G.R. Nos. 217126-27. November 10, 2015.

*
 
CONCHITA CARPIO-MORALES, in her capacity as
the Ombudsman, petitioner, vs. COURT OF
APPEALS (SIXTH DIVISION) and JEJOMAR
ERWIN S. BINAY, JR., respondents.

Remedial Law; Special Civil Actions; Certiorari;

Prohibition; A common requirement to both a petition for
certiorari and a petition for prohibition taken under Rule
65 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure is that the petitioner
has no other plain, speedy, and adequate remedy in the
ordinary course of law.—A common requirement to both a
petition for certiorari and a petition for prohibition taken
under Rule 65 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure is that
the petitioner has no other plain, speedy, and adequate
remedy in the ordinary course of law.
Same; Same; Same; Motion for Reconsideration; As a
general rule, a motion for reconsideration must first be filed
with the lower court prior to resorting to the extraordinary
remedy of certiorari

_______________

*  EN BANC.

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

or prohibition since a motion for reconsideration may

still be considered as a plain, speedy, and adequate remedy
in the ordinary course of law; Exceptions.—As a general
rule, a motion for reconsideration must first be filed with
the lower court prior to resorting to the extraordinary
remedy of certiorari or prohibition since a motion for
reconsideration may still be considered as a plain, speedy,
and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law. The
rationale for the prerequisite is to grant an opportunity for
the lower court or agency to correct any actual or perceived
error attributed to it by the reexamination of the legal and
factual circumstances of the case. Jurisprudence states
that “[i]t is [the] inadequacy, [and] not the mere absence of
all other legal remedies and the danger of failure of justice
without the writ, that must usually determine the
propriety of certiorari [or prohibition]. A remedy is plain,
speedy[,] and adequate if it will promptly relieve the
petitioner from the injurious effects of the judgment, order,
or resolution of the lower court or agency. x  x  x.” In this
light, certain exceptions were crafted to the general rule
requiring a prior motion for reconsideration before the
filing of a petition for certiorari, which exceptions also
apply to a petition for prohibition. These are: (a) where the
order is a patent nullity, as where the court a quo has no
jurisdiction; (b) where the questions raised in the certiorari
proceedings have been duly raised and passed upon by the
lower court, or are the same as those raised and passed
upon in the lower court; (c) where there is an urgent
necessity for the resolution of the question and any
further delay would prejudice the interests of the
Government or of the petitioner or the subject matter of
the action is perishable; (d) where, under the
circumstances, a motion for reconsideration would be
useless; (e) where petitioner was deprived of due process
and there is extreme urgency for relief; (f) where, in a
criminal case, relief from an order of arrest is urgent and
the granting of such relief by the trial court is improbable;
(g) where the proceedings in the lower court are a nullity
for lack of due process; (h) where the proceedings were ex
parte or in which the petitioner had no opportunity to
object; and (i) where the issue raised is one purely of
law or where public interest is involved.
Same; Courts; Jurisdiction; A court’s jurisdiction over
the subject matter may be raised at any stage of the
proceedings.—Albeit raised for the first time by the
Ombudsman in her Memorandum, it is nonetheless proper
to resolve the issue on the CA’s lack of subject

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

matter jurisdiction over the main petition for certiorari

in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453, in view of the well-
established rule that a court’s jurisdiction over the subject
matter may be raised at any stage of the proceedings. The
rationale is that subject matter jurisdiction is conferred by
law, and the lack of it affects the very authority of the
court to take cognizance of and to render judgment on the
action. Hence, it should be preliminarily determined if the
CA indeed had subject matter jurisdiction over the main
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 petition, as the same determines
the validity of all subsequent proceedings relative thereto.
It is noteworthy to point out that Binay, Jr. was given the
opportunity by this Court to be heard on this issue, as he,
in fact, duly submitted his opposition through his comment
to the Ombudsman’s Memorandum. That being said, the
Court perceives no reasonable objection against ruling on
this issue.
 Ombudsman Act; The first paragraph of Section 14,
Republic Act (RA) No. 6770 is a prohibition against any
court (except the Supreme Court [SC]) from issuing a writ
of injunction to delay an investigation being conducted by
the Office of the Ombudsman.—The first paragraph of
Section 14, RA 6770 is a prohibition against any court
(except the Supreme Court) from issuing a writ of
injunction to delay an investigation being conducted by the
Office of the Ombudsman. Generally speaking,
“[i]njunction is a judicial writ, process or proceeding
whereby a party is ordered to do or refrain from doing a
certain act. It may be the main action or merely a
provisional remedy for and as an incident in the main
action.” Considering the textual qualifier “to delay,” which
connotes a suspension of an action while the main case
remains pending, the “writ of injunction” mentioned in this
paragraph could only refer to injunctions of the provisional
kind, consistent with the nature of a provisional injunctive
relief. The exception to the no injunction policy is when
there is prima facie evidence that the subject matter of the
investigation is outside the office’s jurisdiction. The Office
of the Ombudsman has disciplinary authority over all
elective and appointive officials of the government and its
subdivisions, instrumentalities, and agencies, with the
exception only of impeachable officers, Members of
Congress, and the Judiciary. Nonetheless, the Ombudsman
retains the power to investigate any serious misconduct in
office allegedly committed by officials removable by
impeachment, for the purpose of filing a verified complaint
for impeachment, if warranted. Note that the Ombudsman
has concurrent jurisdiction over certain adminis-

