twenty-one (21) Pinagtong-ulan residents who plainly accused the two of lying. Meanwhile, the affidavits of private respondent91 and Eladio de Torres92 stating that petitioner is not a resident of Lipa City because he has no work or family there is hardly worthy of credence since both are residents of Barangay Calamias, which is, and private respondent does not contest this, about 15 kilometers from Pinagtong-ulan.

As to the Dissent’s second argument, the fact that the notarization of the deed of absolute sale of the property was made months after April 2007 does not negate petitioner’s claim that he started residing therein in April 2007. It is clear from the Affidavit of the property’s seller, Leonila Suarez, that it was not yet fully paid in April 2007, so it was understandable that a deed of absolute sale was not executed at the time. Thus:That initially, the contract to sell was entered into by and between Mr. & Mrs. Meynardo Asa Sabili and Bernadette Palomares and myself, but eventually the spouses changed their mind, and after the couple settled all my loan obligations to the bank, they requested me to put the name of Ms. Bernadette P. Palomares instead of Mr. & Mrs. Meynardo Asa Sabili and Bernadette Palomares in the absolute deed of sale;

That it was Mr. Meynardo Asa Sabili who came to my former residence at Barangay Pinagtong-ulan sometime in the month of April 2007. At that time, Mr. Meynardo Asa Sabili was still running for Representative (Congressman) in the 4th District of Batangas;That after payment of the down payment and signing of an agreement that Mr. Meynardo Asa Sabili will be the one to settle my bank obligations, Mr. & Mrs. Meynardo A. Sabili and Bernadette Palomares had an actual transfer of their residence at Barangay Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City;That they started living and residing in Pinagtong-ulan in the month of April, 2007 up to this point in time; xxx93

As to the rest of the documents presented by petitioner, the COMELEC held that the Memorandum issued by the Guardians Brotherhood Inc. San Jose/Lipa City Chapter merely declares the designation of petitioner in the organization, without any showing that residence in the locality was a requirement for that designation. Meanwhile, the Certificate of Appreciation was nothing more than an acknowledgment of petitioner’s material and financial support, and not an indication of residence.

We agree that considered separately, the Guardians Brotherhood Memorandum and the Pinagtong-ulan Parish Certificate of Appreciation do not establish petitioner’s residence in Pinagtong-ulan, Lipa City. Nevertheless, coupled with the fact that petitioner had twice been elected as Provincial Board Member representing the Fourth District of Batangas, which encompasses Lipa City, petitioner’s involvement in the religious life of the community, as attested to by the certificate of appreciation issued to him by the Pinagtong-ulan parish for his "material and financial support" as President of the Barangay Fiesta Committee in 2009, as well as his assumption of a leadership role in the socio-civic sphere of the locality as a member of the advisory body of the Pinagtong-ulan, San Jose/Lipa City Chapter of the Guardians Brotherhood Inc. , manifests a significant level of knowledge of and sensitivity to the needs of the said community. Such, after all, is the rationale for the residency requirement in our elections laws, to wit:The Constitution and the law requires residence as a qualification for seeking and holding elective public office, in order to give candidates the opportunity to be familiar with the needs, difficulties, aspirations, potentials for growth and all matters vital to the welfare of their constituencies; likewise, it enables the electorate to evaluate the office seekers’ qualifications and fitness for the job they aspire for xxx. 94

Considering all of the foregoing discussion, it is clear that while separately, each evidence presented by petitioner might fail to convincingly show the fact of his residence at Pinagtong-ulan since 2007, collectively, these pieces of evidence tend to sufficiently establish the said fact.

Petitioner’s actual physical presence in Lipa City is established not only by the presence of a place (Pinagtong-ulan house and lot) he can actually live in, but also the affidavits of various persons in Pinagtong-ulan, and the Certification of its barangay captain. Petitioner’s substantial and real interest in establishing his domicile of choice in Lipa City is also sufficiently shown not only by the acquisition of additional property in the area and the transfer of his voter registration, but also his participation in the community’s socio-civic and religious life, as well as his declaration in his ITR that he is a resident thereof.

We therefore rule that petitioner has been able to adduce substantial evidence to demonstrate compliance with the one-year residency requirement for local elective officials under the law.

In view of this Court’s finding that petitioner has not misrepresented his residence at Pinagtong-ulan and the duration thereof, there is no need to further discuss whether there was material and deliberate misrepresentation of the residency qualification in his COC.

As a final note, we do not lose sight of the fact that Lipa City voters manifested their own judgment regarding the qualifications of petitioner when they voted for him, notwithstanding that the issue of his residency qualification had been raised prior to the elections. Petitioner has garnered the highest number of votes (55,268 votes as opposed to the 48,825 votes in favor of his opponent, Oscar Gozos)95 legally cast for the position of Mayor of Lipa City and has consequently been proclaimed duly elected municipal Mayor of Lipa City during the last May 2010 elections96

In this regard, we reiterate our ruling in Frivaldo v. Commission on Elections97 that "(t)o successfully challenge a winning candidate's qualifications, the petitioner must clearly demonstrate that the ineligibility is so patently antagonistic to constitutional and legal principles that overriding such ineligibility and thereby giving effect to the apparent will of the people, would ultimately create greater prejudice to the very democratic institutions and juristic traditions that our Constitution and laws so zealously protect and promote."

Similarly, in Japzon v. Commission on Elections,98 we concluded that "when the evidence of the alleged lack of residence qualification of a candidate for an elective position is weak or inconclusive and it clearly appears that the purpose of the law would not be thwarted by upholding the victor's right to the office, the will of the electorate should be respected. For the purpose of election laws is to give effect to, rather than frustrate, the will of the voters."

In sum, we grant the Petition not only because petitioner sufficiently established his compliance with the one-year residency requirement for local elective officials under the law. We also recognize that "(a)bove and beyond all, the determination of the true will of the electorate should be paramount. It is their voice, not ours or of anyone else, that must prevail. This, in essence, is the democracy we continue to hold sacred."99

WHEREFORE, premises considered, the Petition is GRANTED. The assailed COMELEC Resolutions dated 26 January 2010 and 17 August 2010 in Florencio Librea v. Meynardo A. Sabili [SPA No. 09-047(DC)] are ANNULLED. Private respondent’s Petition to cancel the Certificate of Candidacy of Meynardo A. Sabili is DENIED. The Status Quo Ante Order issued by this Court on 7 September 2010 is MADE PERMANENT.

SO ORDERED.

G.R. No. 193314               June 25, 2013SVETLANA P. JALOSJOS, Petitioner, vs.COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, EDWIN ELIM TUPAG and RODOLFO Y. ESTRELLADA. Respondents.

R E S O L U T I O N

SERENO, CJ.:This Resolution resolves the Motion for Partial Reconsideration dated 8 March 2013, filed by Edwin Elim Tumpag and Rodolfo Y. Estrellada (private respondents) and the Motion for Reconsideration dated 27 March 2013, filed by Svetlana P. Jalosjos (petitioner) in connection with the Decision of the Court promulgated on 26 February 2013.

Private respondents come before this Court on the sole issue of who between the vice-mayor and the second placer shall assume office pursuant to the final determination of petitioner's ineligibility to run for office and the lifting of the 07 September 20 1 0 Status Quo Order.

Petitioner, on the other hand, questions the Decision, by raising the following arguments:1. This Court erred in concluding that there are inconsistencies in the Joint Affidavit of the witnesses presented by petitioner.2. Petitioner’s stay in Brgy. Punta Miray should be considered in determining the one-year residency requirement in the same municipality.3. Petitioner’s registration as a voter presupposes she has stayed in the municipality at least six months prior to the registration.4. Petitioner’s certificate of candidacy (COC) should not be cancelled, absent any finding of a deliberate attempt to deceive the electorate.5. COMELEC was ousted of its jurisdiction to decide on the question of the qualification of petitioner after she was proclaimed as winner.

We deny the motion of petitioner and grant the partial motion for reconsideration of private respondents.

The claim of actual and physical residence in Brgy. Tugas since 2008 is contradicted by the statements that petitioner was staying in Mrs. Lourdes Yap’s house while her residential unit was being constructed; and that by December 2009, the construction was still ongoing.

Petitioner questions the inconsistencies noted by the court in the affidavit of her witnesses who, while claiming that they personally know her to have been an actual and physical resident of Brgy. Tugas since 2008, declared in the same affidavit that while her house was being constructed, she used to stay at the residence of Mrs. Lourdes Yap (Mrs. Yap) in Brgy. Punta Miray.

The declaration of petitioner’s witnesses that they know petitioner to be "an actual and physical resident of Brgy. Tugas since 2008" contradicts their statements that (1) they have "started the construction of the residential house of the owner and other infrastructures of the resort since January 2009"; (2) "until the present (meaning until December 2009 when they executed their affidavit), the construction and development projects are still on-going"; and (3) "at times when Ms. Jalosjos is in Baliangao, she used to stay in the house of Mrs. Lourdes Yap at Sitio Balas Diut, Brgy. Punta Miray, Baliangao, Misamis Occidental, while her residential house was still being constructed."

Petitioner asserts that there are no inconsistencies in the statements of her witnesses, and that the statements are in fact consistent with her claim that she had been residing in Baliangao, Misamis Occidental for at least one year prior to the 10 May 2010 elections. She argues as follows:x x x the fact that some of these witnesses knew that petitioner lived in the house of Mrs. Lourdes Yap in a different barangay, particularly Brgy. Punta Miray, is not at all inconsistent or contradictory with petitioner’s assertion and the witnesses’ statements that petitioner resides in Brgy. Tugas, because petitioner obviously needed a place to stay while her residence in Brgy. Tugas was being constructed. This does not negate the fact that petitioner was establishing her residence in Brgy. Tugas since the latter part of 2008, or at the very latest during the first few months (sic) of January 2009.1

Her assertion that she "was establishing her residence in Brgy. Tugas since the latter part of 2008, or at the very latest during the first few months [sic] of January 2009" shows that she herself cannot pinpoint the particular date when she established her legal residence in Brgy. Tugas. This fact is contradictory to the declaration of the witnesses that "we have personal knowledge that Ms. Svetlana P. Jalosjos has been an actual and physical resident of Sunrise Tugas, Baliangao, Misamis Occidental, after she bought the properties thereat from the Heirs

of Agapita Yap, Jr. on 9 December 2008."

To be an actual and physical resident of a locality, one must have a dwelling place where one resides no matter how modest and regardless of ownership. The mere purchase of a parcel of land does not make it one’s residence. The fact that the residential structure where petitioner intends to reside was still under construction on the lot she purchased means that she has not yet established actual and physical residence in the barangay, contrary to the declaration of her witnesses that she has been an actual and physical resident of Brgy. Tugas since 2008.

Petitioner wants this Court to believe that the ongoing construction referred to by her witnesses in their joint affidavit does not refer to the residential structure, but to the other structures in the resort that petitioner was then establishing. She does not assert, however, that her residential unit had already been completed by that time. In fact, she has failed to present any proof as to when her claimed residential unit was completed, or when she transferred to the unit.

It must be pointed out that the second statement in paragraph 1 of the Joint Affidavit states: "We have started the construction of the residential house of the owner and the other infrastructures of the resort since January, 2009." This was immediately followed by paragraph 2 which reads:2. Until the present, the construction and development projects are still ongoing. To establish the fact of the on-going construction work, we are attaching herewith as part hereof, pictures we have taken on December 20 and 29, 2009 marked Annexes "1", "2", "3", "4", "5", and "6" hereof, respectively.2

Without any qualification as to what is being referred to by the construction and development projects in paragraph 2, it follows that it refers to the "construction of the residential house of the owner and the other infrastructures of the resort" found in the prior statement.

In the affidavit, there is no mention whatsoever of completion of the residential house as of 30 December 2009. Neither has any occupancy permit been presented by petitioner to definitely establish the date she started occupying what she claims to be her residential unit in the resort.

Petitioner takes pains to present photographs of other structures in the resort, but fails to present any photograph of a completed residential structure, which is more relevant in proving her claimed residence in Brgy. Tugas. If the residential unit was already completed by December 2009, her witnesses could have easily testified to that fact and presented photographs of the structure.

This absence of any photograph proving the alleged residence of petitioner in the resort bolsters the court’s conclusion that at the time the witnesses signed their affidavits in December 2009, or six months prior to the May 2010 elections, her residential unit had not yet been built.

A temporary stay in a stranger’s house cannot amount to residence.

Petitioner wants this Court to credit her stay in Mrs. Yap’s house as proof that she had been a resident of the Municipality of Baliangao for more than one year prior to the 10 May 2010 elections. In her words:7. More importantly, if this Honorable Court would consider the circumstance that petitioner was staying in Brgy. Punta Miray as true so as to render the statements of her witnesses inconsistent, then such a consideration should not have led this Honorable Court to the conclusion that petitioner was not a resident of Baliangao, Misamis Occidental since Brgy. Punta Miray is located in the municipality of Baliangao like Brgy. Tugas. In other words, the fact that petitioner was staying in a house in Brgy. Punta Miray while her residence in Brgy. Tugas was being constructed during the early part of 2009 would STILL LEAD to the conclusion that petitioner has been residing in Baliangao, Misamis Occidental for at least one (1) year prior to the 10 May 2010 elections since Brgy. Punta Miray is a part of Baliangao.3 (Emphasis in the original and underscoring omitted)

Petitioner relies on Mitra v. COMELEC4 and Sabili v. COMELEC5 in claiming that "the series of events whereby petitioner first had her residence constructed ... after she purchased in 2008 the property where her residence was eventually established, and while she lived in another barangay of the same municipality, and then eventually moved in to her residence in Brgy. Tugas amounted to an ‘incremental process’ of transferring residence."

Petitioner’s case must be differentiated from Mitra in that petitioner therein presented not only the notarized lease

contract over the property where he claimed to be residing, but also "a residence certificate ... and an identification card of the House of Representatives showing Aborlan as his residence."6

In Sabili, the Court declared that "the existence of a house and lot apparently owned by petitioner’s common-law wife, with whom he has been living for over two decades, makes plausible petitioner’s allegation of bodily presence and intent to reside in the area."7

Petitioner’s stay in the house of Mrs. Yap in Brgy. Punta Miray, on the other hand, was only a temporary and intermittent stay that does not amount to residence. It was never the intention of petitioner to reside in that barangay, as she only stayed there at times when she was in Baliangao while her house was being constructed. 8

Her temporary stay in Brgy. Punta Miray cannot be counted as residence in Baliangao.

Petitioner failed to show by what right she stayed in Mrs. Yap’s house. Except for the declarations of her witnesses that she stayed there while her residential unit in the resort was being built, she presented no other evidence to show any basis of her right to stay in that particular house as a resident.

Approval of voter registration does not presuppose six-month residency in the place prior to registration.

It appears on record that petitioner, in filing her application for registration as a voter on 7 May 2009, claimed "that she has been a resident of Brgy. Tugas, Baliangao, Misamis Occidental for six (6) months prior to the filing of the said registration."9 For her claim to be true, she must have resided in Brgy. Tugas on or before 8 November 2008. The records, however, show that she purchased property in Brgy. Tugas only on December 2008. Thus, her claim that she had been a resident of Brgy. Tugas for at least six (6) months prior to her application for registration as a voter on 7 May 2009 is an utter falsity.

The approval of the registration of petitioner as a voter does not and cannot carry with it an affirmation of the falsehood and misrepresentation as to the period of her residence in Brgy. Tugas. At best, the approval of her registration as a voter carries a presumption that the registrant will be able to meet the six-month residency requirement for the elections in which the registrant intends to vote.10 It does not prove that the registrant has resided in the locality for more than one year prior to the elections.

