In the second meeting of my Constitutional Law class last night, we discussed, among others, Constitutional Construction. One of the students raised a question on the correct interpretation of Section 4, Article VII of the Constitution, which provides in part that “[t]he President shall not be eligible for any re-election.” Her query: Why was Erap Estrada allowed to run again as President in the 2010 presidential elections despite the foregoing provision?
Two or three other students simultaneously responded that in fact there was a disqualification case filed against Erap, but when it reached the Supreme Court, it was dismissed “on a technicality.” They were of course referring to Pormento vs. Estrada, G.R. No. 191988, promulgated August 31, 2010, where the Supreme Court dismissed the petition not on the merits but because it has become moot.
Several cases against Erap
There were actually several disqualification cases filed against Erap in relation to his candidacy in the 2010 presidential elections. One such case was filed by Atty. Oliver Lozano even before Erap could file his Certificate of Candidacy. This was denied for prematurity, with the Comelec refusing to even issue a resolution because of the patent defect in the timing of the filing of the case.
Then there was also the disqualification case filed by a disqualified senatorial aspirant named Mary Lou Estrada, and yet another case filed by lawyer Elly Pamatong. Both of these cases were denied for utter lack of merit by the Comelec.
Another case was filed directly with the Supreme Court by a certain Atty. Eligio Mallari of the shadowy group Vanguard of the Philippine Constitution, Inc. This was dismissed by the High Tribunal for prematurity/failure to exhaust administrative remedies.
Pormento vs. Estrada: All the way to the Supreme Court...
Pormento vs. Estrada was yet another disqualification case filed against Erap. It was first filed with the Comelec, and it went all the way to the Supreme Court. The petition was dismissed by the Comelec, which sustained Estrada’s argument that he is not covered by Section 4, Article VII since he is not an incumbent president intending to run for re-election, and that he did not even serve a minimum of four years.
After his Motion for Reconsideration was denied by the Comelec en banc, Atty. Pormento brought the matter to the Supreme Court. He argued that that the spirit of the constitutional ban on presidents seeking re-election is “absolute,” and that Erap cannot to be voted upon by virtue of his self-imposed condition under his pardon that states that he “has publicly committed to no longer seek any elective position or office.”
...only to be denied due course for mootness
The Supreme Court was overtaken by the May 2010 elections without having resolved the petition. In the presidential race, Erap placed second to now-incumbent President Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” Aquino.
The Court only promulgated its decision (styled “resolution” by the ponente, Chief Justice Renato Corona) on August 31, 2010. In this unanimous decision, the Court, instead of deciding on the merits of the controversy, opted instead to DENY DUE COURSE to the petition and to DISMISS it for being moot and academic. The Court held:
Private respondent was not elected President the second time he ran. Since the issue on the proper interpretation of the phrase “any reelection” [sic] will be premised on a person’s second (whether immediate or not) election as President, there is no case or controversy to be resolved in this case. No live conflict of legal rights exists. There is in this case no definite, concrete, real or substantial controversy that touches on the legal relations of parties having adverse legal interests. No specific relief may conclusively be decreed upon by this Court in this case that will benefit any of the parties herein. As such, one of the essential requisites for the exercise of the power of judicial review, the existence of an actual case or controversy, is sorely lacking in this case.
As a rule, this Court may only adjudicate actual, ongoing controversies. The Court is not empowered to decide moot questions or abstract propositions, or to declare principles or rules of law which cannot affect the result as to the thing in issue in the case before it. In other words, when a case is moot, it becomes non-justiciable.
An action is considered “moot” when it no longer presents a justiciable controversy because the issues involved have become academic or dead or when the matter in dispute has already been resolved and hence, one is not entitled to judicial intervention unless the issue is likely to be raised again between the parties. There is nothing for the court to resolve as the determination thereof has been overtaken by subsequent events.
Assuming an actual case or controversy existed prior to the proclamation of a President who has been duly elected in the May 10, 2010 elections, the same is no longer true today. Following the results of that elections, private respondent was not elected President for the second time. Thus, any discussion of his “reelection” [sic] will simply be hypothetical and speculative. It will serve no useful or practical purpose.
Rare opportunity to interpret Section 4, Article VII wasted
The Court chose to heed “prudence” and took the route of “judicial restraint”. This tack is understandable, given the personalities involved (a virtually unknown petitioner against a popular ex-President), and the passing of the urgency to rule on the matter. The ruling is legally defensible in all fronts.
But the Court could have very well chosen to decide the case despite the mootness of the issue. After all, it is “capable of repetition yet evading review.” This is an exception to the moot-and-academic rule. Although the May 2010 elections are over and Erap did not win, he may in fact again run in the May 2016 presidential elections.
A more liberal approach to the actual-case-or-controversy requirement of judicial review – or in other words, choosing judicial activism over judicial restraint – would have definitively settled once and for all the meaning of Section 4, Article VII. By being conservative, by avoiding what it calls the "temptation that magistrates, lawyers, legal scholars and law students alike would find hard to resist," the Court wasted the golden opportunity to enrich Philippine jurisprudence.
I would not have been surprised if it were Retired Justice Vicente V. Mendoza who wrote the decision for the Court. After all, he is one of the most consistent judicial conservatives ever to grace the Supreme Court. The rest of these incumbent magistrates have no clearly-defined judicial philosophy on the matter of judicial review and judicial power. They tend to vacillate between activism and conservativism depending on the personalities and considerations involved.
Sayang. An activist approach would have been reinforced by a discussion on what is referred in Salonga vs. Paño as the “symbolic function” of the High Tribunal to "educat[e] [the] bench and [the] bar." But since the gods have already delivered the verdict, we, ordinary mortals, would have to abide by it. We would have to wait for yet another Erap moment in the indeterminate future to definitively get educated on this matter.
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