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)
 trative cases which are within the jurisdiction of the
regular courts or administrative agencies, but has primary
jurisdiction to investigate any act or omission of a public
officer or employee who is under the jurisdiction of the
Sandiganbayan.
Same; The second paragraph of Section 14, Republic
Act (RA) No. 6770 provides that no appeal or application
for remedy may be heard against the decision or findings of
the Ombudsman, with the exception of the Supreme Court
(SC) on pure questions of law.—On the other hand, the
second paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 provides that
no appeal or application for remedy may be heard against
the decision or findings of the Ombudsman, with the
exception of the Supreme Court on pure questions of law.
This paragraph, which the Ombudsman particularly relies
on in arguing that the CA had no jurisdiction over the
main C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 petition, as it is
supposedly this Court which has the sole jurisdiction to
conduct a judicial review of its decisions or findings, is
vague for two (2) reasons: (1) it is unclear what the phrase
“application for remedy” or the word “findings” refers to;
and (2) it does not specify what procedural remedy is solely
allowable to this Court, save that the same be taken only
against a pure question of law. The task then, is to apply
the relevant principles of statutory construction to resolve
the ambiguity.
Same; Statutory Construction; In case of doubt as to
what a provision of a statute means, the meaning put to the
provision during the legislative deliberations may be
adopted, albeit not controlling in the interpretation of the
law.—As an aid to construction, courts may avail
themselves of the actual proceedings of the legislative body
in interpreting a statute of doubtful meaning. In case of
doubt as to what a provision of a statute means, the
meaning put to the provision during the legislative
deliberations may be adopted, albeit not controlling in the
interpretation of the law.
 Same; Same; As a general rule, the second paragraph
of Section 14, Republic Act (RA) No. 6770 bans the whole
range of remedies against issuances of the Ombudsman, by
prohibiting: (a) an appeal against any decision or finding
of the Ombudsman, and (b) “any application of remedy”
against the same.—As a general rule, the second
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 bans the whole range
of remedies against issuances of the Ombudsman, by
prohibiting: (a) an appeal against any decision or finding
of the Ombudsman,

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

and (b) “any application of remedy” (subject to the

exception below) against the same. To clarify, the phrase
“application for remedy,” being a generally worded
provision, and being separated from the term “appeal” by
the disjunctive “or,” refers to any remedy (whether taken
mainly or provisionally), except an appeal, following the
maxim generalia verba sunt generaliter intelligenda:
general words are to be understood in a general sense. By
the same principle, the word “findings,” which is also
separated from the word “decision” by the disjunctive “or,”
would therefore refer to any finding made by the
Ombudsman (whether final or provisional), except a
decision. The subject provision, however, crafts an
exception to the foregoing general rule. While the specific
procedural vehicle is not explicit from its text, it is fairly
deducible that the second paragraph of Section 14, RA
6770 excepts, as the only allowable remedy against “the
decision or findings of the Ombudsman,” a Rule 45
appeal, for the reason that it is the only remedy
taken to the Supreme Court on “pure questions of
law,” whether under the 1964 Rules of Court or the 1997
Rules of Civil Procedure.
Doctrine of Non-Interference; Appeals; Petition for
Review on Certiorari; Congress cannot interfere with
matters of procedure; hence, it cannot alter the scope of a
Rule 45 appeal so as to apply to interlocutory “findings”
issued by the Ombudsman.—Of course, the second
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770’s extremely limited
restriction on remedies is inappropriate since a Rule 45
appeal — which is within the sphere of the rules of
procedure promulgated by this Court — can only be taken
against final decisions or orders of lower courts, and not
against “findings” of quasi-judicial agencies. As will be
later elaborated upon, Congress cannot interfere with
matters of procedure; hence, it cannot alter the scope of a
Rule 45 appeal so as to apply to interlocutory “findings”
issued by the Ombudsman. More significantly, by
confining the remedy to a Rule 45 appeal, the
provision takes away the remedy of certiorari, grounded on
errors of jurisdiction, in denigration of the judicial power
constitutionally vested in courts. In this light, the second
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 also increased this
Court’s appellate jurisdiction, without a showing, however,
that it gave its consent to the same. The provision is, in
fact, very similar to the fourth paragraph of Section 27, RA
6770 (as above cited), which was invalidated in the case of
Fabian v. Desierto, 295 SCRA 470 (1998).