Representation that one is qualified to run for public office when proven false constitutes a deliberate attempt to deceive the electorate.

Petitioner contends that the Court erred in upholding the cancellation of her COC despite the glaring absence of any finding made by the respondent COMELEC in its assailed Resolution that petitioner committed a false material representation in said COC.

The finding of the COMELEC that petitioner lacks the one year residency requirement to run for local elective position in the municipality of Baliangao directly contradicts her sworn declaration that she is eligible to run for public office. The fact that petitioner failed to prove that she has been a resident of the locality for at least one year prior to the elections reveals the falsity of her assertion in her COC that she is qualified to run for a local elective position. This false material representation justifies the cancellation of her COC.

When the candidate’s claim of eligibility is proven false, as when the candidate failed to substantiate meeting the required residency in the locality, the representation of eligibility in the COC constitutes a "deliberate attempt to mislead, misinform, or hide the fact"11 of ineligibility.

COMELEC is not ousted of jurisdiction to decide a petition for cancellation of the certificate of candidacy after the winner is proclaimed.

The COMELEC, in its Resolution dated 19 August 2010, citing Aquino v. COMELEC,12 has amply discussed this matter, thus:Petitioner’s contention that "after the conduct of the election and (petitioner) has been established the winner of the electoral exercise from the moment of election, the COMELEC is automatically divested of authority to pass upon the question of qualification" finds no basis in law, because even after the elections the COMELEC is empowered by Section 6 (in relation to Section 7) of R.A. 6646 to continue to hear and decide questions relating to qualifications of candidates. Section 6 states:

SECTION 6. Effect of Disqualification Case. – Any candidate who has been declared by final judgment to be disqualified shall not be voted for, and the votes cast for him shall not be counted. If for any reason a candidate is not declared by final judgment before an election to be disqualified and he is voted for and receives the winning number of votes in such election, the Court or Commission shall continue with the trial and hearing of the action, inquiry or protest and, upon motion of the complainant or any intervenor, may during the pendency thereof order the suspension of the proclamation of such candidate whenever the evidence of guilt is strong.

Under the above-quoted provision, not only is a disqualification case against a candidate allowed to continue after the election (and does not oust the COMELEC of its jurisdiction), but his obtaining the highest number of votes will not result in the suspension or termination of the proceedings against him when the evidence of guilt is strong. While the phrase "when the evidence of guilt is strong" seems to suggest that the provisions of Section 6 ought to be applicable only to disqualification cases under Section 68 of the Omnibus Election Code, Section 7 of R.A. 6646 allows the application of the provisions of Section 6 to cases involving disqualification based on ineligibility under Section 78 of B.P. 881. Section 7 states:SECTION 7. Petition to Deny Due Course or to Cancel a Certificate of Candidacy. – The procedure hereinabove provided shall apply to petition to deny due course to or cancel a certificate of candidacy based on Sec. 78 of Batas Pambansa 881.13

The cancellation of the certificate of candidacy of an ineligible candidate who has assumed office renders the officer a de facto officer.

This Court has ruled in Aratea v. COMELEC14 and Jalosjos, Jr. v. COMELEC15 that the cancellation of the COC based on an ineligibility that existed at the time of its filing means that the candidate was never a valid candidate from the very beginning.16

On the question of who should assume the post vacated by the ineligible candidate, this Court amply explained in Jalosjos, Jr. that:Decisions of this Court holding that the second-placer cannot be proclaimed winner if the first-placer is disqualified or declared ineligible should be limited to situations where the certificate of candidacy of the first placer was valid at the time of filing but subsequently had to be cancelled because of a violation of law that took place, or a legal impediment that took effect, after the filing of the certificate of candidacy. If the certificate of candidacy is void ab initio, then legally the person who filed such void certificate of candidacy was never a candidate in the elections at any time. All votes for such non-candidate are stray votes and should not be counted. Thus, such non-candidate can never be a first-placer in the elections. If a certificate of candidacy void ab initio is cancelled on the day, or before the day, of the election, prevailing jurisprudence holds that all votes for that candidate are stray votes. If a certificate of candidacy void ab initio is cancelled one day or more after the elections, all votes for such candidate should also be stray votes because the certificate of candidacy is void from the very beginning.17 x x x. (Citations omitted)

There is another more compelling reason why the eligible candidate who garnered the highest number of votes must assume the office. The ineligible candidate who was proclaimed and who already assumed office is a de facto officer by virtue of the ineligibility.

The rule on succession in Section 44 of the Local Government Code18 cannot apply in instances when a de facto officer is ousted from office and the de jure officer takes over. The ouster of a de facto officer cannot create a permanent vacancy as contemplated in the Local Government Code. There is no vacancy to speak of as the de jure officer, the rightful winner in the elections, has the legal right to assume the position.

WHEREFORE, in view of the foregoing, the Motion for Partial Reconsideration dated 08 March 2013 is hereby GRANTED. Petitioner's Motion for Reconsideration dated 27 March 2013 is hereby DENIED with FINALITY. AGNE V. YAP, SR. is hereby declared the duly elected Mayor of the Municipality of Baliangao, Misamis Occidental in the 10 May 2010 elections. This resolution is immediately executory.

SO ORDERED.G.R. No. 191970               April 24, 2012ROMMEL APOLINARIO JALOSJOS, Petitioner, vs. THE COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS and DAN ERASMO, SR.,

D E C I S I O N

ABAD, J.:This case is about the proof required to establish the domicile of a reinstated Filipino citizen who seeks election as governor of a province.

The Facts and the CasePetitioner Rommel Jalosjos was born in Quezon City on October 26, 1973. He migrated to Australia in 1981 when he was eight years old and there acquired Australian citizenship. On November 22, 2008, at age 35, he decided to return to the Philippines and lived with his brother, Romeo, Jr., in Barangay Veteran’s Village, Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay. Four days upon his return, he took an oath of allegiance to the Republic of the Philippines, resulting in his being issued a Certificate of Reacquisition of Philippine Citizenship by the Bureau of Immigration. 1 On September 1, 2009 he renounced his Australian citizenship, executing a sworn renunciation of the same2 in compliance with Republic Act (R.A.) 9225.3

From the time of his return, Jalosjos acquired a residential property in the same village where he lived and a fishpond in San Isidro, Naga, Zamboanga Sibugay. He applied for registration as a voter in the Municipality of Ipil but respondent Dan Erasmo, Sr., the Barangay Captain of Barangay Veteran’s Village, opposed the same. Acting on the application, the Election Registration Board approved it and included Jalosjos’ name in the Commission on Elections’ (COMELEC’s) voters list for Precinct 0051F of Barangay Veterans Village, Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay.4

Undaunted, Erasmo filed before the 1st Municipal Circuit Trial Court (MCTC) of Ipil-Tungawan-R.T. Lim in Ipil a petition for the exclusion of Jalosjos’ name from the official voters list. After hearing, the MCTC rendered a decision, denying the petition.5 On appeal,6 the Regional Trial Court (RTC) affirmed the MCTC decision. The RTC decision became final and executory.

On November 28, 2009 Jalosjos filed his Certificate of Candidacy (COC) for Governor of Zamboanga Sibugay Province for the May 10, 2010 elections. Erasmo promptly filed a petition to deny due course or to cancel Jalosjos’ COC7 on the ground that the latter made material misrepresentation in the same since he failed to comply with (1) the requirements of R.A. 9225 and (2) the one-year residency requirement of the Local Government Code.

After hearing, the Second Division of the COMELEC ruled that, while Jalosjos had regained Philippine citizenship by complying with the requirements of R.A. 9225, he failed to prove the residency requirement for a gubernatorial candidate. He failed to present ample proof of a bona fide intention to establish his domicile in Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay. On motion for reconsideration, the COMELEC En Banc affirmed the Second Division’s decision, ruling that Jalosjos had been a mere guest or transient visitor in his brother’s house and, for this reason, he cannot claim Ipil as his domicile.

Acting on Jalosjos’ prayer for the issuance of a temporary restraining order, the Court resolved on May 7, 2010 to issue a status quo ante order, enjoining the COMELEC from enforcing its February 11, 2010 decision pending further orders. Meanwhile, Jolosjos won the election and was proclaimed winner of the 2010 gubernatorial race in the Province of Zamboanga Sibugay.8

The Issue PresentedThe sole issue presented in this case is whether or not the COMELEC acted with grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction in ruling that Jalosjos failed to present ample proof of a bona fide intention to establish his domicile in Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay.

The Court’s RulingThe Local Government Code requires a candidate seeking the position of provincial governor to be a resident of the province for at least one year before the election.9 For purposes of the election laws, the requirement of residence is synonymous with domicile,10 meaning that a person must not only intend to reside in a particular place but must also have personal presence in such place coupled with conduct indicative of such intention.11

There is no hard and fast rule to determine a candidate’s compliance with residency requirement since the question of residence is a question of intention.12 Still, jurisprudence has laid down the following guidelines: (a) every person has a domicile or residence somewhere; (b) where once established, that domicile remains until he acquires a new one; and (c) a person can have but one domicile at a time.13

It is inevitable under these guidelines and the precedents applying them that Jalosjos has met the residency requirement for provincial governor of Zamboanga Sibugay.

One. The COMELEC appears hasty in concluding that Jalosjos failed to prove that he successfully changed his domicile to Zamboanga Sibugay. The COMELEC points out that, since he was unable to discharge the burden of proving Zamboanga Sibugay to be his rightful domicile, it must be assumed that his domicile is either Quezon City or Australia.

But it is clear from the facts that Quezon City was Jalosjos’ domicile of origin, the place of his birth. It may be taken for granted that he effectively changed his domicile from Quezon City to Australia when he migrated there at the age of eight, acquired Australian citizenship, and lived in that country for 26 years. Australia became his domicile by operation of law and by choice.14

On the other hand, when he came to the Philippines in November 2008 to live with his brother in Zamboanga Sibugay, it is evident that Jalosjos did so with intent to change his domicile for good. He left Australia, gave up his Australian citizenship, and renounced his allegiance to that country. In addition, he reacquired his old citizenship by taking an oath of allegiance to the Republic of the Philippines, resulting in his being issued a Certificate of Reacquisition of Philippine Citizenship by the Bureau of Immigration. By his acts, Jalosjos forfeited his legal right to live in Australia, clearly proving that he gave up his domicile there. And he has since lived nowhere else except in Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay.

To hold that Jalosjos has not establish a new domicile in Zamboanga Sibugay despite the loss of his domicile of origin (Quezon City) and his domicile of choice and by operation of law (Australia) would violate the settled maxim that a man must have a domicile or residence somewhere.

Two. The COMELEC concluded that Jalosjos has not come to settle his domicile in Ipil since he has merely been staying at his brother’s house. But this circumstance alone cannot support such conclusion. Indeed, the Court has repeatedly held that a candidate is not required to have a house in a community to establish his residence or domicile in a particular place. It is sufficient that he should live there even if it be in a rented house or in the house of a friend or relative.15 To insist that the candidate own the house where he lives would make property a qualification for public office. What matters is that Jalosjos has proved two things: actual physical presence in Ipil and an intention of making it his domicile.

Jalosjos presented the affidavits of next-door neighbors, attesting to his physical presence at his residence in Ipil. These adjoining neighbors are no doubt more credible since they have a better chance of noting his presence or absence than his other neighbors, whose affidavits Erasmo presented, who just sporadically passed by the subject residence. Further, it is not disputed that Jalosjos bought a residential lot in the same village where he lived and a fish pond in San Isidro, Naga, Zamboanga Sibugay. He showed correspondences with political leaders, including local and national party-mates, from where he lived. Moreover, Jalosjos is a registered voter of Ipil by final judgment of the Regional Trial Court of Zamboanga Sibugay.

Three. While the Court ordinarily respects the factual findings of administrative bodies like the COMELEC, this does not prevent it from exercising its review powers to correct palpable misappreciation of evidence or wrong or irrelevant considerations.16 The evidence Jalosjos presented is sufficient to establish Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay, as his domicile. The COMELEC gravely abused its discretion in holding otherwise.

Four. Jalosjos won and was proclaimed winner in the 2010 gubernatorial race for Zamboanga Sibugay. The Court will respect the decision of the people of that province and resolve all doubts regarding his qualification in his favor to breathe life to their manifest will.

WHEREFORE, the Court GRANTS the petition and SETS ASIDE the Resolution of the COMELEC Second Division dated February 11, 2010 and the Resolution of the COMELEC En Banc dated May 4, 2010 that disqualified petitioner Rommel Jalosjos from seeking election as Governor of Zamboanga Sibugay. SO ORDERED.G.R. No. 191938               July 2, 2010ABRAHAM KAHLIL B. MITRA, Petitioner, vs.COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, ANTONIO V. GONZALES, and ORLANDO R. BALBON, JR., Respondents.

D E C I S I O N

BRION, J.:The minimum requirement under our Constitution1 and election laws2 for the candidates’ residency in the political unit they seek to represent has never been intended to be an empty formalistic condition; it carries with it a very specific purpose: to prevent "stranger[s] or newcomer[s] unacquainted with the conditions and needs of a community" from seeking elective offices in that community.3

The requirement is rooted in the recognition that officials of districts or localities should not only be acquainted with the metes and bounds of their constituencies; more importantly, they should know their constituencies and the unique circumstances of their constituents – their needs, difficulties, aspirations, potentials for growth and development, and all matters vital to their common welfare. Familiarity, or the opportunity to be familiar, with these circumstances can only come with residency in the constituency to be represented.

The purpose of the residency requirement is "best met by individuals who have either had actual residence in the area for a given period or who have been domiciled in the same area either by origin or by choice." 4 At the same time, the constituents themselves can best know and evaluate the candidates’ qualifications and fitness for office if these candidates have lived among them.5

Read and understood in this manner, residency can readily be appreciated as a requirement that goes into the heart of our democratic system; it directly supports the purpose of representation – electing those who can best serve the community because of their knowledge and sensitivity to its needs. It likewise adds meaning and substance to the voters’ freedom of choice in the electoral exercise that characterizes every democracy.

