Facts:

The National Union of Workers in the Hotel, Restaurant and Allied Industries-Heritage Hotel
Manila Supervisors Chapter (NUWHRAIN-HHMSC) was issued an order for certification election.
Subsequently, when Heritage Hotel Manila (Heritage) discovered that NUWHRAIN-HHMSC had failed to
submit to the BLR its annual financial report for several years and the list of its members since the time it
filed its registration papers, Heritage filed a Petition for Cancellation of Registration of NUWHRAINHHMSC and requested the suspension of the certification election proceedings. Nevertheless, the
certification election pushed through and NUWHRAIN-HHMSC emerged as the winner.
Thereafter, Heritage filed a Protest with Motion to Defer Certification of Election Results and
Winner contending that the petition for cancellation should be first resolved before the proclamation of the
winner in the certification election. The Med-Arbiter held that the pendency of a petition for cancellation of
registration is not a bar to the holding of a certification election. The DOLE Secretary likewise dismissed
the appeal and the subsequent MR.
In the meantime, the Regional Director of DOLE-NCR finally resolved the petition for cancellation
of registration. While finding that respondent had indeed failed to file financial reports and the list of its
members for several years, he, nonetheless, denied the petition, because the freedom of association and
the employees right to self-organization are more substantive considerations. The DOLE Secretary Sto.
Tomas dismissed the subsequent appeal, holding that the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of
association and right of workers to self-organization outweighed respondents noncompliance with the
statutory requirements to maintain its status as a legitimate labor organization. MR was denied. CA
affirmed the decision of the DOLE Secretary.

ISSUE:
Whether or not the CA erred in affirming the dismissal of the Cancellation Petition
despite the mandatory and unequivocal provisions of the Labor Core and its IRR.
HELD:
NO. The freedom of association and right of the workers to self-organization are
more substantive considerations. The Decision of the CA is affirmed.

Articles 238 and 239 give the Reg. Director ample discretion in dealing with a
petition for cancellation of a unions registration. It is sufficient to give the Reg.
Director license to treat the late fling of required documents as sufficient
compliance with the law.

The union members and all the employees belonging to the appropriate
bargaining unit should not be deprived of a bargaining agent, merely because of
the negligence of the union officers who were responsible for the submission of
the documents to the BLR

Registration confers upon a union the status of legitimacy and the

concomitant rights and privileges granted by law to a legitimate labor
organization, particularly the right to participate in or ask for a certification
election in a bargaining unit.

Thus, the cancellation of a certification of registration is the equivalent

of snuffing out the life of a labor organization. For without such
registration, it loses its right under the Labor Code.

It should be noted that the relevant provisions of the Labor Code has been
amended by RA 9481. The last paragraph under Article 242-A now provides
that failure to comply with the reportorial requirements shall not be a ground for
cancellation of union registration but shall subject the erring officers/members
to suspension, expulsion from membership, or any appropriate penalty.

ILO Convention No. 87 provides that workers and employers organizations

shall not be liable to be dissolved or suspended by administrative authority. The
cancellation of union registration by the registrar of labor unions (the BLR) is
tantamount to dissolution of the organization by administrative authority when
it would give rise to the loss of legal personality of the union or loss of
advantages necessary to carry out its activities. It is therefore preferable if such
actions were to be taken only as a last resort.