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)
 Same; Judicial Power; The concept of Ombudsman
independence cannot be invoked as basis to insulate the
Ombudsman from judicial power constitutionally vested
unto the courts.—The concept of Ombudsman
independence cannot be invoked as basis to insulate the
Ombudsman from judicial power constitutionally vested
unto the courts. Courts are apolitical bodies, which are
ordained to act as impartial tribunals and apply even
justice to all. Hence, the Ombudsman’s notion that it can
be exempt from an incident of judicial power — that is, a
provisional writ of injunction against a preventive
suspension order — clearly strays from the concept’s
rationale of insulating the office from political harassment
or pressure.
Remedial Law; Courts; Hierarchy of Courts; Certiorari;
The Court of Appeals’ (CA’s) certiorari jurisdiction is not
only original but also concurrent with the Regional Trial
Courts (RTCs) (under Section 21[1], Chapter II of Batas
Pambansa [BP] Blg. 129), and the Supreme Court (SC)
(under Section 5, Article VIII of the 1987 Philippine
Constitution). In view of the concurrence of these courts’
jurisdiction over petitions for certiorari, the doctrine of
hierarchy of courts should be followed.—Note that the CA’s
certiorari jurisdiction, as above stated, is not only original
but also concurrent with the Regional Trial Courts
(under Section 21[1], Chapter II of BP 129), and the
Supreme Court (under Section 5, Article VIII of the 1987
Philippine Constitution). In view of the concurrence of
these courts’ jurisdiction over petitions for certiorari, the
doctrine of hierarchy of courts should be followed. In
People v. Cuaresma, 172 SCRA 415 (1989), the doctrine
was explained as follows: [T]his concurrence of
jurisdiction is not x  x  x to be taken as according to
parties seeking any of the writs an absolute, unrestrained
freedom of choice of the court to which application therefor
will be directed. There is after all a hierarchy of courts.
That hierarchy is determinative of the venue of appeals,
and should also serve as a general determinant of the
appropriate forum for petitions for the extraordinary writs.
A becoming regard for that judicial hierarchy most
certainly indicates that petitions for the issuance of
extraordinary writs against first level (“inferior”) courts
should be filed with the Regional Trial Court, and those
against the latter, with the Court of Appeals. When a court
has subject matter jurisdiction over a particular case,
as conferred unto it by law, said court may then exercise
its jurisdiction acquired over that case, which is called
judicial power.

 
 
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Judicial Power; Words and Phrases; Judicial power, as

vested in the Supreme Court (SC) and all other courts
established by law, has been defined as the “totality of
powers a court exercises when it assumes jurisdiction and
hears and decides a case.”—Judicial power, as vested in
the Supreme Court and all other courts established by law,
has been defined as the “totality of powers a court
exercises when it assumes jurisdiction and hears
and decides a case.” Under Section 1, Article VIII of the
1987 Constitution, it includes “the duty of the courts of
justice to settle actual controversies involving rights
which are legally demandable and enforceable, and
to determine whether or not there has been a grave
abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of
jurisdiction on the part of any branch or
instrumentality of the Government.”wor
Same; While the power to define, prescribe, and
apportion the jurisdiction of the various courts is, by
constitutional design, vested unto Congress, the power to
promulgate rules concerning the protection and
enforcement of constitutional rights, pleading, practice, and
procedure in all courts belongs exclusively to the Supreme
Court (SC).—Judicial power is never exercised in a
vacuum. A court’s exercise of the jurisdiction it has
acquired over a particular case conforms to the
limits and parameters of the rules of procedure duly
promulgated by this Court. In other words, procedure is
the framework within which judicial power is exercised. In
Manila Railroad Co. v. Attorney-General, 20 Phil. 523
(1911), the Court elucidated that “[t]he power or authority
of the court over the subject matter existed and was fixed
before procedure in a given cause began. Procedure does
not alter or change that power or authority; it
simply directs the manner in which it shall be fully
and justly exercised. To be sure, in certain cases, if that
power is not exercised in conformity with the provisions of
the procedural law, purely, the court attempting to
exercise it loses the power to exercise it legally. This does
not mean that it loses jurisdiction of the subject matter.”
While the power to define, prescribe, and apportion the
jurisdiction of the various courts is, by constitutional
design, vested unto Congress, the power to promulgate
rules concerning the protection and enforcement of
constitutional rights, pleading, practice, and
procedure in all courts belongs exclusively to this
Court.

 
 

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

Remedial Law; Temporary Restraining Order;

Preliminary Injunction; It is well-settled that the sole object
of a temporary restraining order (TRO) or a writ of
preliminary injunction (WPI), whether prohibitory or
mandatory, is to preserve the status quo until the merits of
the case can be heard.—A temporary restraining order and
a writ of preliminary injunction both constitute temporary
measures availed of during the pendency of the action.
They are, by nature, ancillary because they are mere
incidents in and are dependent upon the result of the main
action. It is well-settled that the sole object of a
temporary restraining order or a writ of
preliminary injunction, whether prohibitory or
mandatory, is to preserve the status quo until the
merits of the case can be heard. They are usually
granted when it is made to appear that there is a
substantial controversy between the parties and one of
them is committing an act or threatening the immediate
commission of an act that will cause irreparable injury or
destroy the status quo of the controversy before a full
hearing can be had on the merits of the case. In other
words, they are preservative remedies for the protection of
substantive rights or interests, and, hence, not a cause of
action in itself, but merely adjunct to a main suit. In a
sense, they are regulatory processes meant to prevent a
case from being mooted by the interim acts of the parties.
Same; Same; Same; The Supreme Court (SC) rules
that when Congress passed the first paragraph of Section
14, Republic Act (RA) No. 6770 and, in so doing, took away
from the courts their power to issue a Temporary
Restraining Order (TRO) and/or Writ of Preliminary
Injunction (WPI) to enjoin an investigation conducted by
the Ombudsman, it encroached upon the Court’s
constitutional rule-making authority.—With these
considerations in mind, the Court rules that when
Congress passed the first paragraph of Section 14, RA
6770 and, in so doing, took away from the courts their
power to issue a TRO and/or WPI to enjoin an
investigation conducted by the Ombudsman, it encroached
upon this Court’s constitutional rule-making authority.
Clearly, these issuances, which are, by nature, provisional
reliefs and auxiliary writs created under the provisions of
the Rules of Court, are matters of procedure which
belong exclusively within the province of this Court. Rule
58 of the Rules of Court did not create, define, and regulate
a right but merely prescribed the means of implementing
an existing right since it only provided for temporary
reliefs to preserve the applicant’s right in