In the present case, the respondent Commission on Elections (COMELEC) canceled the certificate of candidacy (COC) of petitioner Abraham Kahlil B. Mitra for allegedly misrepresenting that he is a resident of the Municipality of Aborlan, Province of Palawan where he ran for the position of Governor. Mitra came to this Court to seek the reversal of the cancellation.6

The AntecedentsWhen his COC for the position of Governor of Palawan was declared cancelled, Mitra was the incumbent Representative of the Second District of Palawan. This district then included, among other territories, the Municipality of Aborlan and Puerto Princesa City. He was elected Representative as a domiciliary of Puerto Princesa City, and represented the legislative district for three (3) terms immediately before the elections of 2010.7

On March 26, 2007 (or before the end of Mitra’s second term as Representative), Puerto Princesa City was reclassified as a "highly urbanized city" and thus ceased to be a component city of the Province of Palawan. The direct legal consequence of this new status was the ineligibility of Puerto Princesa City residents from voting for candidates for elective provincial officials.8

On March 20, 2009, with the intention of running for the position of Governor, Mitra applied for the transfer of his Voter’s Registration Record from Precinct No. 03720 of Brgy. Sta. Monica, Puerto Princesa City, to Sitio Maligaya, Brgy. Isaub, Municipality of Aborlan, Province of Palawan. He subsequently filed his COC for the position of Governor of Palawan as a resident of Aborlan.9

Soon thereafter, respondents Antonio V. Gonzales and Orlando R. Balbon, Jr. (the respondents) filed a petition to deny due course or to cancel Mitra’s COC.10 They essentially argued that Mitra remains a resident of Puerto Princesa City who has not yet established residence in Aborlan, and is therefore not qualified to run for Governor of Palawan. Mitra insisted in his Answer that he has successfully abandoned Puerto Princesa City as his domicile of origin, and has established a new domicile in Aborlan since 2008.11

The Parties’ Claims and EvidenceThe respondents’ petition before the COMELEC claimed that Mitra’s COC should be cancelled under the following factual premises: (a) Mitra bought, in June 2009, a parcel of land in Aborlan where he began to construct a house, but up to the time of the filing of the petition to deny due course or to cancel Mitra’s COC, the house had yet to be completed; (b) in the document of sale, Puerto Princesa City was stated as Mitra’s residence (attached as Annex "J" of the Respondents’ Petition before the COMELEC);12 (c) Mitra’s Puerto Princesa City residence was similarly

stated in his application for a building permit (attached as Annex "K" of the Respondents’ Petition before the COMELEC);13 and (d) Mitra’s community tax certificate states that his residence was Puerto Princesa City (attached as Annex "M" of the Respondents’ Petition before the COMELEC).14 The respondents presented several affidavits attesting to the non-completion of the construction of the house,15 and asserted that without a fully constructed house, Mitra could not claim residence in Aborlan.

Mitra denied the respondents’ allegations in his Answer. He claimed that the respondents misled the COMELEC by presenting photographs of his unfinished house on the land he purchased from a certain Rexter Temple. He claimed, on the contrary, that his residence is located inside the premises of the Maligaya Feedmill and Farm (Maligaya Feedmill) which the owner, Carme Caspe, leased to him; and that he purchased a farm and presently has an experimental pineapple plantation and a cock farm. The transfer of his residence, he claimed, began in 2008.16

He submitted the following: (a) the Sinumpaang Salaysay of Ricardo Temple; Florame T. Gabrillo, the Punong Barangay of Isaub, Aborlan; Marissa U. Zumarraga, Councilor of Aborlan; Virginia J. Agpao and Elsa M. Dalisay, both Sangguniang Barangay members of Isaub, Aborlan, attesting that Mitra resides in their locality;17 (b) photographs of the residential portion of the Maligaya Feedmill18 where he claims to reside, and of his Aborlan experimental pineapple plantation, farm, farmhouse and cock farm;19 (c) the lease contract over the Maligaya Feedmill;20 (d) the community tax certificate he claims he himself secured, stating that Aborlan is his residence; 21

and (e) an updated identification card issued by the House of Representatives stating that Aborlan is his residence.22

To refute Mitra’s claimed residence in Aborlan – specifically, that he resides at the Maligaya Feedmill property – the respondents additionally submitted: (a) the affidavits of the 14 Punong Barangays of Aborlan and of six residents of Aborlan, all stating that Mitra is not a resident of Aborlan and has never been seen in that municipality; (b) a Certification from the Barangay Captain of Sta. Monica, Puerto Princesa City stating that Mitra was a resident of that barangay as of November 16, 2009; (c) the affidavit of Commodore Nicanor Hernandez attesting that Mitra continues to reside in Puerto Princesa City; and (d) 24 affidavits of former employees, workers, Aborlan residents and a customer of the Maligaya Feedmill attesting that they have never seen Mitra during the time he claimed to have lived there and that the area where Mitra supposedly lives is, in fact, the office of the feedmill and is unlivable due to noise and pollution.23

The Ruling of the COMELEC’s First Division24

The Law. The First Division defined the governing law with the statement that residence means domicile under the Court’s consistent rulings since 1928 in Nuval v. Guray.25 Domicile imports not only the intent to reside in a fixed place but also personal presence in that place, coupled with conduct indicative of this intention.26

To acquire a new domicile – a domicile by choice – the following must concur: (1) residence or bodily presence in a new locality; (2) an intention to remain there; and (3) an intention to abandon the old domicile. In other words, there must be an animus non revertendi with respect to the old domicile, and an animus manendi at the domicile of choice. The intent to remain in or at the domicile of choice must be for an indefinite period of time and the acts of the person must be consistent with this intent.27

The First Division’s Evaluation of the Parties’ Evidence. Based on its consideration of the submitted evidence (including various affidavits submitted by both parties and the photographs of the room that Mitra claims to be his residence) and citing jurisprudence, the First Division granted the respondents’ petition to cancel Mitra’s COC.

To the First Division, Mitra’s submitted pictures are telling; they show a small, sparsely furnished room that is evidently unlived in, located at the second floor of a structure that appears to be a factory or a warehouse; the residence appears hastily set-up, cold, and utterly devoid of any indication of Mitra’s personality such as old family photographs and memorabilia collected through the years. What the supposed residence lacks, in the First Division’s perception, are the loving attention and details inherent in every home to make it one’s residence; perhaps, at most, this small room could have served as Mitra’s resting area whenever he visited the locality, but nothing more than this.28

These observations – coupled with the statements from former employees and customers of the Maligaya Feedmill that the claimed residence is located in an unsavory location (for its noise and pollution), and that it had been in fact Maligaya Feedmill’s office just a few months back – militated against Mitra’s claim. These pieces of information made it clear, to the First Division, that this room is not the home that a residence is supposed to be.29

A person’s domicile of origin is not easily lost, the First Division further said. The fact that Mitra registered as a voter in Aborlan, has a cock farm, a farm, a rest house and an experimental pineapple plantation in Maligaya Feedmill, was occasionally seen staying in Aborlan, and held meetings with Aborlan constituents does not necessarily establish Mitra’s status as an Aborlan resident, or prove his abandonment of his domicile of origin in Puerto Princesa City. Mere absence from one’s residence or domicile of origin to pursue studies, engage in business, or practice one’s vocation is not sufficient to constitute abandonment or loss of domicile. Registration or voting in a place other than one’s domicile does not eliminate an individual’s animus revertendi to his domicile of origin; the natural desire and longing of every person to return to the place of birth and his strong feeling of attachment to this place can only be shown to have been overcome by a positive proof of abandonment of this place for another.30

Also, the First Division said that Mitra’s witnesses’ sworn statements appear to have been prepared by the same person, as they use similar wordings, allegations, and contents; thus, putting into question the credibility of the statements. Furthermore, the lease contract over the Maligaya Feedmill between Mitra and Carme Caspe is effective only up to February 28, 2010, thus casting doubt on Mitra’s claim of residency in Aborlan.31

The COMELEC En Banc RulingThe COMELEC en banc – in a divided decision32 – subsequently denied Mitra’s motion to reconsider the First Division ruling under the following outlined reasons.

First, registration as a voter of Aborlan is not sufficient evidence that Mitra has successfully abandoned his domicile of origin.33

Second, mere intent cannot supplant the express requirement of the law; the "physical presence" required to establish domicile connotes actual, factual and bona fide residence in a given locality. The COMELEC en banc agreed with the First Division’s evidentiary findings on this point.34

Third, the First Division’s Resolution was based on a careful and judicious examination and consideration of all evidence submitted by the parties. The summary nature of the proceedings is not necessarily offensive to a party’s right to due process.35

Fourth, Fernandez v. House of Representatives Electoral Tribunal36 is not on all fours with the present case – Fernandez stemmed from a quo warranto case while the present case involves a petition to deny due course or cancel the COC. Likewise, Fernandez successfully proved that his transfer to Sta. Rosa City, Laguna several years prior to his candidacy was prompted by valid reasons, i.e., existence of his business in the area and the enrolment of his children at Sta. Rosa schools, thereby erasing doubts as to the bona fide nature of his transfer. In the present case, the COMELEC en banc found that Mitra admitted that his transfer to Aborlan in 2008 was prompted by his plans to run for governor in the 2010 national and local elections. The COMELEC en banc also noted that Fernandez involved an individual who had earned an overwhelming mandate from the electorate. The COMELEC en banc’s ruling on Mitra’s case, on the other hand, came before the 2010 elections; thus, the people had not then voted.37

In his Dissent,38 Commissioner Sarmiento points out that the following acts of Mitra, taken collectively, indubitably prove a change of domicile from Puerto Princesa to Aborlan:(a) in January 2008, [Mitra] started a pineapple growing project in a rented farmland near Maligaya Feedmill and Farm located in Barangay Isaub, Aborlan;(b) in February 2008, [Mitra] leased the residential portion of the said Maligaya Feedmill;(c) in March 2008, after the said residential portion has been refurbished and renovated, [Mitra] started to occupy and reside in the said premises;(d) in 2009, [Mitra] purchased his own farmland in the same barangay but continued the lease involving the Maligaya Feedmill, the contract of which was even renewed until February 2010; and(e) [Mitra] caused the construction of a house in the purchased lot which has been recently completed.39

The PetitionMitra supports his petition with the following ARGUMENTS:6.1 x x x COMELEC’s GRAVE ABUSE is most patent as IT forgets, wittingly or unwittingly that the solitary GROUND to deny due course to a COC is the DELIBERATE false material representation to DECEIVE, and not the issue of the candidate’s eligibility which should be resolved in an appropriate QUO WARRANTO proceedings

post election.40

6.2 Deny Due Course Petitions under Section 78 of the OEC, being SUMMARILY decided and resolved, the same must be exercised most sparingly, with utmost care and extreme caution; and construed most strictly against the proponent/s, and liberally in favor of the candidate sought to be eliminated. When exercised otherwise and with apparent biased in favor of the proponents, as in this instance, GRAVE ABUSE OF DISCRETION necessarily sets in.41

6.3 The mandate to be extremely cautious and careful in the SUMMARY exercise of the awesome power to simplistically cancel [one’s] candidacy x x x is further made manifest by the availability of a QUO WARRANTO proceeding appropriately prosecuted post election.42

6.4 Absent any formal HEARINGS and Presentation of Evidence; Lacking the actual inspection and verification; and without actual confrontation of affiants/alleged witnesses – ALL the "conclusions" of COMELEC on the RESIDENCE issue, were indeed predicted (sic) on sheer SPECULATION[.]43

6.5 A grievous procedural flaw, FATAL in character. THE BURDEN OF PROOF MUST ALWAYS BE PLACED ON THE SHOULDERS OF THE PROPONENT/s. Not so in the present controversy, where COMELEC’s assailed decision/s were devoted exclusively to the alleged weakness of MITRA’s submissions and COMELEC’s speculative conclusions, rather than on the strength of proponents’ unverified and unconfirmed submissions and unconfronted sworn statements of supposed affiants[.]44

The petition also asks for ancillary injunctive relief. We granted the application for injunctive relief by issuing a status quo ante order, allowing Mitra to be voted upon in the May 10, 2010 elections.45

The respondents’ Comment46 states the following counter-arguments:a. Procedural Arguments:II. THE INSTANT PETITION FAILED TO ATTACH CERTIFIED TRUE COPIES OF THE MATERIAL PORTIONS OF THE RECORDS REFERRED TO THEREIN IN GROSS CONTRAVENTION OF SECTION 5 OF RULE 64 OF THE RULES OF COURT. CONSEQUENTLY, IT MUST BE DISMISSED OUTRIGHT.III. THE INSTANT PETITION RAISES MERE ERRORS OF JUDGMENT, WHICH ARE OUTSIDE THIS HONORABLE COURT’S CERTIORARI JURISDICTION.b. Arguments on the MeritsI. XXXB. THE LAW, IN IMPOSING A RESIDENCY REQUIREMENT, MANDATES NOT ONLY FAMILIARITY WITH THE NEEDS AND CONDITIONS OF THE LOCALITY, BUT ALSO ACTUAL PHYSICAL, PERSONAL AND PERMANENT RESIDENCE THEREIN. PETITIONER’S SUPPOSED FAMILIARITY WITH THE "NEEDS, DIFFICULTIES, ASPIRATIONS, POTENTIALS (SIC) FOR GROWTH AND ALL MATTERS VITAL TO THE WELFARE OF HIS CONSTITUENCY WHICH CONSTITUTES ONE/THIRD OF THE WHOLE PROVINCE OF PALAWAN" AS A THREE-TERM CONGRESSMAN ABSENT SUCH RESIDENCE DOES NOT SUFFICE TO MEET THE RESIDENCY REQUIREMENT OF THE LAW.IV. FINDINGS OF FACTS OF ADMINISTRATIVE BODIES SUCH AS THE COMELEC, ARE ACCORDED GREAT RESPECT, IF NOT FINALITY BY THE COURTS, ESPECIALLY IF SUPPORTED BY SUBSTANTIAL EVIDENCE. BECAUSE THE FINDINGS OF FACTS OF THE COMELEC IN THE INSTANT CASE ARE OVERWHELMINGLY SUPPORTED BY SUBSTANTIAL EVIDENCE, THIS HONORABLE COURT MAY NOT REVERSE SUCH FINDINGS.V. THE COMELEC DID NOT COMMIT ANY GRAVE ABUSE OF DISCRETION AMOUNTING TO LACK OR EXCESS OF JURISDICTION IN ISSUING THE ASSAILED RESOLUTION DATED 04 MAY 2010.A. THE COMELEC CORRECTLY RULED THAT PETITIONER’S REGISTRATION AS A VOTER IN ABORLAN, PALAWAN IS NOT SUFFICIENT EVIDENCE THAT HE HAS SUCCESSFULLY ABANDONED HIS DOMICILE OF ORIGIN AT PUERTO PRINCESA CITY, PALAWAN.B. THE COMELEC CORRECTLY RULED THAT PETITIONER’S MERE INTENT TO TRANSFER RESIDENCE TO ABORLAN, PALAWAN, ABSENT ACTUAL, FACTUAL, AND BONA FIDE RESIDENCE THEREIN DOES NOT SUFFICE TO PROVE HIS TRANSFER OF RESIDENCE FROM PUERTO PRINCESA, PALAWAN TO ABORLAN, PALAWAN.C. THE COMELEC THOROUGHLY EVALUATED THE EVIDENCE, AND CORRECTLY ARRIVED AT THE ASSAILED DECISION ONLY AFTER MUCH DELIBERATION AND CAREFUL ASSESSMENT OF THE EVIDENCE, ALBEIT THROUGH SUMMARY PROCEEDINGS PARTICIPATED IN ACTIVELY BY PETITIONER. THE COMELEC CORRECTLY DID NOT GIVE CREDENCE TO THE TESTIMONIES OF PETITIONER’S WITNESSES FOR BEING INCREDIBLE AND CONTRARY TO THE PHYSICAL EVIDENCE, ESPECIALLY PERTAINING TO HIS ALLEGED RESIDENCE AT THE FEEDMILL PROPERTY.D. THE COMELEC CORRECTLY RULED THAT PETITIONER HAS NOT TRANSFERRED HIS RESIDENCE

FROM PUERTO PRINCESA, PALAWAN TO ABORLAN, PALAWAN.E. THE ALLEGED LEASE OF THE RESIDENTIAL PORTION OF THE FEEDMILL PROPERTY IS A SHAM.VI. GIVEN HIS STATURE AS A MEMBER OF THE PROMINENT MITRA CLAN OF PALAWAN, AND AS A 3-TERM CONGRESSMAN, IT IS HIGHLY INCREDIBLE THAT A SMALL ROOM IN A FEEDMILL HAS SERVED AS HIS RESIDENCE SINCE 2008.VII. THE COMELEC CORRECTLY RULED THAT PETITIONER MAY NOT INVOKE THE CASE OF FERNANDEZ V. HRET AS PETITIONER IS NOT SIMILARLY SITUATED AS DAN FERNANDEZ.VIII. THE MATERIAL STATEMENT IN PETITIONER’S COC RESPECTING HIS RESIDENCE HAS BEEN SHOWN TO BE FALSE. BY MAKING SUCH FALSE STATEMENT, PETITIONER DELIBERATELY TRIED TO MISLEAD AND TO MISINFORM THE ELECTORATE AS TO HIS ACTUAL RESIDENCE. HENCE, HIS COC WAS CORRECTLY DENIED DUE COURSE AND CANCELED.

