G.R. No. 206666 January 21, 2015
ATTY. ALICIA RISOS-VIDAL, Petitioner,
ALFREDO S. LIM Petitioner-Intervenor,
vs.
COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS and JOSEPH EJERCITO ESTRADA, Respondents.
Facts : On September 12, 2007, the Sandiganbayan convicted former President Estrada, a former President of the Republic of the Philippines. On October 26, 2007, at 3:35 p.m., former President Estrada "received and accepted"6 the pardon by affixing his signature beside his handwritten notation thereon. On November 30, 2009, former President Estrada filed a Certificate of Candidacy7 for the position of President. During that time, his candidacy earned three oppositions in the COMELEC. After the conduct of the May 10, 2010 synchronized elections, however, former President Estrada only managed to garner the second highest number of votes. On October 2, 2012, former President Estrada once more ventured into the political arena, and filed a Certificate of Candidacy. On January 24, 2013, Risos-Vidal, the petitioner in this case, filed a Petition for Disqualification against former President Estrada before the COMELEC. Risos Vidal anchored her petition on the theory that "[Former President Estrada] is Disqualified to Run for Public Office because of his Conviction for Plunder by the Sandiganbayan in Criminal Case No. 26558. Sentencing Him to Suffer the Penalty of Reclusion Perpetuawith Perpetual Absolute Disqualification." In a Resolution dated April 1, 2013,the COMELEC, Second Division, dismissed the petition for disqualification. The subsequent motion for reconsideration filed by Risos-Vidal was denied in a Resolution dated April 23, 2013. On April 30, 2013, Risos-Vidal invoked the Court’s jurisdiction by filing the present petition.
Issue : WON Estrada Pardon is Conditional thus barring him to run from any elective posisiton.
Held: No, Estrada's Pardon is not Conditional. Former President Estrada was granted an absolute pardon that fully restored allhis civil and political rights, which naturally includes the right to seek public elective office, the focal point of this controversy. The wording of the pardon extended to former President Estrada is complete, unambiguous, and unqualified. The pardoning power of the President cannot be limited by legislative action. This doctrine of non-diminution or non-impairment of the President’s power of pardon by acts of Congress, specifically through legislation, was strongly adhered to by an overwhelming majority of the framers of the 1987 Constitution when they flatly rejected a proposal to carve out an exception from the pardoning power of the President in the form of "offenses involving graft and corruption" that would be enumerated and defined by Congress through the enactment of a law
The third preambular clause of the pardon did not operate to make the pardon conditional. Contrary to Risos-Vidal’s declaration, the third preambular clause of the pardon, i.e., "[w]hereas, Joseph Ejercito Estrada has publicly committed to no longer seek any elective position or office," neither makes the pardon conditional, nor militate against the conclusion that former President Estrada’s rights to suffrage and to seek public elective office have been restored. This is especially true as the pardon itself does not explicitly impose a condition or limitation, considering the unqualified use of the term "civil and political rights"as being restored. Jurisprudence educates that a preamble is not an essential part of an act as it is an introductory or preparatory clause that explains the reasons for the enactment, usually introduced by the word "whereas." Whereas clauses do not form part of a statute because, strictly speaking, they are not part of the operative language of the statute. In this case, the whereas clause at issue is not an integral part of the decree of the pardon, and therefore, does not by itself alone operate to make the pardon conditional or to make its effectivity contingent upon the fulfilment of the aforementioned commitment nor to limit the scope of the pardon.
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