 
 

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

esse which is threatened to be violated during the

course of a pending litigation.
Political Law; Separation of Powers; When Congress
creates a court and delimits its jurisdiction, the procedure
for which its jurisdiction is exercised is fixed by the Court
through the rules it promulgates.—That Congress has been
vested with the authority to define, prescribe, and
apportion the jurisdiction of the various courts under
Section 2, Article VIII, supra, as well as to create statutory
courts under Section 1, Article VIII, supra, does not result
in an abnegation of the Court’s own power to promulgate
rules of pleading, practice, and procedure under Section
5(5), Article VIII, supra. Albeit operatively interrelated,
these powers are nonetheless institutionally separate and
distinct, each to be preserved under its own sphere of
authority. When Congress creates a court and
delimits its jurisdiction, the procedure for which its
jurisdiction is exercised is fixed by the Court
through the rules it promulgates. The first paragraph
of Section 14, RA 6770 is not a jurisdiction-vesting
provision, as the Ombudsman misconceives, because it
does not define, prescribe, and apportion the subject
matter jurisdiction of courts to act on certiorari cases; the
certiorari jurisdiction of courts, particularly the CA, stands
under the relevant sections of BP 129 which were not
shown to have been repealed. Instead, through this
provision, Congress interfered with a provisional
remedy that was created by this Court under its
duly promulgated rules of procedure, which utility
is both integral and inherent to every court’s
exercise of judicial power. Without the Court’s
consent to the proscription, as may be manifested by
an adoption of the same as part of the rules of
procedure through an administrative circular
issued therefor, there thus, stands to be a violation
of the separation of powers principle.
Same; Judicial Power; To give true meaning to the
judicial power contemplated by the Framers of our
Constitution, the Court’s duly promulgated rules of
procedure should therefore remain unabridged, this, even
by statute.—It should be pointed out that the breach of
Congress in prohibiting provisional injunctions, such as in
the first paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770, does not only
undermine the constitutional allocation of powers; it also
practically dilutes a court’s ability to carry out its
functions. This is so since a particular case can
easily be mooted by supervening events if

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

no provisional injunctive relief is extended

while the court is hearing the same. Accordingly, the
court’s acquired jurisdiction, through which it exercises its
judicial power, is rendered nugatory. Indeed, the force of
judicial power, especially under the present Constitution,
cannot be enervated due to a court’s inability to regulate
what occurs during a proceeding’s course. As earlier
intimated, when jurisdiction over the subject matter is
accorded by law and has been acquired by a court, its
exercise thereof should be unclipped. To give true meaning
to the judicial power contemplated by the Framers of our
Constitution, the Court’s duly promulgated rules of
procedure should therefore remain unabridged, this, even
by statute. Truth be told, the policy against provisional
injunctive writs in whatever variant should only subsist
under rules of procedure duly promulgated by the Court
given its sole prerogative over the same.
Administrative Law; Preventive Suspension; A
preventive suspension order is not a penalty but only a
preventive measure.—By nature, a preventive
suspension order is not a penalty but only a
preventive measure. In Quimbo v. Acting Ombudsman
Gervacio, 466 SCRA 277 (2005), the Court explained the
distinction, stating that its purpose is to prevent the
official to be suspended from using his position and
the powers and prerogatives of his office to
influence potential witnesses or tamper with
records which may be vital in the prosecution of the
case against him: Jurisprudential law establishes a
clear-cut distinction between suspension as preventive
measure and suspension as penalty. The distinction, by
considering the purpose aspect of the suspensions, is
readily cognizable as they have different ends sought to be
achieved. Preventive suspension is merely a
preventive measure, a preliminary step in an
administrative investigation. The purpose of the
suspension order is to prevent the accused from
using his position and the powers and prerogatives
of his office to influence potential witnesses or
tamper with records which may be vital in the
prosecution of the case against him. If after such
investigation, the charge is established and the person
investigated is found guilty of acts warranting his
suspension or removal, then he is suspended, removed or
dismissed. This is the penalty.
Same; Same; The law sets forth two (2) conditions that
must be satisfied to justify the issuance of an order of
preventive suspension

 
 
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pending an investigation.—The law sets forth two (2)

conditions that must be satisfied to justify the issuance of
an order of preventive suspension pending an
investigation, namely: (1) The evidence of guilt is strong;
and (2) Either of the following circumstances coexist with
the first requirement: (a) The charge involves dishonesty,
oppression or grave misconduct or neglect in the
performance of duty; (b) The charge would warrant
removal from the service; or (c) The respondent’s continued
stay in office may prejudice the case filed against him.
Same; Condonation; Words and Phrases; Generally
speaking, condonation has been defined as “[a] victim’s
express or implied forgiveness of an offense, [especially] by
treating the offender as if there had been no offense.”—
Generally speaking, condonation has been defined as “[a]
victim’s express or implied forgiveness of an offense,
[especially] by treating the offender as if there had
been no offense.” The condonation doctrine — which
connotes this same sense of complete extinguishment of
liability as will be herein elaborated upon — is not based
on statutory law. It is a jurisprudential creation that
originated from the 1959 case of Pascual v. Hon.
Provincial Board of Nueva Ecija, 106 Phil. 466
(Pascual), which was therefore decided under the
1935 Constitution.
Same; Condonation Doctrine; The Court, citing Civil
Service Commission v. Sojor, 554 SCRA 160 (2008), also
clarified that the condonation doctrine would not apply to
appointive officials since, as to them, there is no sovereign
will to disenfranchise.—The Court, citing Civil Service
Commission v. Sojor, 554 SCRA 160 (2008), also clarified
that the condonation doctrine would not apply to
appointive officials since, as to them, there is no
sovereign will to disenfranchise.
Civil Service; Public Officers; The 1987 Constitution
strengthened and solidified what has been first proclaimed
in the 1973 Constitution by commanding public officers to
be accountable to the people at all times.—After the
turbulent decades of Martial Law rule, the Filipino People
have framed and adopted the 1987 Constitution, which
sets forth in the Declaration of Principles and State
Policies in Article II that “[t]he State shall maintain
honesty and integrity in the public service and take
positive and effective measures against graft and
corruption.” Learning how unbridled power could corrupt
public servants under the regime of a dictator,