In the recently concluded elections of May 10, 2010, Mitra obtained the most number of votes for Governor and was accordingly proclaimed winner of the Palawan gubernatorial contest.47

We required the respondents and the COMELEC to comment on the petition.48 They complied on May 6, 201049

and June 2, 2010, respectively.50 On May 17, 2010, the petitioner filed a "Supplemental Petition."51

On May 26, 2010, the respondents filed a "Supplemental Comment (with Omnibus Motion to Annul Proclamation and for Early Resolution)" to the petitioner’s "Supplemental Petition."52 We deemed the case ready for resolution on the basis of these submissions.

The Court’s RulingWe find the petition meritorious.The Limited Review in Certiorari Petitions under Rule 64, in relation to Rule 65 of the Rules of Court

A preliminary matter before us is the respondents’ jurisdictional objection based on the issues raised in the present petition. The respondents assert that the questions Mitra brought to us are beyond our certiorari jurisdiction. Specifically, the respondents contend that Mitra’s petition merely seeks to correct errors of the COMELEC in appreciating the parties’ evidence – a question we cannot entertain under our limited certiorari jurisdiction.

Mitra brought his case before us pursuant to Rule 64, in relation to Rule 65 of the Rules of Court. 53 Our review, therefore, is based on a very limited ground – the jurisdictional issue of whether the COMELEC acted without or in excess of its jurisdiction, or with grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction.

Whether the COMELEC, by law, has jurisdiction over a case or matter brought to it is resolved by considering the black-letter provisions of the Constitution and pertinent election laws, and we see no disputed issue on this point. Other than the respondents’ procedural objections which we will fully discuss below, the present case rests on the allegation of grave abuse of discretion – an issue that generally is not as simple to resolve.

As a concept, "grave abuse of discretion" defies exact definition; generally, it refers to "capricious or whimsical exercise of judgment as is equivalent to lack of jurisdiction"; the abuse of discretion must be patent and gross as to amount to an evasion of a positive duty or a virtual refusal to perform a duty enjoined by law, or to act at all in contemplation of law, as where the power is exercised in an arbitrary and despotic manner by reason of passion and hostility.54 Mere abuse of discretion is not enough; it must be grave.55 We have held, too, that the use of wrong or irrelevant considerations in deciding an issue is sufficient to taint a decision-maker’s action with grave abuse of discretion.56

Closely related with the limited focus of the present petition is the condition, under Section 5, Rule 64 of the Rules of Court, that findings of fact of the COMELEC, supported by substantial evidence, shall be final and non-reviewable. Substantial evidence is that degree of evidence that a reasonable mind might accept to support a conclusion.57

In light of our limited authority to review findings of fact, we do not ordinarily review in a certiorari case the COMELEC’s appreciation and evaluation of evidence. Any misstep by the COMELEC in this regard generally involves an error of judgment, not of jurisdiction.

In exceptional cases, however, when the COMELEC’s action on the appreciation and evaluation of evidence

oversteps the limits of its discretion to the point of being grossly unreasonable, the Court is not only obliged, but has the constitutional duty to intervene.58 When grave abuse of discretion is present, resulting errors arising from the grave abuse mutate from error of judgment to one of jurisdiction.59

Our reading of the petition shows that it is sufficient in form with respect to the requisite allegation of jurisdictional error. Mitra clearly alleged the COMELEC acts that were supposedly tainted with grave abuse of discretion. Thus, we do not agree with the respondents’ contention that the petition on its face raises mere errors of judgment that are outside our certiorari jurisdiction. Whether the allegations of "grave abuse" are duly supported and substantiated is another matter and is the subject of the discussions below.

Nature of the Case under Review:COC Denial/Cancellation ProceedingsThe present petition arose from a petition to deny due course or to cancel Mitra’s COC. This is the context of and take-off point for our review. From this perspective, the nature and requisites of the COC cancellation proceedings are primary considerations in resolving the present petition.60

Section 74, in relation to Section 78, of the Omnibus Election Code (OEC) governs the cancellation of, and grant or denial of due course to, COCs. The combined application of these sections requires that the candidate’s stated facts in the COC be true, under pain of the COC’s denial or cancellation if any false representation of a material fact is made. To quote these provisions:SEC. 74. Contents of certificate of candidacy. — The certificate of candidacy shall state that the person filing it is announcing his candidacy for the office stated therein and that he is eligible for said office; if for Member of the Batasang Pambansa, the province, including its component cities, highly urbanized city or district or sector which he seeks to represent; the political party to which he belongs; civil status; his date of birth; residence; his post office address for all election purposes; his profession or occupation; that he will support and defend the Constitution of the Philippines and will maintain true faith and allegiance thereto; that he will obey the laws, legal orders, and decrees promulgated by the duly constituted authorities; that he is not a permanent resident or immigrant to a foreign country; that the obligation imposed by his oath is assumed voluntarily, without mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that the facts stated in the certificate of candidacy are true to the best of his knowledge.x x x xSEC. 78. Petition to deny due course to or cancel a certificate of candidacy. – A verified petition seeking to deny due course or to cancel a certificate of candidacy may be filed by any person exclusively on the ground that any material representation contained therein as required under Section 74 hereof is false. The petition may be filed at any time not later than twenty-five days from the time of the filing of the certificate of candidacy and shall be decided, after due notice and hearing not later than fifteen days before the election.

The false representation that these provisions mention must necessarily pertain to a material fact. The critical material facts are those that refer to a candidate’s qualifications for elective office, such as his or her citizenship and residence. The candidate’s status as a registered voter in the political unit where he or she is a candidate similarly falls under this classification as it is a requirement that, by law (the Local Government Code), must be reflected in the COC. The reason for this is obvious: the candidate, if he or she wins, will work for and represent the political unit where he or she ran as a candidate.61

The false representation under Section 78 must likewise be a "deliberate attempt to mislead, misinform, or hide a fact that would otherwise render a candidate ineligible." Given the purpose of the requirement, it must be made with the intention to deceive the electorate as to the would-be candidate’s qualifications for public office.62 Thus, the misrepresentation that Section 78 addresses cannot be the result of a mere innocuous mistake, and cannot exist in a situation where the intent to deceive is patently absent, or where no deception on the electorate results. The deliberate character of the misrepresentation necessarily follows from a consideration of the consequences of any material falsity: a candidate who falsifies a material fact cannot run; if he runs and is elected, he cannot serve; in both cases, he can be prosecuted for violation of the election laws.

Based on these standards, we find that Mitra did not commit any deliberate material misrepresentation in his COC. The COMELEC gravely abused its discretion in its appreciation of the evidence, leading it to conclude that Mitra is not a resident of Aborlan, Palawan. The COMELEC, too, failed to critically consider whether Mitra deliberately attempted to mislead, misinform or hide a fact that would otherwise render him ineligible for the position of Governor of Palawan.

Under the evidentiary situation of the case, there is clearly no basis for the conclusion that Mitra deliberately attempted to mislead the Palawan electorate.

From the start, Mitra never hid his intention to transfer his residence from Puerto Princesa City to Aborlan to comply with the residence requirement of a candidate for an elective provincial office. Republic Act No. 7160, otherwise known as the Local Government Code, does not abhor this intended transfer of residence, as its Section 39 merely requires an elective local official to be a resident of the local government unit where he intends to run for at least one (1) year immediately preceding the day of the election. In other words, the law itself recognizes implicitly that there can be a change of domicile or residence, but imposes only the condition that residence at the new place should at least be for a year. Of course, as a continuing requirement or qualification, the elected official must remain a resident there for the rest of his term.

Mitra’s domicile of origin is undisputedly Puerto Princesa City. For him to qualify as Governor – in light of the relatively recent change of status of Puerto Princesa City from a component city to a highly urbanized city whose residents can no longer vote for provincial officials – he had to abandon his domicile of origin and acquire a new one within the local government unit where he intended to run; this would be his domicile of choice. To acquire a domicile of choice, jurisprudence, which the COMELEC correctly invoked, requires the following:(1) residence or bodily presence in a new locality;(2) an intention to remain there; and(3) an intention to abandon the old domicile.63

The contentious issues in Mitra’s case relate to his bodily presence, or the lack of it, in Aborlan, and the declaration he made on this point. The respondents anchor their cause of action on the alleged falsity of Mitra’s statement that he is a resident of Aborlan. To support this contention, the respondents claim that the construction of the supposed Mitra residence or house, other than the leased premises in Maligaya Feedmill, has yet to be completed, leaving Mitra with no habitable place in Aborlan. When Mitra successfully refuted this original claim, the respondents presented sworn statements of Aborlan residents contradicting Mitra’s claimed physical residence at the Maligaya Feedmill building in Aborlan. They likewise point out, by sworn statements, that this alleged residence could not be considered a house that Mitra could properly consider his residence, on the view that the feedmill place is beneath what Mitra – a three-term congressman and a member of the Mitra political clan of Palawan – would occupy.

Mitra, on the other hand, presented sworn statements of various persons (including the seller of the land he purchased, the lessor of the Maligaya Feedmill, and the Punong Barangay of the site of his residence) attesting to his physical residence in Aborlan; photographs of the residential portion of Maligaya Feedmill where he resides, and of his experimental pineapple plantation, farm, farmhouse and cock farm; the lease contract over the Maligaya Feedmill; and the deed of sale of the lot where he has started constructing his house. He clarified, too, that he does not claim residence in Aborlan at the house then under construction; his actual residence is the mezzanine portion of the Maligaya Feedmill building.

Faced with the seemingly directly contradictory evidence, the COMELEC apparently grossly misread its import and, because it used wrong considerations, was led into its faulty conclusion.

The seeming contradictions arose from the sworn statements of some Aborlan residents attesting that they never saw Mitra in Aborlan; these are controverted by similar sworn statements by other Aborlan residents that Mitra physically resides in Aborlan. The number of witnesses and their conflicting claims for and against Mitra’s residency appear to have sidetracked the COMELEC. Substantial evidence, however, is not a simple question of number; reason demands that the focus be on what these differing statements say.

For example, the sworn statements that Mitra has never been seen in Aborlan border on the unbelievable and loudly speak of their inherent weakness as evidence.

Mitra has established business interests in Aborlan, a fact which the respondents have never disputed. He was then the incumbent three-term Representative who, as early as 2008, already entertained thoughts of running for Governor in 2010. It is not disputed, too, that Mitra has started the construction of a house on a lot he bought from Rexter Temple; the site is very near the Maligaya Feedmill that he leased from its owner, Carme Caspe.

While Mitra might not have stayed in Aborlan nor in Palawan for most of 2008 and 2009 because his office and activities as a Representative were in Manila, it is hardly credible that he would not be seen in Aborlan. In this

regard, the sworn statement of the Punong Barangay of Isaub, Aborlan should carry a lot more weight than the statements of punong barangay officials elsewhere since it is the business of a punong barangay to know who the residents are in his own barangay. The COMELEC apparently missed all these because it was fixated on the perceived coldness and impersonality of Mitra’s dwelling.

The parties’ submitted documentary evidence likewise requires careful consideration for the correct appraisal of its evidentiary value. On the one hand, the document of sale of the Temple property, the building permit for the house under construction, and the community tax certificate used in these transactions all stated that Mitra’s residence was Puerto Princesa City. On the other hand, Mitra introduced a notarized contract of lease – supported by the sworn explanation of the lessor (Carme Caspe) – showing that he indeed leased Maligaya Feedmill. He submitted, too, a residence certificate showing Aborlan as his residence, and an identification card of the House of Representatives showing Aborlan as his residence.

We cannot give full evidentiary weight to the contract of sale as evidence relating to Mitra’s residence for two reasons. First, it is a unilateral contract executed by the seller (Rexter Temple); thus, his statement and belief as to Mitra’s personal circumstances cannot be taken as conclusive against the latter. Second, the sale involved several vendees, including Mitra’s brother (Ramon B. Mitra) and one Peter Winston T. Gonzales; his co-vendees still live in Puerto Princesa City; hence, they were all loosely and collectively described to have their residence in Puerto Princesa City.64 Parenthetically, the document simply stated: "I, REXTER TEMPLE, of legal age, Filipino, single and resident of Isaub, Aborlan, Palawan, hereby by these presents, x x x do hereby SELL, TRANSFER and CONVEY unto the said Vendees, ABRAHAM KAHLIL B. MITRA, single; RAMON B. MITRA, married to Mary Ann Mitra; PETER WINSTON T. GONZALES, married to Florecita R. Gonzales, all of legal ages and residents [of] Rancho Sta. Monica, Brgy. Sta. Monica, Puerto Princesa City, their heirs and assigns."65 Thus, the contract contained a mere general statement that loosely described the vendees as Puerto Princesa City residents. This general statement solely came from the vendor.

The building permit, on the other hand, was filed by Mitra’s representative, an architect named John Quillope, who apparently likewise filled the form. That Mitra only signed the building permit form is readily discernible from an examination of the face of the form; even the statement on his community tax certificate bearing a Puerto Princesa City residence does not appear in his handwriting.66 Significantly, Mitra’s secretary – Lilia Camora – attested that it was she who secured the community tax certificate for Mitra in February 2009 without the latter’s knowledge. 67

Annex "M" of the respondents’ Petition before the COMELEC indeed shows that the community tax certificate did not bear the signature of Mitra.68 Mitra secured his own certificate in Aborlan on March 18, 2009. This community tax certificate carries his own signature.69 Parenthetically, per Carme Caspe’s statement, Mitra leased the feedmill residence in February 2008 and started moving in his belongings in March 2008, confirming the veracity of his Aborlan presence at the time he secured his community tax certificate.70 In these lights, the February 3, 2009 community tax certificate, if at all, carries very little evidentiary value.

The respondents expectedly attacked the validity of the lease contract; they contended in their Memorandum that the feedmill was situated in a forest land that cannot be leased, and that the contract, while notarized, was not registered with the required notarial office of the court.71

The validity of the lease contract, however, is not the issue before us; what concerns us is the question of whether Mitra did indeed enter into an agreement for the lease, or strictly for the use, of the Maligaya Feedmill as his residence (while his house, on the lot he bought, was under construction) and whether he indeed resided there. The notary’s compliance with the notarial law likewise assumes no materiality as it is a defect not imputable to Mitra; what is important is the parties’ affirmation before a notary public of the contract’s genuineness and due execution.

A sworn statement that has no counterpart in the respondents’ evidence in so far as it provides details (particularly when read with the statement of Ricardo Temple)72 is Carme Caspe’s statement73 on how Mitra’s transfer of residence took place. Read together, these statements attest that the transfer of residence was accomplished, not in one single move but, through an incremental process that started in early 2008 and was in place by March 2009, although the house Mitra intended to be his permanent home was not yet then completed.74

In considering the residency issue, the COMELEC practically focused solely on its consideration of Mitra’s residence at Maligaya Feedmill, on the basis of mere photographs of the premises. In the COMELEC’s view (expressly voiced out by the Division and fully concurred in by the En Banc), the Maligaya Feedmill building could

not have been Mitra’s residence because it is cold and utterly devoid of any indication of Mitra’s personality and that it lacks loving attention and details inherent in every home to make it one’s residence. 75 This was the main reason that the COMELEC relied upon for its conclusion.

