CASE DIGEST : AQUINO VS COMELEC

G.R. Nos. 211789-90               March 17, 2015

DR. REY B. AQUINO, Petitioner, 

vs.

COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, Respondent.

Aquino vs Comelec

On January 8, 2010, Aquino, as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PHIC),issued PhilHealth Special Order No. 16, Series of 2010 (reassignment order)5 directing the reassignment of several PHIC officers and employees.

On the same date, Aquino released the reassignment order, via the PHIC’s intranet service, to all PHIC officers and employees, including the following: (1) Dennis Adre, PHIC Regional Vice-President (VP); (2) Masiding Alonto, PHIC Regional VP; and (3) Khaliquzzaman M. Macabato, PHIC Assistant Regional VP.

On January 11, 2010, Aquino issued an Advisory implementing the reassignment order.

In view of the reassignment order and its directive, Dean Rudyard A. Avila III, consultant to the Chairman of the Board of PHIC and former Secretary of the PHIC Board of Directors, filed before the COMELEC on January 18, 2010, a complaint against Aquino and Melinda C. Mercado, PHIC Officer-in-Charge, Executive VPand Chief Operating Officer, for violation of COMELEC Resolution No. 8737in relation to Section 261(h) of BP 881. The case was docketed as E.O. Case No. 10-003.

On March 29, 2010, Aquino filed a petition10 before the COMELEC reiterating his request and maintaining that PhilHealth SO No. 16-2010 is beyond the coverage of Resolution No. 8737. The COMELEC directed its Law Department to file the appropriate information against Aquino for violation of Resolution No. 8737 in relation to Section 261(h) of BP 881; it dismissed, for lack of merit, the complaint against Mercado, Mendiola, and Basa.

The COMELEC declared that Aquino violated Section 261(h) of BP 881 when he directed the transfer/reassignment of the PHIC officers and employees within the declared election period without its prior approval. It pointed out that Section 261(h) considers an election offense for "any public official who makes or causes the transfer or detail whatever of any public officer or employee in the civil service x x x within the election period except upon prior approval of the Commission."

On December 7, 2012, Aquino sought reconsideration15 of the COMELEC’s October 19, 2012 resolution.

The COMELEC agreed with the complainants’ position and ruled that the word "whatever" in Section 261(h) of BP 881 expanded the coverage of the prohibition so as to include any movement of personnel, including reassignment, among others. In fact, to dispel any ambiguity as regards Section 261(h)’s prohibition, Resolution No. 8737 defined the word "transfer" as including any personnel action.

The COMELEC affirmed in toto the October 19, 2012 resolution.

ISSUE : WON  the COMELEC validly found prima facie case against Aquino for violation of Resolution No. 8737 in relation to Section 261(h).

HELD : COMELEC Resolution No. 8737 is valid

A common and clear conclusion that we can gather from these provisions is the obvious and unequivocal intent of the framers of the Constitution and of the law to grant the COMELEC with powers, necessary and incidental to achieve the objective of ensuring free, orderly, honest, peaceful and credible elections.

In Resolution No. 8737, the COMELEC defined the phrase "transfer or detail whatever" found in Section 261(h) of BP 881 as including any personnel action, i.e., "reassignment." Aquino questions this COMELEC interpretation as an unwarranted expansion of the legal prohibition which he argues renders the COMELEC liable for grave abuse of discretion.

the Court already clarified the interpretation of the term whatever as used in Section 261(h) of BP 881 in relation to the terms transfer and detail. In agreeing with the Solicitor General’s position, this Court declared that the terms transfer and detail are modified by the term whatever such that "any movement of personnel from one station to another, whether or not in the same office or agency, during the election period is covered by the prohibition.

Read in the light of this ruling, we affirm the COMELEC’s interpretation of the phrase "transfer or detail whatever" as we find the Regalado interpretation consistent with the legislative intent

Thus, to reiterate and emphasize – the election law’s prohibition on transfer or detail covers any movement of personnel from one station to another, whether or not in the same office or agency when made or caused during the election period.