 
 

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the Framers put primacy on the integrity of the public

service by declaring it as a constitutional principle and a
State policy. More significantly, the 1987 Constitution
strengthened and solidified what has been first proclaimed
in the 1973 Constitution by commanding public officers to
be accountable to the people at all times: Section 1. Public
office is a public trust. Public officers and employees must
at all times be accountable to the people, serve them
with utmost responsibility, integrity, loyalty, and
efficiency and act with patriotism and justice, and
lead modest lives. In Belgica v. Ochoa, Jr., 710 SCRA 1
(2013), it was explained that: [t]he aphorism forged under
Section 1, Article XI of the 1987 Constitution, which states
that “public office is a public trust,” is an overarching
reminder that every instrumentality of government should
exercise their official functions only in accordance with the
principles of the Constitution which embodies the
parameters of the people’s trust. The notion of a public
trust connotes accountability x  x  x. (Emphasis
supplied) The same mandate is found in the Revised
Administrative Code under the section of the Civil Service
Commission, and also, in the Code of Conduct and Ethical
Standards for Public Officials and Employees.
Same; Same; For local elective officials like Binay, Jr.,
the grounds to discipline, suspend or remove an elective
local official from office are stated in Section 60 of Republic
Act (RA) No. 7160, otherwise known as the “Local
Government Code of 1991” (LGC), which was approved on
October 10 1991, and took effect on January 1, 1992.—For
local elective officials like Binay, Jr., the grounds to
discipline, suspend or remove an elective local
official from office are stated in Section 60 of
Republic Act No. 7160, otherwise known as the “Local
Government Code of 1991” (LGC), which was approved on
October 10 1991, and took effect on January 1, 1992:
Section 60. Grounds for Disciplinary Action.—An elective
local official may be disciplined, suspended, or removed
from office on any of the following grounds: (a) Disloyalty
to the Republic of the Philippines; (b) Culpable violation of
the Constitution; (c) Dishonesty, oppression, misconduct in
office, gross negligence, or dereliction of duty; (d)
Commission of any offense involving moral turpitude or an
offense punishable by at least prisión mayor; (e) Abuse of
authority; (f) Unauthorized absence for fifteen (15)
consecutive working days, except in the case of members of
the sangguniang panlalawigan, sangguniang panlungsod,
sangguniang bayan, and sangguniang

 
 

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barangay; (g) Application for, or acquisition of, foreign

citizenship or residence or the status of an immigrant of
another country; and (h) Such other grounds as may be
provided in this Code and other laws. An elective local
official may be removed from office on the grounds
enumerated above by order of the proper court.
Same; Same; Section 40(b) of the Local Government
Code (LGC) states that those removed from office as a result
of an administrative case shall be disqualified from
running for any elective local position.—Related to this
provision is Section 40(b) of the LGC which states that
those removed from office as a result of an
administrative case shall be disqualified from
running for any elective local position: Section 40.
Disqualifications.—The following persons are disqualified
from running for any elective local position: x  x  x  x (b)
Those removed from office as a result of an
administrative case.
Same; Same; Condonation Doctrine; The doctrine of
condonation is actually bereft of legal bases.—Section 52(a)
of the RRACCS provides that the penalty of dismissal
from service carries the accessory penalty of
perpetual disqualification from holding public
office: Section 52. Administrative Disabilities Inherent in
Certain Penalties.—a. The penalty of dismissal shall carry
with it cancellation of eligibility, forfeiture of retirement
benefits, perpetual disqualification from holding public
office, and bar from taking the civil service examinations.
In contrast, Section 66(b) of the LGC states that the
penalty of suspension shall not exceed the unexpired
term of the elective local official nor constitute a bar to his
candidacy for as long as he meets the qualifications
required for the office. Note, however, that the provision
only pertains to the duration of the penalty and its effect
on the official’s candidacy. Nothing therein states that
the administrative liability therefor is extinguished
by the fact of reelection: Section 66. Form and Notice of
Decision.—x x x. x x x x (b) The penalty of suspension shall
not exceed the unexpired term of the respondent or a
period of six (6) months for every administrative offense,
nor shall said penalty be a bar to the candidacy of the
respondent so suspended as long as he meets the
qualifications required for the office. Reading the 1987
Constitution together with the above cited legal provisions
now leads this Court to the conclusion that the doctrine of
condonation is actually bereft of legal bases.