Such assessment, in our view, based on the interior design and furnishings of a dwelling as shown by and examined only through photographs, is far from reasonable; the COMELEC thereby determined the fitness of a dwelling as a person’s residence based solely on very personal and subjective assessment standards when the law is replete with standards that can be used. Where a dwelling qualifies as a residence – i.e., the dwelling where a person permanently intends to return to and to remain76 – his or her capacity or inclination to decorate the place, or the lack of it, is immaterial.

Examined further, the COMELEC’s reasoning is not only intensely subjective but also flimsy, to the point of grave abuse of discretion when compared with the surrounding indicators showing the Mitra has indeed been physically present in Aborlan for the required period with every intent to settle there. Specifically, it was lost on the COMELEC majority (but not on the Dissent) that Mitra made definite, although incremental transfer moves, as shown by the undisputed business interests he has established in Aborlan in 2008; by the lease of a dwelling where he established his base; by the purchase of a lot for his permanent home; by his transfer of registration as a voter in March 2009; and by the construction of a house all viewed against the backdrop of a bachelor Representative who spent most of his working hours in Manila, who had a whole congressional district to take care of, and who was establishing at the same time his significant presence in the whole Province of Palawan.

From these perspectives, we cannot but conclude that the COMELEC’s approach – i.e., the application of subjective non-legal standards and the gross misappreciation of the evidence – is tainted with grave abuse of discretion, as the COMELEC used wrong considerations and grossly misread the evidence in arriving at its conclusion. In using subjective standards, the COMELEC committed an act not otherwise within the contemplation of law on an evidentiary point that served as a major basis for its conclusion in the case.

With this analysis and conclusion in mind, we come to the critical question of whether Mitra deliberately misrepresented that his residence is in Aborlan to deceive and mislead the people of the Province of Palawan.

We do not believe that he committed any deliberate misrepresentation given what he knew of his transfer, as shown by the moves he had made to carry it out. From the evidentiary perspective, we hold that the evidence confirming residence in Aborlan decidedly tilts in Mitra’s favor; even assuming the worst for Mitra, the evidence in his favor cannot go below the level of an equipoise, i.e., when weighed, Mitra’s evidence of transfer and residence in Aborlan cannot be overcome by the respondents’ evidence that he remained a Puerto Princesa City resident. Under the situation prevailing when Mitra filed his COC, we cannot conclude that Mitra committed any misrepresentation, much less a deliberate one, about his residence.

The character of Mitra’s representation before the COMELEC is an aspect of the case that the COMELEC completely failed to consider as it focused mainly on the character of Mitra’s feedmill residence. For this reason, the COMELEC was led into error – one that goes beyond an ordinary error of judgment. By failing to take into account whether there had been a deliberate misrepresentation in Mitra’s COC, the COMELEC committed the grave abuse of simply assuming that an error in the COC was necessarily a deliberate falsity in a material representation. In this case, it doubly erred because there was no falsity; as the carefully considered evidence shows, Mitra did indeed transfer his residence within the period required by Section 74 of the OEC.

The respondents significantly ask us in this case to adopt the same faulty approach of using subjective norms, as they now argue that given his stature as a member of the prominent Mitra clan of Palawan, and as a three term congressman, it is highly incredible that a small room in a feed mill has served as his residence since 2008.77

We reject this suggested approach outright for the same reason we condemned the COMELEC’s use of subjective non-legal standards. Mitra’s feed mill dwelling cannot be considered in isolation and separately from the circumstances of his transfer of residence, specifically, his expressed intent to transfer to a residence outside of Puerto Princesa City to make him eligible to run for a provincial position; his preparatory moves starting in early 2008; his initial transfer through a leased dwelling; the purchase of a lot for his permanent home; and the construction of a house in this lot that, parenthetically, is adjacent to the premises he leased pending the completion of his house. These incremental moves do not offend reason at all, in the way that the COMELEC’s highly subjective non-legal standards do.

Thus, we can only conclude, in the context of the cancellation proceeding before us, that the respondents have not presented a convincing case sufficient to overcome Mitra’s evidence of effective transfer to and residence in Aborlan and the validity of his representation on this point in his COC, while the COMELEC could not even present any legally acceptable basis to conclude that Mitra’s statement in his COC regarding his residence was a misrepresentation.

Mitra has significant relationship with, and intimate knowledge of, the constituency he wishes to serve.

Citing jurisprudence, we began this ponencia with a discussion of the purpose of the residency requirement under the law. By law, this residency can be anywhere within the Province of Palawan, except for Puerto Princesa City because of its reclassification as a highly urbanized city. Thus, residency in Aborlan is completely consistent with the purpose of the law, as Mitra thereby declared and proved his required physical presence in the Province of Palawan.

We also consider that even before his transfer of residence, he already had intimate knowledge of the Province of Palawan, particularly of the whole 2nd legislative district that he represented for three terms. For that matter, even the respondents themselves impliedly acknowledged that the Mitras, as a family, have been identified with elective public service and politics in the Province of Palawan.78 This means to us that Mitra grew up in the politics of Palawan.

We can reasonably conclude from all these that Mitra is not oblivious to the needs, difficulties, aspirations, potential for growth and development, and all matters vital to the common welfare of the constituency he intends to serve. Mitra who is no stranger to Palawan has merely been compelled – after serving three terms as representative of the congressional district that includes Puerto Princesa City and Aborlan – by legal developments to transfer his residence to Aborlan to qualify as a Province of Palawan voter. To put it differently, were it not for the reclassification of Puerto Princesa City from a component city to a highly urbanized city, Mitra would not have encountered any legal obstacle to his intended gubernatorial bid based on his knowledge of and sensitivity to the needs of the Palawan electorate.

This case, incidentally, is not the first that we have encountered where a former elective official had to transfer residence in order to continue his public service in another political unit that he could not legally access, as a candidate, without a change of residence.

In Torayno, Sr. v. COMELEC,79 former Governor Vicente Y. Emano re-occupied a house he owned and had leased out in Cagayan de Oro City to qualify as a candidate for the post of Mayor of that city (like Puerto Princesa City, a highly urbanized city whose residents cannot vote for and be voted upon as elective provincial officials). We said in that case that –In other words, the actual, physical and personal presence of herein private respondent in Cagayan de Oro City is substantial enough to show his intention to fulfill the duties of mayor and for the voters to evaluate his qualifications for the mayorship. Petitioners' very legalistic, academic and technical approach to the residence requirement does not satisfy this simple, practical and common-sense rationale for the residence requirement.

In Asistio v. Hon. Trinidad Pe-Aguirre,80 we also had occasion to rule on the residency and right to vote of former Congressman Luis A. Asistio who had been a congressman for Caloocan in 1992, 1995, 1998 and 2004, and, in the words of the Decision, "is known to be among the prominent political families in Caloocan City."81 We recognized Asistio’s position that a mistake had been committed in his residency statement, and concluded that the mistake is not "proof that Asistio has abandoned his domicile in Caloocan City, or that he has established residence outside of Caloocan City." By this recognition, we confirmed that Asistio has not committed any deliberate misrepresentation in his COC.

These cases are to be distinguished from the case of Velasco v. COMELEC82 where the COMELEC cancelled the COC of Velasco, a mayoralty candidate, on the basis of his undisputed knowledge, at the time he filed his COC, that his inclusion and registration as a voter had been denied. His failure to register as a voter was a material fact that he had clearly withheld from the COMELEC; he knew of the denial of his application to register and yet concealed his non-voter status when he filed his COC. Thus, we affirmed the COMELEC’s action in cancelling his COC.

If there is any similarity at all in Velasco and the present case, that similarity is in the recognition in both cases of the rule of law. In Velasco, we recognized – based on the law – that a basic defect existed prior to his candidacy, leading to his disqualification and the vice-mayor-elect’s assumption to the office. In the present case, we recognize the validity of Mitra’s COC, again on the basis of substantive and procedural law, and no occasion arises for the vice-governor-elect to assume the gubernatorial post.Mitra has been proclaimed winner in the electoral contest and has therefore the mandate of the electorate to serve.

We have applied in past cases the principle that the manifest will of the people as expressed through the ballot must be given fullest effect; in case of doubt, political laws must be interpreted to give life and spirit to the popular mandate.83 Thus, we have held that while provisions relating to certificates of candidacy are in mandatory terms, it is an established rule of interpretation as regards election laws, that mandatory provisions, requiring certain steps before elections, will be construed as directory after the elections, to give effect to the will of the people.84

Quite recently, however, we warned against a blanket and unqualified reading and application of this ruling, as it may carry dangerous significance to the rule of law and the integrity of our elections. For one, such blanket/unqualified reading may provide a way around the law that effectively negates election requirements aimed at providing the electorate with the basic information for an informed choice about a candidate’s eligibility and fitness for office.85 Short of adopting a clear cut standard, we thus made the following clarification:We distinguish our ruling in this case from others that we have made in the past by the clarification that COC defects beyond matters of form and that involve material misrepresentations cannot avail of the benefit of our ruling that COC mandatory requirements before elections are considered merely directory after the people shall have spoken. A mandatory and material election law requirement involves more than the will of the people in any given locality. Where a material COC misrepresentation under oath is made, thereby violating both our election and criminal laws, we are faced as well with an assault on the will of the people of the Philippines as expressed in our laws. In a choice between provisions on material qualifications of elected officials, on the one hand, and the will of the electorate in any given locality, on the other, we believe and so hold that we cannot choose the electorate will.86

Earlier, Frivaldo v. COMELEC87 provided the following test:[T]his Court has repeatedly stressed the importance of giving effect to the sovereign will in order to ensure the survival of our democracy. In any action involving the possibility of a reversal of the popular electoral choice, this Court must exert utmost effort to resolve the issues in a manner that would give effect to the will of the majority, for it is merely sound public policy to cause elective offices to be filled by those who are the choice of the majority. To successfully challenge a winning candidate's qualifications, the petitioner must clearly demonstrate that the ineligibility is so patently antagonistic to constitutional and legal principles that overriding such ineligibility and thereby giving effect to the apparent will of the people would ultimately create greater prejudice to the very democratic institutions and juristic traditions that our Constitution and laws so zealously protect and promote. [Emphasis supplied.]

With the conclusion that Mitra did not commit any material misrepresentation in his COC, we see no reason in this case to appeal to the primacy of the electorate’s will. We cannot deny, however, that the people of Palawan have spoken in an election where residency qualification had been squarely raised and their voice has erased any doubt about their verdict on Mitra’s qualifications.

WHEREFORE, premises considered, we GRANT the petition and ANNUL the assailed COMELEC Resolutions in Antonio V. Gonzales and Orlando R. Balbon, Jr. v. Abraham Kahlil B. Mitra (SPA No. 09-038 [C]). We DENY the respondents’ petition to cancel Abraham Kahlil Mitra’s Certificate of Candidacy. No costs.

SO ORDERED.

G.R. No. 137329               August 9, 2000ROGELIO M. TORAYNO SR., GENEROSO ELIGAN and JACQUELINE M. SERIÑO, petitioners, vs.COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS and VICENTE Y. EMANO, respondents.

D E C I S I O N

PANGANIBAN, J.:The Constitution and the law requires residence as a qualification for seeking and holding elective public office, in order to give candidates the opportunity to be familiar with the needs, difficulties, aspirations, potentials for growth and all matters vital to the welfare of their constituencies; likewise, it enables the electorate to evaluate the office seekers' qualifications and fitness for the job they aspire for. Inasmuch as Vicente Y. Emano has proven that he, together with his family, (1) had actually resided in a house he bought in 1973 in Cagayan de Oro City; (2) had actually held office there during his three terms as provincial governor of Misamis Oriental, the provincial capitol being located therein; and (3) has registered as voter in the city during the period required by law, he could not be deemed "a stranger or newcomer" when he ran for and was overwhelmingly voted as city mayor. Election laws must be liberally construed to give effect to the popular mandate.

The CaseBefore us is a Petition for Certiorari under Rule 65 of the Rules of Court seeking to set aside the January 18, 1999 Resolution1 of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) en banc in SPA No. 98-298, which upheld the July 14, 1998 Resolution2 of the Comelec First Division. The assailed Resolutions ruled that Private Respondent Vicente Y. Emano possessed the minimum period of residence to be eligible to vote in Cagayan de Oro City, as well as be voted mayor thereof.

The FactsThe pertinent facts of the case, as culled from the records, are as follows.

During the 1995 elections, Vicente Y. Emano ran for, was elected, and proclaimed provincial governor of Misamis Oriental. It was his third consecutive term as governor of the province. In his Certificate of Candidacy dated March 12, 1995, his residence was declared to be in Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental.

On June 14, 1997, while still the governor of Misamis Oriental, Emano executed a Voter Registration Record in Cagayan de Oro City (geographically located in the Province of Misamis Oriental), a highly urbanized city, in which he claimed 20 years of residence. On March 25, 1998, he filed his Certificate of Candidacy for mayor of the city, stating therein that his residence for the preceding two years and five months was at 1409 San Jose Street, Capistrano Subdivision, Gusa, Cagayan de Oro City.

Among those who ran for the mayorship of the city in 1998, along with Emano, was Erasmo B. Damasing, counsel of herein petitioners. On May 15, 1998, Petitioners Rogelio M. Torayno Sr., Generoso Q. Eligan and Jacqueline M. Seriño, all residents of Cagayan de Oro City, filed a Petition before the Comelec, docketed as SPA No. 98-298, in which they sought the disqualification of Emano as mayoral candidate, on the ground that he had allegedly failed to meet the one-year residence requirement. Prior to the resolution of their Petition, the Comelec proclaimed private respondent as the duly elected city mayor. Thus, on May 29, 1998, petitioners filed another Petition before the Comelec, this time for quo warranto,3 in which they sought (1) the annulment of the election of private respondent; and (2) the proclamation of Erasmo B. Damasing, who had garnered the next highest number of votes, as the duly elected mayor of the city.

In its Resolution dated July 14, 1998, the Comelec First Division denied the Petition for Disqualification. Upon petitioners' Motion for Reconsideration and Motion for Consolidation, the two cases were consolidated.4

Ruling of the ComelecAs earlier stated, the Comelec en banc upheld the findings and conclusions of the First Division, holding that "[t]he records clearly show that the respondent is an actual resident of Cagayan de Oro City for such a period of time necessary to qualify him to run for mayor therein. This fact is clearly established by the respondent having a house in the city which has been existing therein since 1973 and where his family has been living since then."

Additionally, it ruled:"There is nothing in the law which bars an elected provincial official from residing and/or registering as a voter in a highly urbanized city whose residents are not given the right to vote for and be elected to a position in the province embracing such highly urbanized city as long as he has complied with the requirements prescribed by law in the case of a qualified voter.

"Neither can the list of voters submitted as evidence for the petitioners showing that the respondent was a

registered voter as of March 13, 1995 in Precinct No. 12, Barangay Poblacion, Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental bolster the petitioner's argument that the respondent is not a resident [or a] registered voter in Cagayan de Oro City since registration in said Precinct No. 12 does not preclude the respondent from registering anew in another place."

