DE CASTRO v JBC

ISSUES/TOPIC:
1. Is the constitutional prohibition against
appointment under Section 15, Article VII of the
Constitution applicable only to positions in the
Executive Department?

4. To hold that Section 15 extends to appointments

to the Judiciary further undermines the intent of
the Constitution of ensuring the independence
of the Judicial Department from the Executive
and Legislative Departments.
DISCRETIONARY &MINISTERIAL

Locus standi as a right of appearance in a court of

justice on a given question

If the law imposes a duty upon a public officer

and gives him the right to decide how or when
the duty shall be performed, such duty is
discretionary and not ministerial.

Direct injury - the person who would assail the validity

of a statute must have a personal and substantial
interest in the case such that he has sustained, or will
sustain direct injury as a result

The duty is ministerial only when the discharge

of the same requires neither the exercise of
official discretion or judgment

Section 15, Article VII (Executive Department), provides:

Two months immediately before the next
presidential elections and up to the end of his
term, a President or Acting President shall not
make
appointments,
except
temporary
appointments to executive positions when
continued vacancies therein will prejudice public
service or endanger public safety.
Section 4 (1), Article VIII (Judicial Department), states:
The Supreme Court shall be composed of a Chief
Justice and fourteen Associate Justices. It may sit
en banc or in its discretion, in division of three,
five, or seven Members. Any vacancy shall be
filled within ninety days from the occurrence
thereof.
ANSWER:
Prohibition under Section 15, Article VII does not apply
to appointments to fill a vacancy in the Supreme Court or
to other appointments to the Judiciary.
1. Had the framers intended to extend the
prohibition contained in Section 15, Article VII to
the appointment of Members of the Supreme
Court, they could have explicitly done so.
2. They could not have ignored the meticulous
ordering of the provisions.
3. They would have easily and surely written the
prohibition made explicit in Section 15, Article VII
as being equally applicable to the appointment of
Members of the Supreme Court in Article VIII
itself, most likely in Section 4 (1), Article VIII.

Mandamus shall issue when any tribunal, corporation,

board, officer, or person unlawfully neglects the
performance of an act that the law specifically enjoins as
a duty resulting from an office, trust, or station
For mandamus to lie, the following requisites must be
complied with:
(a) The plaintiff has a clear legal right to the act
demanded;
(b) It must be the duty of the defendant to perform
the act, because it is mandated by law;
(c) The defendant unlawfully neglects
performance of the duty enjoined by law;

the

(d) The act to be performed is ministerial, not

discretionary;
(e) There is no appeal or any other plain, speedy
and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of
law

PENERA V. COMELEC

BANAT V. COMELEC

Section 79(a) of the Omnibus Election Code:

Candidate as any person aspiring for or seeking
an elective public office, who has filed a certificate
of candidacy
The second sentence, third paragraph Section 15 of RA
8436, as amended by Section 13 of RA 9369:

Section 5(1), Article VI of the 1987 Constitution

The 1987 Constitution fixes the maximum number
of members of the House of Representatives at 250.
However, the 1987 Constitution expressly allows for an
increase in the number of members of the House of
Representatives provided a law is enacted for the
purpose

Provides that any person who files his certificate

of candidacy within [the period for filing] shall
only be considered as a candidate at the start of
the campaign period for which he filed his
certificate of candidacy.

Section 5(2), Article VI of the 1987 Constitution:

The party-list representatives shall constitute
twenty per centum of the total number of
representatives including those under the party-list

The immediately succeeding proviso in the same

third paragraph states that unlawful acts or
omissions applicable to a candidate shall take
effect only upon the start of the aforesaid
campaign period.

1. Twenty percent of the total number of the

membership of the House of Representatives is
the maximum number of seats available to
party-list organizations, such that there is
automatically one party-list seat for every four
existing legislative districts.

Section 11 of RA 8436, the only purpose for the early

filing of certificates of candidacy is to give ample time for
the printing of official ballots
Section 11 of RA 8436 moved the deadline for the filing
of certificates of candidacy to 120 days before Election
Day
Election offenses can be committed by a
candidate only upon the start of the campaign
period. This clearly means that before the start of
the campaign period, such election offenses cannot
be so committed.

2. Garnering two percent of the total votes cast in

the party-list elections guarantees a partylist
organization one seat. The guaranteed seats shall
be distributed in a first round of seat allocation to
parties receiving at least two percent of the total
party-list votes.
3. The additional seats, that is, the remaining seats
after allocation of the guaranteed seats, shall be
distributed to the party-list organizations including
those that received less than two percent of the
total votes. The continued operation of the two
percent threshold as it applies to the allocation
of the additional seats is now unconstitutional
because this threshold mathematically and
physically prevents the filling up of the available
party-list seats. The additional seats shall be
distributed to the parties in a second round of seat
allocation according to the two-step procedure laid
down in the Decision of 21 April 2009 as clarified
in this Resolution.
4. The three-seat cap is constitutional. The threeseat cap is intended by the Legislature to
prevent any party from dominating the partylist system. There is no violation of the
Constitution because the 1987 Constitution does
not require absolute proportionality for the partylist system.

ARNADO V. COMELEC

QUINTO V COMELEC

Section 4(d) of the Local Government Code,

a person with dual citizenship is disqualified
from running for any elective local position. In
Mercado v. Manzano, it was clarified that the
phrase dual citizenship in said Section 4(d) must
be understood as referring to dual allegiance.

Elective officials
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

RA 9225
Allowing natural-born citizens of the Philippines who have
lost their Philippine citizenship by reason of their
naturalization abroad to reacquire Philippine citizenship
and to enjoy full civil and political rights upon compliance
with the requirements of the law
They may now run for public office in the Philippines
provided that they:
(1) Meet the qualifications for holding such public
office as required by the Constitution and existing
laws
(2) Make a personal and sworn renunciation of any
and all foreign citizenships before any public
officer authorized to administer an oath prior to or
at the time of filing of their CoC
Effect of the use of a foreign passport on the
qualification to run for public office of a natural-born
Filipino citizen who was naturalized abroad and
subsequently availed of the privileges under RA 9225
It was settled in that case that the use of a foreign
passport amounts to repudiation or recantation of
the oath of renunciation
Landslide election victory cannot override eligibility
requirements
Election victory cannot be used as a magic formula
to bypass election eligibility requirements;
otherwise, certain provisions of laws pertaining to
elections will become toothless.

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
Equal protection clause does not require the universal
application of the laws to all persons or things without
distinction. What it simply requires is equality among
equals as determined according to a valid classification
The test developed by jurisprudence here and yonder is that
of reasonableness, which has four requisites: SGEE
(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
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
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
Any person who poses an equal protection challenge
must convincingly show that the law creates a
classification that is palpably arbitrary or capricious.
He must refute all possible rational bases for the differing
treatment, whether or not the Legislature cited those bases
as reasons for the enactment, such that the constitutionality
of the law must be sustained even if the reasonableness of
the classification is fairly debatable
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