As a general rule, the period of election starts at ninety (90) days before and ends thirty (30) days after the election date pursuant to Section 9, Article IX-C of the Constitution and Section 3 of BP 881. This rule, however, is not without exception. Under these same provisions, the COMELEC is not precluded from setting a period different from that provided thereunder.

In this case, the COMELEC fixed the election period for the May 10, 2010 Elections at 120 days before and 30 days after the day of the election. We find this period proper as we find no arbitrariness in the COMELEC’s act of fixing an election period longer than the period fixed in the Constitution and BP 881

Under Section 261(h) of BP 881,a person commits the election offense of violation of the election transfer ban when he makes or causes the transfer or detail whatever of any official or employee of the government during the election period absent prior approval of the COMELEC.

By its terms, Section 261(h) provides at once the elements of the offense and its exceptions. The elements are: (1) the making or causing of a government official or employee’s transfer or detail whatever; (2) the making or causing of the transfer or detail whatever was made during the election period; and (3) these acts were made without the required prior COMELEC approval

By its terms, Section 261(h) provides at once the elements of the offense and its exceptions. The elements are: (1) the making or causing of a government official or employee’s transfer or detail whatever; (2) the making or causing of the transfer or detail whatever was made during the election period; and (3) these acts were made without the required prior COMELEC approval

Make is defined as "to cause to exist. To do, perform, or execute; as to make an issue, to make oath, to make a presentment. To do in form of law; to perform with due formalities; to execute in legal form; as to make answer, to make a return or report. To execute as one’s act or obligation; to prepare and sign; to issue; to sign, execute, and deliver."44

Cause, on the other hand, is defined as "each separate antecedent of an event. Something that precedes and brings about an effect or result. A reason for an action or condition x x x x an agent that brings about something. That which in some manner is accountable for condition that brings about an effect or that produces a cause for the resultant action or state.

Significantly, the terms make and cause indicate one and the same thing – the beginning, the start of something, a precursor; it pertains to an act that brings about a desired result. If we read these definitions within the context of Section 261(h) of BP 881, the legal prohibition on transfer or detail undoubtedly affects only those acts that go into the making or causing or to the antecedent acts.

In short, during the making or causing phase of the entire transfer or reassignment process – from drafting the order, to its signing, up to its release – the issuing official plays a very real and active role. Once the transfer or reassignment order is issued, the active role is shifted to the addressee of the order who should now carry out the purpose of the order. At this level – the implementation phase – the issuing official’s only role is to see to it that the concerned officer or employee complies with the order. The issuing official may only exert discipline upon the addressee who refuses to comply with the order.

Following these considerations, we find that the COMELEC gravely abused its discretion in this case based on the following facts:

First, Aquino made or caused the reassignment of the concerned PHIC officers and employees before the election period.

Second, Aquino sent out, via the PHIC’s intranet service, the reassignment order to all affected PHIC officers and employees before the election period.

Third, the reassignment order was complete in its terms, as it enumerated clearly the affected PHIC officers and employees as well as their respective places of reassignments, and was made effective immediately or on the day of its issue, which was likewise before the election period.

Fourth, the subsequent orders that Aquino issued were not reassignment orders per se contrary to the COMELEC’s assessment.

Based on these clear facts, Aquino completed the act of making or causing the reassignment of the affected PHIC officers and employees before the start of the election period. In this sense, the evils sought to be addressed by Section 261 (h) of BP 881 is kept intact by the timely exercise of his management prerogative in rearranging or reassigning PHIC personnel within its various offices necessary for the PHIC's efficient and smooth operation. As Aquino's acts of issuing the order fell outside the coverage of the transfer prohibition, he cannot be held liable for violation of Section 261(h).

In sum, the COMELEC gravely abused its discretion when, firstly, it used wrong or irrelevant considerations when it sought to hold Aquino liable for violation of Section 261 (h) for issuing orders that were clearly not for reassignment, but which were simply orders for retention of position or orders for temporary discharge of additional duties.