 
 

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444 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

Same; Same; Same; Election is not a mode of

condoning an administrative offense, and there is simply no
constitutional or statutory basis in our jurisdiction to
support the notion that an official elected for a different
term is fully absolved of any administrative liability
arising from an offense done during a prior term.—The
concept of public office is a public trust and the
corollary requirement of accountability to the
people at all times, as mandated under the 1987
Constitution, is plainly inconsistent with the idea that
an elective local official’s administrative liability for a
misconduct committed during a prior term can be wiped off
by the fact that he was elected to a second term of office, or
even another elective post. Election is not a mode of
condoning an administrative offense, and there is
simply no constitutional or statutory basis in our
jurisdiction to support the notion that an official elected for
a different term is fully absolved of any administrative
liability arising from an offense done during a prior term.
In this jurisdiction, liability arising from
administrative offenses may be condoned by the
President in light of Section 19, Article VII of the 1987
Constitution which was interpreted in Llamas v. Orbos,
202 SCRA 844 (1991), to apply to administrative offenses.
Same; Same; Same; Nothing in Section 66(b) states
that the elective local official’s administrative liability is
extinguished by the fact of reelection. Thus, at all events, no
legal provision actually supports the theory that the
liability is condoned.—At best, Section 66(b) of the LGC
prohibits the enforcement of the penalty of
suspension beyond the unexpired portion of the elective
local official’s prior term, and likewise allows said official
to still run for reelection. This treatment is similar to
People ex rel. Bagshaw v. Thompson, (55 Cal. App. 2d 147;
130 P.2d.237 [1942]), and Montgomery v. Nowell, (183 Ark.
1116; 40 S.W.2d 418 [1931]), both cited in Pascual,
wherein it was ruled that an officer cannot be suspended
for a misconduct committed during a prior term. However,
as previously stated, nothing in Section 66(b) states that
the elective local official’s administrative liability is
extinguished by the fact of reelection. Thus, at all events,
no legal provision actually supports the theory that the
liability is condoned.
Same; Same; Same; The Supreme Court’s (SC’s)
abandonment of the condonation doctrine should be
prospective in application for the reason that judicial
decisions applying or interpreting the laws or

 
  

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the Constitution, until reversed, shall form part of the

legal system of the Philippines.—This Court simply finds
no legal authority to sustain the condonation doctrine in
this jurisdiction. As can be seen from this discourse, it was
a doctrine adopted from one class of US rulings way back
in 1959 and thus, out of touch from — and now rendered
obsolete by — the current legal regime. In consequence, it
is high time for this Court to abandon the condonation
doctrine that originated from Pascual, and affirmed in the
cases following the same, such as Aguinaldo v. Santos, 212
SCRA 768 (1992), Salalima v. Guingona, Jr., 257 SCRA 55
(1996), Mayor Garcia v. Mojica, 314 SCRA 207 (1999), and
Governor Garcia, Jr. v. CA, 586 SCRA 799 (2009), which
were all relied upon by the CA. It should, however, be
clarified that this Court’s abandonment of the condonation
doctrine should be prospective in application for the
reason that judicial decisions applying or interpreting the
laws or the Constitution, until reversed, shall form part of
the legal system of the Philippines. Unto this Court
devolves the sole authority to interpret what the
Constitution means, and all persons are bound to follow its
interpretation. As explained in De Castro v. Judicial Bar
Council, 618 SCRA 639 (2010): Judicial decisions assume
the same authority as a statute itself and, until
authoritatively abandoned, necessarily become, to the
extent that they are applicable, the criteria that must
control the actuations, not only of those called upon to
abide by them, but also of those duty-bound to enforce
obedience to them.
Grave Abuse of Discretion; It is well-settled that an act
of a court or tribunal can only be considered as with grave
abuse of discretion when such act is done in a capricious or
whimsical exercise of judgment as is equivalent to lack of
jurisdiction.—It is well-settled that an act of a court or
tribunal can only be considered as with grave abuse of
discretion when such act is done in a capricious or
whimsical exercise of judgment as is equivalent to
lack of jurisdiction. The abuse of discretion must be so
patent and gross as to amount to an evasion of a positive
duty or to a virtual refusal to perform a duty enjoined by
law, or to act at all in contemplation of law, as where the
power is exercised in an arbitrary and despotic manner by
reason of passion and hostility. It has also been held that
“grave abuse of discretion arises when a lower court
or tribunal patently violates the Constitution, the
law or existing jurisprudence.”

 
 

446

446 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

Civil Service; Public Officers; Condonation Doctrine;

The Supreme Court (SC) deems it apt to clarify that the
mootness of the issue regarding the validity of the
preventive suspension order subject of this case does not
preclude any of its foregoing determinations, particularly,
its abandonment of the condonation doctrine.—This Court
deems it apt to clarify that the mootness of the issue
regarding the validity of the preventive suspension order
subject of this case does not preclude any of its foregoing
determinations, particularly, its abandonment of the
condonation doctrine. As explained in Belgica v. Ochoa,
Jr., “‘the moot and academic principle’ is not a magical
formula that can automatically dissuade the Court in
resolving a case. The Court will decide cases, otherwise
moot, if: first, there is a grave violation of the
Constitution; second, the exceptional character of the
situation and the paramount public interest is involved;
third, when the constitutional issue raised requires
formulation of controlling principles to guide the bench,
the bar, and the public; and fourth, the case is capable of
repetition yet evading review.”
Same; Same; Same; It would be a violation of the
Supreme Court’s (SC’s) own duty to uphold and defend the
Constitution if it were not to abandon the condonation
doctrine now that its infirmities have become apparent.—It
would be a violation of the Court’s own duty to uphold and
defend the Constitution if it were not to abandon the
condonation doctrine now that its infirmities have become
apparent. As extensively discussed, the continued
application of the condonation doctrine is simply
impermissible under the auspices of the present
Constitution which explicitly mandates that public office is
a public trust and that public officials shall be accountable
to the people at all times.
Same; Same; Same; The condonation doctrine is a
peculiar jurisprudential creation that has persisted as a
defense of elective officials to escape administrative
liability.—The condonation doctrine is a peculiar
jurisprudential creation that has persisted as a defense of
elective officials to escape administrative liability. It is the
first time that the legal intricacies of this doctrine have
been brought to light; thus, this is a situation of
exceptional character which this Court must ultimately
resolve. Further, since the doctrine has served as a
perennial obstacle against exacting public accountability
from the multitude of elective local officials throughout the
years, it is indubitable that paramount public interest is
involved.