Hence, this recourse5 before this Court.

IssuesIn their Memorandum,6 petitioners submit that the main issue is whether the "Comelec gravely abused its discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction in issuing the questioned Resolutions." Allegedly, the resolution of this issue would depend on the following:7

"1. Whether or not private respondent Emano's(a) remaining as governor of Misamis Oriental until he filed his certificate of candidacy for mayor of Cagayan de Oro City on March 25, 1998 in the May 11, 1998 election;(b) asserting under oath [that he was] qualified to act as governor of said province until said date; and(c) admitting, in sworn statements, [that he was] a resident of Misamis Oriental,

precluded him from acquiring a bona fide domicile of choice for at least one (1) year in Cagayan de Oro City prior to the May 11, 1998 elections, as to disqualify him for being a candidate for city mayor of said City.

2. Differently stated, whether or not Emano's securing a residence certificate in Cagayan de Oro City, holding offices as governor of Misamis Oriental in the Capitol Building located in Cagayan de Oro City and having a house therein where [he had] stay[ed] during his tenure as governor, and registering as a voter in said City in June 1997, would be legally sufficient, as against the undisputed facts above enumerated, to constitute a change of his domicile of birth in Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental in favor of a new domicile of choice in Cagayan de Oro City for at least one (1) year for purposes of qualifying him to run for city mayor in the May 11, 1998 elections.

3. Whether or not Erasmo Damasing, the candidate for mayor of Cagayan de Oro City in the May 11, 1998 elections, who received the second highest number of votes, can be declared winner, considering that respondent Emano was disqualified to run for and hold said office and considering that his disqualification or ineligibility had been extensively brought to the attention and consciousness of the voters prior to the May 11, 1998 election as to attain notoriety, notwithstanding which they still voted for him."

Petitioners are seeking the resolution of essentially two questions: (1) whether private respondent had duly established his residence in Cagayan de Oro City at least one year prior to the May 11, 1998 elections to qualify him to run for the mayorship thereof; and (2) if not, whether Erasmo Damasing, the candidate who had received the second highest number of votes, should be proclaimed mayor of the city.

The Court’s RulingThe Petition has no merit.

Preliminary Matter: Locus Standi of PetitionersAlthough not raised by the parties, the legal standing of the petitioners was deliberated upon by the Court. We note that petitioners pray, among others, for judgment "declaring Atty. Erasmo B. Damasing as entitled to be proclaimed winner as mayor in the May 11, 1998 elections in Cagayan de Oro City." 8 And yet, Damasing is not a party to the instant "Petition for Certiorari pursuant to Rule[s] 64 and 65" brought before us.

Under the Rules of Court, a quo warranto may be brought only by (1) the solicitor general or (2) a public prosecutor or (3) a person claiming to be entitled to the public office or position usurped or unlawfully held or exercised by another.9 A reading of the Rules shows that petitioners, none of whom qualify under any of the above three categories, are without legal standing to bring this suit.

However, the present Petition finds its root in two separate cases filed before the Comelec: (1) SPC 98-298 for disqualification and (2) EPC 98-62 for quo warranto. Under our election laws and the Comelec Rules of Procedure, any voter may file a petition to disqualify a candidate on grounds provided by law,10 or to contest the election of a city officer on the ground of ineligibility or disloyalty to the Republic.11 The petitioners herein, being "duly-registered voters" of Cagayan de Oro City, therefore satisfy the requirement of said laws and rules.12

Main Issue: Residence Qualification for Candidacy

Petitioners argue that private respondent maintains his domicile in Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental, not in Cagayan de Oro City, as allegedly shown by the following facts: (1) he had run and won as governor of the province of Misamis Oriental for three consecutive terms immediately preceding the 1998 elections; (2) in the pleadings he filed in connection with an election protest against him relating to the 1995 election, he had stated that he was a resident of Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental; (3) he had fully exercised the powers and prerogatives of governor until he filed his Certificate of Candidacy for mayor on March 25, 1998.

Petitioners claim that in discharging his duties as provincial governor, private respondent remained a resident of the province. They aver that residence is a continuing qualification that an elective official must possess throughout his term. Thus, private respondent could not have changed his residence to Cagayan de Oro City while he was still governor of Misamis Oriental.

Petitioners further contend that the following were not sufficient to constitute a change of domicile: having a house in Cagayan de Oro City, residing therein while exercising one's office as governor (the city being the seat of government of the province), securing a residence certificate and registering as voter therein.

Private respondent, on the other hand, alleges that he actually and physically resided in Cagayan de Oro City while serving as provincial governor for three consecutive terms, since the seat of the provincial government was located at the heart of that city.13 He also avers that one's choice of domicile is a matter of intention, and it is the person concerned who would be in the best position to make a choice. In this case, Emano decided to adopt Cagayan de Oro City as his place of residence after the May 1995 elections. In fact, in January 1997, he secured his Community Tax Certificate at the City Treasurer's Office, stating therein that he was a resident of 1409 San Jose Street, Capistrano Subdivision, Gusa, Cagayan de Oro City. During the general registration of voters in June 1997, he registered in one of the precincts of Gusa, Cagayan de Oro City. This meant that, at the time, Emano had been a voter of the city for the minimum period required by law. No one has ever challenged this fact before any tribunal.

Private respondent contends further that his transfer of legal residence did not ipso facto divest him of his position as provincial governor. First, there is no law that prevents an elected official from transferring residence while in office. Second, an elective official's transfer of residence does not prevent the performance of that official's duties, especially in private respondent's case in which the seat of government became his adopted place of residence. Third, as ruled in Frivaldo v. Comelec,14 the loss of any of the required qualifications for election merely renders the official's title or right to office open to challenge. In Emano's case, no one challenged his right to the Office of Provincial Governor when he transferred his residence to Cagayan de Oro City. Naturally, he continued to discharge his functions as such, until he filed his candidacy for mayor in March 1998.

Lastly, Emano urges that the sanctity of the people's will, as expressed in the election result, must be respected. He is not, after all, a stranger to the city, much less to its voters. During his three terms as governor of Misamis Oriental, his life and actuations have been closely interwoven with the pulse and beat of Cagayan de Oro City.

Public Respondent Comelec relies essentially on Romualdez-Marcos v. Comelec15 in its Memorandum16 which supports the assailed Resolutions, and which has been filed in view of the solicitor general's Manifestation and Motion in Lieu of Comment.17 Thus, the poll body argues that "x x x the fact of residence x x x ought to be decisive in determining whether or not an individual has satisfied the Constitution's residency qualification requirement."

Law on Qualifications of Local Elective OfficialsThe pertinent provision sought to be enforced is Section 39 of the Local Government Code (LGC) of 1991, 18 which provides for the qualifications of local elective officials, as follows:"SEC. 39. Qualifications. - (a) An elective local official must be a citizen of the Philippines; a registered voter in the barangay, municipality, city, or province x x x where he intends to be elected; a resident therein for at least one (1) year immediately preceding the day of the election; and able to read and write Filipino or any other local language or dialect."Generally, in requiring candidates to have a minimum period of residence in the area in which they seek to be elected, the Constitution or the law intends to prevent the possibility of a "stranger or newcomer unacquainted with the conditions and needs of a community and not identified with the latter from [seeking] an elective office to serve that community."19 Such provision is aimed at excluding outsiders "from taking advantage of favorable circumstances existing in that community for electoral gain."20 Establishing residence in a community merely to meet an election law requirement defeats the purpose of representation: to elect through the assent of voters those

most cognizant and sensitive to the needs of the community. This purpose is "best met by individuals who have either had actual residence in the area for a given period or who have been domiciled in the same area either by origin or by choice."21

Facts Showing Change of ResidenceIn the recent en banc case Mamba-Perez v. Comelec,22 this Court ruled that private respondent therein, now Representative Rodolfo E. Aguinaldo of the Third District of Cagayan, had duly proven his change of residence from Gattaran, Cagayan (part of the First District) to Tuguegarao, Cagayan (part of the Third District in which he sought election as congressman). He proved it with the following facts: (1) in July 1990, he leased and lived in a residential apartment in Magallanes Street, Tuguegarao, Cagayan; (2) in July 1995, he leased another residential apartment in Kamias Street, Tanza, Tuguegarao, Cagayan; (3) the January 18, 1998 Certificate of Marriage between Aguinaldo and his second wife, Lerma Dumaguit; (4) the Certificate of Live Birth of his second daughter; and (5) various letters addressed to him and his family showed that he had been a resident of Tuguegarao for at least one year immediately preceding the May 1998 elections. The Court also stated that it was not "of much importance that in his [Aguinaldo's] certificates of candidacy for provincial governor in the elections of 1988, 1992, and 1995, private respondent stated that he was a resident of Gattaran."23

In the case at bar, the Comelec found that private respondent and his family had actually been residing in Capistrano Subdivision, Gusa, Cagayan de Oro City, in a house he had bought in 1973. Furthermore, during the three terms (1988-1998) that he was governor of Misamis Oriental, he physically lived in that city, where the seat of the provincial government was located. In June 1997, he also registered as voter of the same city. Based on our ruling in Mamba-Perez, these facts indubitably prove that Vicente Y. Emano was a resident of Cagayan de Oro City for a period of time sufficient to qualify him to run for public office therein. Moreover, the Comelec did not find any bad faith on the part of Emano in his choice of residence.

Petitioners put much emphasis on the fact that Cagayan de Oro City is a highly urbanized city whose voters cannot participate in the provincial elections. Such political subdivisions and voting restrictions, however, are simply for the purpose of parity in representation. The classification of an area as a highly urbanized or independent component city, for that matter, does not completely isolate its residents, politics, commerce and other businesses from the entire province -- and vice versa -- especially when the city is located at the very heart of the province itself, as in this case.

Undeniably, Cagayan de Oro City was once an integral part of Misamis Oriental and remains a geographical part of the province. Not only is it at the center of the province; more important, it is itself the seat of the provincial government. As a consequence, the provincial officials who carry out their functions in the city cannot avoid residing therein; much less, getting acquainted with its concerns and interests. Vicente Y. Emano, having been the governor of Misamis Oriental for three terms and consequently residing in Cagayan de Oro City within that period, could not be said to be a stranger or newcomer to the city in the last year of his third term, when he decided to adopt it as his permanent place of residence.

Significantly, the Court also declared in Mamba-Perez that "although private respondent declared in his certificates of candidacy prior to the May 11, 1998 elections that he was a resident of Gattaran, Cagayan, the fact is that he was actually a resident of the Third District not just for one (1) year prior to the May 11, 1998 elections but for more than seven (7) years since July 1990. His claim that he ha[s] been a resident of Tuguegarao since July 1990 is credible considering that he was governor from 1988 to 1998 and, therefore, it would be convenient for him to maintain his residence in Tuguegarao, which is the capital of the province of Cagayan."

Similarly in the instant case, private respondent was actually and physically residing in Cagayan de Oro City while discharging his duties as governor of Misamis Oriental. He owned a house in the city and resided there together with his family. He even paid his 1998 community tax and registered as a voter therein. To all intents and purposes of the Constitution and the law, he is a resident of Cagayan de Oro City and eligible to run for mayor thereof.

To petitioners' argument that Emano could not have continued to qualify as provincial governor if he was indeed a resident of Cagayan de Oro City, we respond that the issue before this Court is whether Emano's residence in the city qualifies him to run for and be elected as mayor, not whether he could have continued sitting as governor of the province. There was no challenge to his eligibility to continue running the province; hence, this Court cannot make any pronouncement on such issue. Considerations of due process prevent us from adjudging matters not properly brought to us. On the basis, however, of the facts proven before the Comelec, we hold that he has

satisfied the residence qualification required by law for the mayorship of the city.

We stress that the residence requirement is rooted in the desire that officials of districts or localities be acquainted not only with the metes and bounds of their constituencies but, more important, with the constituents themselves -- their needs, difficulties, aspirations, potentials for growth and development, and all matters vital to their common welfare. The requisite period would give candidates the opportunity to be familiar with their desired constituencies, and likewise for the electorate to evaluate the former's qualifications and fitness for the offices they seek.

In other words, the actual, physical and personal presence of herein private respondent in Cagayan de Oro City is substantial enough to show his intention to fulfill the duties of mayor and for the voters to evaluate his qualifications for the mayorship. Petitioners' very legalistic, academic and technical approach to the residence requirement does not satisfy this simple, practical and common-sense rationale for the residence requirement.

Interpretation to Favor Popular MandateThere is no question that private respondent was the overwhelming choice of the people of Cagayan de Oro City.1âwphi1 He won by a margin of about 30,000 votes.24 Thus, we find it apt to reiterate the principle that the manifest will of the people as expressed through the ballot must be given fullest effect. In case of doubt, political laws must be interpreted to give life and spirit to the popular mandate. 25 Verily, in Frivaldo v. Comelec,26 the Court held:"x x x [T]his Court has repeatedly stressed the importance of giving effect to the sovereign will in order to ensure the survival of our democracy. In any action involving the possibility of a reversal of the popular electoral choice, this Court must exert utmost effort to resolve the issues in a manner that would give effect to the will of the majority, for it is merely sound public policy to cause elective offices to be filled by those who are the choice of the majority. To successfully challenge a winning candidate's qualifications, the petitioner must clearly demonstrate that the ineligibility is so patently antagonistic to constitutional and legal principles that overriding such ineligibility and thereby giving effect to the apparent will of the people would ultimately create greater prejudice to the very democratic institutions and juristic traditions that our Constitution and laws so zealously protect and promote."

In the same vein, we stated in Alberto v. Comelec27 that "election cases involve public interest; thus, laws governing election contests must be liberally construed to the end that the will of the people in the choice of public officials may not be defeated by mere technical objections."

Indeed, "it would be far better to err in favor of popular sovereignty than to be right in complex but little understood legalisms."28

In sum, we hold that Respondent Comelec cannot be faulted with abuse, much less grave abuse, of discretion in upholding private respondent's election.

Corollary Issue: Effect of Disqualification of Winner on Second PlacerWith the resolution of the first issue in the positive, it is obvious that the second one posited by petitioners has become academic and need not be ruled upon.

WHEREFORE, the Petition is DISMISSED and the assailed Comelec Resolutions AFFIRMED. Costs against petitioners.

SO ORDERED.

G.R. No. 135691 September 27, 1999EMMANUEL SINACA, petitioner, vs.MIGUEL MULA and COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, respondents.

 DAVIDE, JR., C.J.:Before us is a special civil action for certiorari, mandamus and prohibition, with a prayer for preliminary injunction and/or temporary restraining order assailing the Resolution of 6 October 1998, of respondent Commission on Elections (hereafter COMELEC) in SPA No. 98-292, declaring as invalid the substitution of mayoralty candidate Teodoro F. Sinaca, Jr. by herein petitioner Emmanuel D. Sinaca. 1

The records disclose that in the 11 May 1998 elections, the two opposing factions of the ruling party LAKAS-NUCD-UMPD (hereafter LAKAS) filled in separate candidates for the position of mayor of the Municipality of Malimano, Surigao del Norte. One faction headed by Robert Z. Barbers (hereafter "BARBERS Wing") nominated Grachil G. Canoy (hereafter CANOY), while the other group lead by Francisco T. MATUGAS (hereafter "MATUGAS Wing") endorsed the candidacy of Teodoro F. Sinaca, Jr. (hereafter TEODORO).