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

Same; Same; Same; In any event, the abandonment of

a doctrine is wholly within the prerogative of the Court. As
mentioned, it is its own jurisprudential creation and may
therefore, pursuant to its mandate to uphold and defend the
Constitution, revoke it notwithstanding supervening events
that render the subject of discussion moot.—The defense of
condonation has been consistently invoked by elective local
officials against the administrative charges filed against
them. To provide a sample size, the Ombudsman has
informed the Court that “for the period of July 2013 to
December 2014 alone, 85 cases from the Luzon Office and
24 cases from the Central Office were dismissed on the
ground of condonation. Thus, in just one and a half years,
over a hundred cases of alleged misconduct — involving
infractions such as dishonesty, oppression, gross neglect of
duty and grave misconduct — were placed beyond the
reach of the Ombudsman’s investigatory and prosecutorial
powers.” Evidently, this fortifies the finding that the case
is capable of repetition and must therefore, not evade
review. In any event, the abandonment of a doctrine is
wholly within the prerogative of the Court. As mentioned,
it is its own jurisprudential creation and may therefore,
pursuant to its mandate to uphold and defend the
Constitution, revoke it notwithstanding supervening
events that render the subject of discussion moot.
Bersamin, J., Concurring and Dissenting Opinion:
The Ombudsman’s Act; View that Section 14 of
Republic Act (RA) No. 6770 should be struck down for
authorizing the undue interference with the prerogatives of
the courts of law to adopt whatever means were allowed by
law and procedure to exercise their jurisdiction in the cases
properly cognizable by them.—I am writing this separate
opinion to memorialize my concurrence with the
declaration of the ineffectiveness of the first paragraph of
Section 14 of Republic Act No. 6770, and of the
unconstitutionality of the second paragraph thereof. The
main opinion has been written well by our esteemed
colleague, Associate Justice Estela M. Perlas-Bernabe, who
has exhibited her scholarly bent once again. But let me
assure my colleagues in the Majority that if I submit this
concurrence, I do not mean to diminish in any way or
degree the forcefulness and correctness of the justification
for the declaration. I simply want to underscore that
Section 14 of Republic Act No. 6770 should be struck down
for authorizing the undue interference with the
prerogatives of the courts of law to adopt whatever means
were allowed by law and

 
 
448

448 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

procedure to exercise their jurisdiction in the cases

properly cognizable by them.
Ombudsman; Preventive Suspension; Administrative
Cases; View that in line with the power to investigate
administrative cases, the Ombudsman is vested with the
authority to preventively suspend respondent public
officials and employees pursuant to Section 24 of Republic
Act (RA) No. 6770.—In line with the power to investigate
administrative cases, the Ombudsman is vested with the
authority to preventively suspend respondent public
officials and employees pursuant to Section 24 of Republic
Act No. 6770, which provides: Section 24. Preventive
Suspension.—The Ombudsman or his Deputy may
preventively suspend any officer or employee under his
authority pending an investigation, if in his judgment the
evidence of guilt is strong, and (a) the charge against such
officer or employee involves dishonesty, oppression or
grave misconduct or neglect in the performance of duty; (b)
the charges would warrant removal from the service; or (c)
the respondent’s continued stay in office may prejudice the
case filed against him. The preventive suspension shall
continue until the case is terminated by the Office of the
Ombudsman but not more than six (6) months, without
pay, except when the delay in the disposition of the case by
the Office of the Ombudsman is due to the fault,
negligence or petition of the respondent, in which case the
period of such delay shall not be counted in computing the
period of suspension herein provided.
Same; Same; View that the Ombudsman has no
authority to issue the preventive suspension order in
connection with criminal investigations of government
officials or employees because such authority rests in the
courts in which the criminal cases are filed.—It is
important to note, however, that the Ombudsman has no
authority to issue the preventive suspension order in
connection with criminal investigations of government
officials or employees because such authority rests in the
courts in which the criminal cases are filed.
Civil Service; Public Officers; Condonation Doctrine;
View that condonation shall apply only in case of the
reelection of a public officer who is sought to be
permanently removed from office as a result of his
misconduct, not while such public officer is undergoing
investigation.—It is clear to me that, based on the
language and the factual milieu of Aguinaldo v. Santos,
212 SCRA 768 (1992), and Salalima v. Guingona, Jr., 257
SCRA 55 (1996), which both cited