Miguel H. Mula (hereafter MULA), a candidate for vice-mayor and belonging to the "BARBERS Wing," filed before the COMELEC a petition for disqualification against TEODORO which was docketed as SPA 98-021. On 8 May 1998, the Second Division of the COMELEC issued a resolution disqualifying TEODORO as candidate for mayor of the Municipality of Malimono, Surigao del Norte and ordering the cancellation of his certificate of candidacy because of prior conviction of bigamy, a crime involving moral turpitude. 2

On 10 May 1998, TEODORO filed a motion for reconsideration of the aforesaid resolution. On even date, herein petitioner Emmanuel D. Sinaca, (hereafter EMMANUEL), an independent candidate, withdrew his certificate of candidacy for Sangguniang Bayan Member, joined and became a member of the LAKAS party and was nominated by the LAKAS "MATUGAS Wing" as the substitute mayoralty candidate for the Municipality of Malimono, Surigao del Norte. On the basis of said nomination, EMMANUEL filed his certificate of candidacy 3 attached thereto is his certificate of nomination as LAKAS mayoralty candidate signed by Governor Francisco T. MATUGAS (hereafter MATUGAS), as party provincial chairman together with EMMANUEL's written acceptance of the party's nomination. 4

On 11 May 1998, MULA filed through mail another petition for disqualification, this time against EMMANUEL, which was received by the COMELEC on 14 May 1998 and was docketed as SPA No. 98-292. In his petition MULA contended that the nomination of EMMANUEL as substitute candidate is illegal on the following grounds:a) The substitute, before he filed his Certificate of Candidacy as LAKAS candidate, was an independent candidate. Being so, he cannot rightfully substitute the disqualified one;b) The nomination of respondent substitute bears only the approval of Provincial Chairman Matugas and without consultation and consent of the higher political hierarchy especially Mr. Robert Ace Barbers who has also a say on nomination of candidates within his jurisdiction, as evidenced by an authority hereto attached as Annex "E";c) Substitution generally takes place when by reason of a candidate's disqualification the party to which he belongs loses such representation. In the instant case, the disqualification did not at all prejudice LAKAS NUCD-UMDP because Mr. Garchil G. Canoy is still there representing the party after the disqualification. The substitution is a redundancy and not necessary under the circumstances, more so that it was done with malice and without the required consensus of the political hierarchy. 5

In his answer, EMMANUEL moved for the dismissal of the petition for the following reasons:a) The petition does not state a cause of action as it is not based on any of the grounds for disqualification as provided under Sec. 68 of the Omnibus Election Code and Sec. 40(A) of the Local Government Code of 1991;b) The issue of who in LAKAS has the authority to nominate candidates for local officials, is an intra-party matter hence beyond the jurisdiction of the Comelec;c) Gov. Matugas was duly authorized by LAKAS as its Provincial Chairman and official candidate for Provincial Governor to nominate the party's local candidates; andd) The petition is already moot and academic because of the proclamation of EMMANUEL as mayor of the Municipality of Malimono, Surigao del Norte. 6

On 28 May 1998, the COMELEC Second Division dismissed the petition for disqualification and upheld the candidacy for mayor of EMMANUEL. 7 The pertinent part of the resolution reads:It is therefore clear, that candidate for governor Matugas was clothed with the authority to nominate the respondent as substitute candidate for the position of mayor of Malimono, Surigao del Norte, vice the disqualified candidate, Apropos thereto, Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code states:xxx xxx xxxConsidering that on May 10, 1998 the proper nomination was issued by the official of the party authorized therefor,

it stands to reason that the substitution was valid, respondent having accepted the nomination and his certificate of candidacy dated May 10, 1998, correspondingly filed.

Respondent is correct in stating that the question of nomination is a party concern which is beyond the ambit of the Commission. What matters is, the candidate has been certified as a party member and the nomination duly issued in his favor.

Be that as it may, the petition is rendered moot and academic by the proclamation of respondent on May 12, 1998, as evidenced by the certificate of canvass and proclamation of winning candidates for municipal offices with SN 16671298 and his oath of office dated May 13, 1998, which forms part of the record of this case.

WHEREFORE, premises considered, the Commission (Second Division) RESOLVES to DISMISS the instant petition for lack of merit.

MULA filed a motion for reconsideration raising in the main that the signature alone of MATUGAS in the nomination was not sufficient because the party's authority to nominate was given to both MATUGAS and Senator Robert S. Barbers (hereafter BARBERS), in their joint capacity, and that the nomination of EMMANUEL is void since he was an independent candidate prior to his nomination. 8

On 6 October 1998, the COMELEC en banc issued a Resolution 9 which set aside the resolution dated 28 May 1998 of the Second Division and disqualified EMMANUEL, for the following reasons:In the motion for reconsideration, petitioner argues that the signature only of Governor Matugas in the nomination was not sufficient because the party's authority to nominate was given to both Governor Matugas and Senator Robert Barbers, in their joint capacity.

We do not have to resolve this issue because the more important issue is whether respondent is disqualified as a substitute candidate. He was an independent candidate for councilor at the time he filed his certificate of candidacy for mayor as a substitute of a disqualified candidate. Thus, he did not belong to the same political party as the substituted candidate.

We sustain petitioner's position. We declare that the substitution of disqualified mayoralty candidate Teodoro F. Sinaca, Jr. by respondent Emmanuel D. Sinaca was not valid because the latter was an independent candidate for councilor prior to his nomination as substitute candidate in place of the withdrawing candidate who was a Lakas party member.

IN VIEW WHEREOF, the Commission en banc hereby resolves to SET ASIDE the Commission (Second Division)'s resolution dated May 28, 1998. We declare Emmanuel D. Sinaca DISQUALIFIED to be a substitute candidate for mayor of Malimono, Surigao del Norte, and ANNUL his proclamation as such being void ab initio. Upon finality of this resolution, he is ordered to vacate the position of mayor of the municipality of Malimono, Surigao del Norte, to which the vice-mayor elected in the May 11, 1998 elections shall succeed by operation of law.

Not satisfied therewith, EMMANUEL is now before us alleging that the COMELEC committed grave abuse of discretion in issuing the assailed Resolution. EMMANUEL principally contends that his nomination as a substitute candidate was regular and valid hence, his proclamation as mayor of the Municipality of Malimono, Surigao del Norte must be upheld.

In the assailed resolution, the COMELEC disqualified EMMANUEL solely on the basis that he was an independent candidate prior to his nomination as a substitute candidate.

The rule on substitution of an official candidate of a registered or accredited political party who dies, withdraws or is disqualified for any cause after the last day for the filing of certificates of candidacy is governed by Sec. 77 of the Omnibus Election Code which provides:If after the last day for the filing of certificates of candidacy, an official candidate of a registered or accredited political party dies, withdraws or is disqualified for any cause, only a person belonging to, and certified by, the same political party may file a certificate of candidacy to replace the candidate who died, withdrew or was disqualified. The substitute candidate nominated by the political party concerned may file his certificate of candidacy for the office affected in accordance with the preceding sections not later than mid-day of the day of the

election. If the death, withdrawal or disqualification should occur between the day before the election and mid-day of election day, said certificate maybe filed with any board of election inspectors in the political subdivision where he is a candidate, or, in the case of candidates to be voted for by the entire electorate of the country, with the Commission.

Thus, under the said provision it is necessary, among others, that the substitute candidate must be of the same political party as the original candidate and must be duly nominated as such by the political party.

In the instant case, there was substantial compliance with the above said requirements. EMMANUEL was properly nominated as substitute candidate by the LAKAS party "MATUGAS wing" to which TEODORO, the disqualified candidate, belongs, as evidenced by the Certificate of Nomination and Acceptance signed by MATUGAS, the Party's provincial chairman. 10 That EMMANUEL is a bona fide member of the LAKAS party is shown not only by the certificate of membership, 11 which is being controverted for having been presented as new evidence for the first time before this court, but more importantly by his certificate of candidacy filed before the COMELEC stating therein that he belongs to the LAKAS party. 12

A certificate of candidacy is in the nature of a formal manifestation to the whole world of the candidate's political creed or lack of political creed. 13 It is a statement of a person seeking to run for a public office certifying that he announces his candidacy for the office mentioned and that he is eligible for the office, the name of the political party to which he belongs, if he belongs to any, and his post-office address for all election purposes being as well stated.

The certificate of candidacy of EMMANUEL permitted the placing of his name before the electorate. It constituted an authorized badge, which the voter could scrutinize before casting his ballot. Thus, with the declaration of EMMANUEL in his certificate of candidacy that he is affiliated with the LAKAS party, he was effectively voted by the electorate not as an independent candidate, but as a member of the LAKAS party. His allegation in the certificate of candidacy as to political party to which he belongs is sufficient to make the electorate conscious of the platform of the said political party. 15

The fact that EMMANUEL was an independent candidate prior to his nomination is immaterial. What is more significant is that he had previously withdrawn his certificate of candidacy as independent candidate for Sangguniang member before he filed his certificate of candidacy as a substitute for TEODORO at which time he was, for all intents and purposes, already deemed a member of the LAKAS party "MATUGAS wing." As such, EMMANUEL is obliged to pursue and carry out the party's ideology, political ideas and platforms of government. As the official candidate of an organized political party, he is bound by the party's rule. He owes loyalty to the party, its tenet and its policies, its platforms and programs of government. To the electorate he represents the party, its principles, ideals and objectives. 16

Even the fact that EMMANUEL only became a member of the LAKAS party after the disqualification of TEODORO, will not affect the validity of the substitution. There is nothing in the Constitution or the statute which requires as a condition precedent that a substitute candidate must have been a member of the party concerned for a certain period of time before he can be nominated as such. Section 77 of the Omnibus Election Code only mandates that a substitute candidate should be a person belonging to and certified by the same political party as the candidate to be replaced. We cannot provide for an additional requirement or condition not provided under the said provision without encroaching into the domain of the legislative department.

As aptly observed by Commissioner Teresita Dy-Liacco Flores in her dissenting opinion, to wit:. . . . With due respect to the majority opinion, I find that at the time the substitute candidate filed his certificate of candidacy for mayor and at the time of his election as such, he was an independent candidate no more. He was, at that time, a nominee of the LAKAS NUCD-UMDP Political Party. This fact is evidenced by the Certificate of Nomination and Acceptance dated 10 May 1998 executed by the Provincial Chairman of the said party of Surigao del Norte and by herein respondent. This certificate bonafide member of the said party. To rule that respondent was still an independent candidate and not a member of the LAKAS NUCD-UMDP political party at the time of filing his certificate of candidacy as a substitute candidate for mayor is to arrogate upon this Commission what would have been the sole and exclusive prerogative of any political organization — to determine party membership and its nominees to elective positions. It is an accepted fact that, in this country, politicians switch party affiliations more frequently than the ebb and flow of the tides. 17

The argument advanced by private respondent MULA that MATUGAS has no authority to nominate a candidate without the concurrence of BARBERS is devoid or merit.

Firstly, MATUGAS, was designated by the LAKAS National Headquarters through its Deputy Secretary General and National Secretariat Executive Director Reynaldo L. Maclang, as the party officer authorized to nominate, sign, attest under oath, and issue Certificates of Nomination and Acceptance for the Party's official candidates for the positions of Board Members, City Councilors, Municipal Mayors, Vice-mayors and councilors for the Province of Surigao del Norte. 18

This authorization which was dated March 26, 1998 replaced and/or modified the former authorization given by the party of both BARBERS and MATUGAS. 19 Both BARBERS and MATUGAS were given separate and distinct authorizations when the mother of BARBERS ran for governor against MATUGAS.

Secondly, there are only two official candidates for mayor of Malimono, Surigao del Norte, namely TEODORO and CANOY, 20 both of whom are members of the LAKAS party but from different factions. TEODORO was indorsed by the "MATUGAS wing" and CANOY by the "BARBERS Wing." The certificates of candidacy of these candidates were never questioned despite the fact that they belong to the same political party and were separately and independently endorsed by either BARBERS or MATUGAS. Therefore, if the absence of a joint nomination is to be considered fatal to the validity of the certificate of candidacy of TEODORO or CANOY, then there would in effect no candidates running for mayor in the Municipality of Malimono, Surigao del Norte.

Verily, it stands to reason that with the disqualification of TEODORO, who is a member of the LAKAS "MATUGAS wing," the substitute must come from the same faction as the candidate to be substituted and since it was MATUGAS who indorsed the nomination of TEODORO, then MATUGAS' nomination of EMMANUEL in substitution of TEODORO is sufficient and in order.

There is also no irregularity in the act of EMMANUEL in joining a political party. The right of individuals to form an association as guaranteed by the fundamental law includes the freedom to associate or refrain from association. 21

No man is compelled by law to become a member of a political party; or after having become such, to remain a member. He may join such a party for whatever reason reasons seems good to him, and may quit the party for any cause, good, bad, or indifferent, or without cause. 22 The decision of a candidate on whether to run as an independent candidate or to join a political party, group or aggrupation is left entirely to his discretion. 23

We also agree with the contention of EMMANUEL that the decision as to which member a party shall nominate as its candidate is a party concern which is not cognizable by the courts.

A political party has the right to identify the people who constitute the association and to select a standard bearer who best represents the party's ideologies and preference. 24 Political parties are generally free to conduct their internal affairs free from judicial supervision; this common-law principle of judicial restraint, rooted in the constitutionally protected right of free association, serves the public interest by allowing the political processes to operate without undue interference. 25 Thus, the rule is that the determination of disputes as to party nominations rests with the party, in the absence of statutes giving the court's jurisdiction. 26

Quintessentially, where there is no controlling statute or clear legal right involved, the court will not assume jurisdiction to determine factional controversies within a political party, but will leave the matter for determination by the proper tribunals of the party itself or by the electors at the polls. 27 Similarly, in the absence of specific constitutional or legislative regulations defining how nominations are to be made, or prohibiting nominations from being made in certain ways, political parties may handle party affairs, including nominations, in such manner as party rules may establish. 28

An election in which the voters have fully, fairly, and honestly expressed their will is not invalid even though an improper method is followed in the nomination of candidates. 29 This is because in determining the effect of a particular irregularity in a party nomination for office on the result of the general election, the pivotal issue is whether the irregularity complained of has prevented a full, fair, and free expression of the public will. Thus, in the absence of a statutory provision to the contrary, an election may not even be invalidated by the fact that the nomination of the successful candidate was brought about by fraud, and not in the manner prescribed by the statute, provided it appears that noncompliance with the law did not prevent a fair and free vote. 30

None of the situations adverted to above are obtaining in the case at bar as to warrant this Court's intervention in ascertaining the propriety of EMMANUEL's nomination as a substitute candidate by the LAKAS "MATUGAS wing."

Finally, the issue as to the validity of EMMANUEL's nomination as substitute candidate has been rendered moot and academic by his proclamation on May 12, 1998, by the Board of Canvassers of Malimono as the duly elected municipal mayor and after he has assumed into office. The fact that the nomination of a substitute lacks the signature of one of the authorized signatory is but a technicality which cannot be used to frustrate the will of the electorate.

It has been held that the provisions of the election law regarding certificates of candidacy, such as signing and swearing on the same, as well as the information required to be stated therein, are considered mandatory prior to the elections. Thereafter, they are regarded as merely directory. With respect to election laws, it is an established rule of interpretation that mandatory provisions requiring certain steps before election will be construed as directory after the elections, to give effect to the will of the electorate. Thus, even if the certificate of candidacy was not duly signed or if it does not contain the required data, the proclamation of the candidate as winner may not be nullified on such ground. The defects in the certificate should have been questioned before the election; they may not be questioned after the election without invalidating the will of the electorate, which should not be done. 30 In Guzman v. Board of Canvassers, 32 the Court held that the "will of the people cannot be frustrated by a technicality that the certificate of candidacy had not been properly sworn to. This legal provision is mandatory and non-compliance therewith before the election would be fatal to the status of the candidate before the electorate, but after the people have expressed their will, the result of the election cannot be defeated by the fact that the candidate has not sworn to his certificate of candidacy."

Thus, were a candidate has received popular mandate, overwhelmingly and clearly expressed, all possible doubts should be resolved in favor of the candidate's eligibility for to rule otherwise is to defeat the will of the people. 33

Above and beyond all, the determination of the true will of the electorate should be paramount. It is their voice, not ours or of anyone else, that must prevail. This, in essence, is the democracy we continue to hold sacred. 34

WHEREFORE, the petition is GRANTED. The assailed resolution of 6 October 1998 of the COMELEC en banc is hereby REVERSED and SET ASIDE and another one rendered declaring EMMANUEL SINACA as having been duly elected mayor of the Municipality of Malimono, Surigao del Norte.

SO ORDERED.

G.R. No. 100947 May 31, 1993PNOC ENERGY DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION and MARCELINO TONGCO, petitioners, vs.NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION and MANUEL S. PINEDA, respondents.Alikpala, Gomez & Associates Law Office for petitioners.Filomeno A. Zieta for private respondent. NARVASA, C.J.:The applicability to private respondent Manuel S. Pineda of Section 66 of the Election Code is what is chiefly involved in the case at bar. Said section reads as follows:Sec. 66. Candidates holding appointive office or position.— Any person holding a public appointive office or position, including active members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and officers and employees in government-owned or controlled corporations, shall be considered ipso facto resigned from his office upon the filing of his certificate of candidacy.

Manuel S. Pineda was employed with the Philippine National Oil Co.-Energy Development Corp. (PNOC-EDC), as subsidiary of the Philippine National Oil Co., from September 17, 1981, when he was hired as clerk, to January 26, 1989, when his employment was terminated. The events leading to his dismissal from his job are not disputed.

In November, 1987, while holding the position of Geothermal Construction Secretary, Engineering and Construction Department, at Tongonan Geothermal Project, Ormoc City, Pineda decided to run for councilor of the Municipality of Kananga, Leyte, in the local elections scheduled in January, 1988, and filed the corresponding certificate of candidacy for the position. Objection to Pineda's being a candidate while retaining his job in the PNOC-EDC was shortly thereafter registered by Mayor Arturo Cornejos of Kananga, Leyte. The mayor communicated with the PNOC-EDC — thru Engr. Ernesto Patanao, Resident Manager, Tongonan Geothermal Project — to express the view that Pineda could not actively participate in politics unless he officially resigned from PNOC-EDC. 1 Nothing seems to have resulted from this protest.

The local elections in Leyte, scheduled for January, 1988, were reset to and held on February 1, 1988. Pineda was among the official candidates voted for, and eventually proclaimed elected to, the office of councilor. Some vacillation appears to have been evinced by Pineda at about this time. On February 8, 1988, he wrote to the COMELEC Chairman, expressing his desire to withdraw from the political contest on account of what he considered to be election irregularities; 2 and on March 19, 1988, he wrote to the Secretary of Justice seeking legal opinion on the question, among others, of whether or not he was "considered automatically resigned upon . . . filing of . . . (his) certificate of candidacy," and whether or not, in case he was elected, he could "remain appointed to any corporate offspring of a government-owned or controlled corporation." 3 Nevertheless, Pineda took his oath of office in June, 1988 as councilor-elect of the Municipality of Kananga, Leyte. 4 And despite so qualifying as councilor, and assuming his duties as such, he continued working for PNOC-EDC as the latter's Geothermal Construction Secretary, Engineering and Construction Department, at Tongonan Geothermal Project, Ormoc City.

On June 7, 1988, Marcelino M. Tongco, Department Manager of the Engineering and Construction Department, PNOC-EDC, addressed an inquiry to the latter's Legal Department regarding the status of Manuel S. Pineda as employee in view of his candidacy for the office of municipal councilor. 5 In response, the Legal Department rendered an opinion to the effect that Manuel S. Pineda should be considered ipso facto resigned upon the filing of his Certificate of Candidacy in November, 1987, in accordance with Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code. 6

Pineda appealed the PNOC-EDC Legal Department's ruling to N.C. Vasquez, the Vice-President of PNOC-EDC, on July 14, 1988. In his letter of appeal, 7 he invoked a "court ruling in the case of Caagusan and Donato vs. PNOC-Exploration Corp. . . . (to the effect that) while the government-owned or controlled corporations are covered by the Civil Service Law (as is taken to mean in Sec. 66 of the Omnibus Election Code of 1985) (sic), the subsidiaries or corporate offsprings are not." In the same letter he declared his wish to continue resign from his position as councilor/member of the Sangguniang Bayan.

He also wrote a letter dated October 1, 1988 to the Department of Local Government inquiring about the status of his employment with PNOC-EDC in relation to his election as member of the Sangguniang Bayan. He was advised by DLG Undersecretary Jacinto T. Rubillo, Jr., by letter dated March 31, 1989, that there was no legal impediment to his continuing in his employment with PNOC-EDC while holding at the same time the elective position of municipal councilor. Cited as basis by Undersecretary Rubillo was Section 2(1) Article IX-B of the 1987

Constitution and this Court's ruling in NASECO vs. NLRC, 168 SCRA 122. Undersecretary Rubillo went on to say that Pineda could receive his per diems as municipal councilor as well as the corresponding representation and transportation allowance [RATA] "provided the PNOC-EDC charter does not provide otherwise and public shall not be prejudiced." 8

The PNOC-EDC did not, however, share the Undersecretary's views. On January 26, 1989, the PNOC-EDC, through Marcelino Tongco (Manager, Engineering and Construction Department), notified Manuel S. Pineda in writing (1) that after having given him "ample time" to make some major adjustments before . . . separation from the company," his employment was being terminated pursuant to Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, effective upon receipt of notice, and (2) that he was entitled to "proper compensation" for the services rendered by him from the time he filed his certificate of candidacy until his actual separation from the service. 9

On October 16, 1989, Pineda lodged a complaint for illegal dismissal in the Regional Arbitration Branch No. VIII, NLRC, Tacloban City. Impleaded as respondents were the PNOC-EDC and the Manager of its Engineering and Construction Department, Marcelino M. Tongco. 10

After due proceedings, Labor Arbiter Araceli H. Maraya, to whom the case was assigned, rendered a decision on December 28, 1990, 11 declaring Manuel S. Pineda's dismissal from the service illegal, and ordering his reinstatement to his former position without loss of seniority rights and payment of full back wages corresponding to the period from his illegal dismissal up to the time of actual reinstatement. The Arbiter pointed out that the ruling relied upon by PNOC-EDC to justify Pineda's dismissal from the service, i.e., NHA v. Juco, 12 had already been abandoned; and that "as early as November 29, 1988," the governing principle laid down by case law — in light of Section 2 (1), Article IX-B of the 1987 Constitution 13 — has been that government-owned or controlled corporations incorporated under the Corporation Code, the general law — as distinguished from those created by special charter — are not deemed to be within the coverage of the Civil Service Law, and consequently their employees, like those of the PNOC-EDC, are subject to the provisions of the Labor Code rather than the Civil Service Law. 14

The PNOC-EDC filed an appeal with the National Labor Relations Commission. The latter dismissed the appeal for lack of merit in a decision dated April 24, 1991. 15 PNOC-EDC sought reconsideration; 16 its motion was denied by the Commission in a Resolution dated June 21, 1991. 17

It is this decision of April 24, 1991 and the Resolution of June 21, 1991 that the PNOC-EDC seeks to be annulled and set aside in the special civil action for certiorari at bar. It contends that the respondent Commission gravely abused its discretion:1) when it ruled that Manuel S. Pineda was not covered by the Civil Service Rules when he filed his candidacy for the 1988 local government elections in November 1987;2) when it ruled that Pineda was not covered by the Omnibus Election Code at the time he filed his certificate of candidacy for the 1988 local elections;3) when it ruled that Pineda was illegally dismissed despite the fact that he was considered automatically resigned pursuant to Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code; and4) when it ruled that Pineda could occupy a local government position and be simultaneously employed in a government-owned or controlled corporation, a situation patently violative of the constitutional prohibition on additional compensation.

Acting on the petition, this Court issued a temporary restraining order enjoining the respondent NLRC from implementing or enforcing its decision and resolution dated April 24, 1991 and June 21, 1991, respectively.

In the comment required of him by the Court, the Solicitor General expressed agreement with the respondent Commission's holding that Manuel Pineda had indeed been illegally separated from his employment in the PNOC-EDC; in other words, that his running for public office and his election thereto had no effect on his employment with the PNOC-EDC, a corporation not embraced within the Civil Service.

Petitioner PNOC-EDC argues that at the time that Pineda filed his certificate of candidacy for municipal councilor in November, 1987, the case law "applicable as far as coverage of government-owned or controlled corporations are concerned . . . ( was to the following effect): 18

As correctly pointed out by the Solicitor General, the issue of jurisdiction had been resolved in a string of cases starting with the National Housing Authority vs. Juco (134 SCRA 172) followed by Metropolitan Waterworks and

Sewerage System vs. Hernandez (143 SCRA 602) and the comparatively recent case of Quimpo vs. Sandiganbayan (G.R. No. 72553, Dec. 2, 1986) in which this Court squarely ruled that PNOC subsidiaries, whether or not originally created as government-owned or controlled corporations are governed by the Civil Service Law.

This doctrine, petitioner further argues, was not "automatically reversed" by the 1987 Constitution because not "amended or repealed by the Supreme Court or the Congress;" 19 and this Court's decision in November, 1988, in National Service Corporation vs. NLRC, supra 20 — abandoning the Juco ruling — "cannot be given retroactive effect . . . (in view of ) the time-honored principle . . . that laws (judicial decisions included) shall have no retroactive effect, unless the contrary is provided (Articles 4 and 8 of the New Civil Code of the Philippines)."

Section 2 (1), Article IX of the 1987 Constitution provides as follows:The civil service embraces all branches, subdivisions, instrumentalities, and agencies of the Government, including government-owned or controlled corporations with original charters.

Implicit in the provision is that government-owned or controlled corporations without original charters — i.e., organized under the general law, the Corporation Code — are not comprehended within the Civil Service Law. So has this Court construed the provision. 21

In National Service Corporation (NASECO), et al. v. NLRC, et al., etc., 22 decided on November 29, 1988, it was ruled that the 1987 Constitution "starkly varies" from the 1973 charter — upon which the Juco doctrine rested — in that unlike the latter, the present constitution qualifies the term, "government-owned or controlled corporations," by the phrase, "with original charter;" hence, the clear implication is that the Civil Service no longer includes government-owned or controlled corporations without original charters, i.e., those organized under the general corporation law. 23 NASECO further ruled that the Juco ruling should not apply retroactively, considering that prior to its promulgation on January 17, 1985, this Court had expressly recognized the applicability of the Labor Code to government-owned or controlled corporations. 24

Lumanta, et al. v. NLRC, et al., 25 decided on February 8, 1989, made the same pronouncement: that Juco had been superseded by the 1987 Constitution for implicit in the language of Section 2 (1), Article IX thereof, is the proposition that government-owned or controlled corporations without original charter do not fall under the Civil Service Law but under the Labor Code.

And in PNOC-EDC v. Leogardo, etc., et al., 26 promulgated on July 5, 1989, this Court ruled that conformably with the apparent intendment of the NASECO case, supra, since the PNOC-EDC, a government-owned or controlled company had been incorporated under the general Corporation Law, its employees are subject to the provisions of the Labor Code.

It is thus clear that the Juco doctrine prevailing at the time of the effectivity of the fundamental charter in 1987 — i.e., that government-owned or controlled corporations were part of the Civil Service and its employees subject to Civil Service laws and regulations, 27 regardless of the manner of the mode of their organization or incorporation — is no longer good law, being at "stark variance," to paraphrase NASECO, with the 1987 Constitution. In other words, and contrary to the petitioner's view, as of the effectivity of the 1987 Constitution, government-owned or controlled corporations without original charters, or, as Mr. Justice Cruz insists in his concurring opinion in NASECO v. NLRC, 28 a legislative charter (i.e., those organized under the Corporation Code), ceased to pertain to the Civil Service and its employees could no longer be considered as subject to Civil Service Laws, rules or regulations.

The basic question is whether an employee in a government-owned or controlled corporations without an original charter (and therefore not covered by Civil Service Law) nevertheless falls within the scope of Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, viz.:Sec. 66. Candidates holding appointive office or position.— Any person holding a public appointive office or position, including active members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and officers and employees in government-owned or controlled corporations, shall be considered ipso facto resigned from his office upon the filing of his certificate of candidacy.

When the Congress of the Philippines reviewed the Omnibus Election Code of 1985, in connection with its deliberations on and subsequent enactment of related and repealing legislation — i.e., Republic Acts Numbered

7166: "An Act Providing for Synchronized National and Local Elections and for Electoral Reforms, Authorizing Appropriations Therefor, and for Other Purposes" (effective November 26, 1991), 6646: "An Act Introducing Additional Reforms in the Electoral System and for Other Purposes" (effective January 5, 1988) and 6636: "An Act Resetting the Local Elections, etc., (effective November 6, 1987), it was no doubt aware that in light of Section 2 (1), Article IX of the 1987 Constitution: (a) government-owned or controlled corporations were of two (2) categories — those with original charters, and those organized under the general law — and (b) employees of these corporations were of two (2) kinds — those covered by the Civil Service Law, rules and regulations because employed in corporations having original charters, and those not subject to Civil Service Law but to the Labor Code because employed in said corporations organized under the general law, or the Corporation Code. Yet Congress made no effort to distinguish between these two classes of government-owned or controlled corporations or their employees in the Omnibus Election Code or subsequent related statutes, particularly as regards the rule that any employee "in government-owned or controlled corporations, shall be considered ipso facto resigned from his office upon the filing of his certificate of candidacy." 29

Be this as it may, it seems obvious to the Court that a government-owned or controlled corporation does not lose its character as such because not possessed of an original charter but organized under the general law. If a corporation's capital stock is owned by the Government, or it is operated and managed by officers charged with the mission of fulfilling the public objectives for which it has been organized, it is a government-owned or controlled corporation even if organized under the Corporation Code and not under a special statute; and employees thereof, even if not covered by the Civil Service but by the Labor Code, are nonetheless "employees in government-owned or controlled corporations," and come within the letter of Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code, declaring them "ipso facto resigned from . . . office upon the filing of . . . (their) certificate of candidacy."

What all this imports is that Section 66 of the Omnibus Election Code applies to officers and employees in government-owned or controlled corporations, even those organized under the general laws on incorporation and therefore not having an original or legislative charter, and even if they do not fall under the Civil Service Law but under the Labor Code. In other words, Section 66 constitutes just cause for termination of employment in addition to those set forth in the Labor Code, as amended.

The conclusions here reached make unnecessary discussion and resolution of the other issues raised in this case.WHEREFORE, the petition is GRANTED; the decision of public respondent National Labor Relations Commission dated April 24, 1991 and its Resolution dated June 21, 1991 are NULLIFIED AND SET ASIDE; and the complaint of Manuel S. Pineda is DISMISSED. No costs.

SO ORDERED.