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)
 Pascual v. Provincial Board of Nueva Ecija, 106 Phil.
466 (1959), and of other akin rulings, condonation shall
apply only in case of the reelection of a public officer who is
sought to be permanently removed from office as a result of
his misconduct, not while such public officer is undergoing
investigation. Condonation necessarily implies that the
condoned act has already been found to have been
committed by the public officer. Hence, condonation
applies to the penalty or punishment imposed after the
conduct of an administrative investigation. Under the
circumstances, the pronouncements in Aguinaldo,
Salalima and the others could not be applicable to the
preventive suspension order issued to Binay, Jr. pending
his administrative investigation because preventive
suspension pending the conduct of an investigation was
not yet a penalty in itself, but a mere measure of
precaution to enable the disciplining authority to
investigate the charges by precluding the respondent from
influencing the witnesses against him.
Same; Same; Same; Suspension; View that the
Supreme Court (SC) notably stated in Garcia, Jr. v. Court
of Appeals, 586 SCRA 799 (2009), and Joson III v. Court of
Appeals, 482 SCRA 360 (2006), that “suspension from office
of an elective official would deprive the electorate of the
services of the person they voted into office” in the context of
determining the propriety of the issuance of the preventive
suspension order.—As I see it, the CA misconstrued the
milieu in Garcia, Jr. v. Court of Appeals, 586 SCRA 799
(2009), and Joson III v. Court of Appeals, 482 SCRA 360
(2006), as an application of the doctrine of condonation.
The Court notably stated in Garcia, Jr. and Joson III that
“suspension from office of an elective official would deprive
the electorate of the services of the person they voted into
office” in the context of determining the propriety of the
issuance of the preventive suspension order. In other
words, the statement only served to remind the
Ombudsman to issue the preventive suspension orders
with utmost caution in view of the gravity of the effects of
suspending an incumbent elective local official. Hence,
Garcia, Jr. and Joson III did not apply the doctrine of
condonation.
Remedial Law; Provisional Remedies; Preliminary
Injunction; View that a preliminary injunction is an order
granted at any stage of an action prior to the judgment or
final order requiring a party or a court, agency or a person
to refrain from a particular act or acts.—A preliminary
injunction is an order granted at any stage of an action
prior to the judgment or final order requiring a party or a

 
 
450

450 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

court, agency or a person to refrain from a particular

act or acts. The requirements for the issuance of a writ of
preliminary injunction or temporary restraining order are
clearly set forth in Section 3, Rule 58 of the Rules of Court.
The sole objective of the writ of preliminary injunction is to
preserve the status quo until the merits of the case can be
heard fully. The writ of preliminary injunction is generally
based solely on initial and incomplete evidence; hence, it
should not determine the merits of a case, or decide
controverted facts, for, being a preventive remedy, it only
seeks to prevent threatened wrong, further injury, and
irreparable harm or injustice until the rights of the parties
can be settled.
Preventive Suspension; View that the preventive
suspension order, being an ancillary issuance, was
dissolved upon the Ombudsman’s resolution of the
administrative charges on the merits.—In the meanwhile,
the Ombudsman found Binay, Jr. administratively liable,
and dismissed him from the service. By such dismissal, the
questions raised against the CA’s issuance of the writ of
preliminary injunction against the Ombudsman were
rendered moot and academic. I join the Majority in saying
that the preventive suspension order, being an ancillary
issuance, was dissolved upon the Ombudsman’s resolution
of the administrative charges on the merits. Thus, to dwell
on the preventive suspension of Binay, Jr. and his co-
respondents any further would be superfluous, for, as the
Court said in Philippine Savings Bank v. Senate
Impeachment Court, 686 SCRA 35 (2012): It is a rule of
universal application that courts of justice constituted to
pass upon substantial rights will not consider questions in
which no actual interests are involved; they decline
jurisdiction of moot cases. And where the issue has become
moot and academic, there is no justiciable controversy, so
that a declaration thereon would be of no practical use or
value. There is no actual substantial relief to which
petitioners would be entitled and which would be
negated by the dismissal of the petition.

SPECIAL CIVIL ACTION in the Supreme Court.

Certiorari and Prohibition.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the Court.
  The Solicitor General for petitioner.
  Claro F. Certeza and Maria Patricia L. Alvarez
for respondent.

 
 
451

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

  Yorac-Sarmiento, Arroyo, Chua-Coronel and

Reyes Law Firm collaborating counsel for private
respondent.

PERLAS-BERNABE, J.:
 “All government is a trust, every
branch of government is a trust,
and immemorially acknowledged
so to be[.]”1
– Jeremy Bentham

The Case
 
Before the Court is a petition for certiorari and
prohibition2 filed on March 25, 2015 by petitioner
Conchita Carpio-Morales, in her capacity as the
Ombudsman (Ombudsman), through the Office of
the Solicitor General (OSG), assailing: (a) the
Resolution3 dated March 16, 2015 of public
respondent the Court of Appeals (CA) in C.A.-G.R.
S.P. No. 139453, which granted private respondent
Jejomar Erwin S. Binay, Jr.’s (Binay, Jr.) prayer for
the issuance of a temporary restraining order (TRO)
against the implementation of the Joint Order4 dated
March 10, 2015 of the Ombudsman in OMB-C-A-15-
0058 to 0063 (preventive suspension order)
preventively suspending him and several other
public officers and employees of the City Government
of Makati, for six (6) months without pay; and (b) the
Resolution5 dated March 20, 2015 of

_______________

2  With urgent prayer for the issuance of a TRO and/or a WPI.

Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 6-36.
3  Id., at pp. 43-47. Penned by Associate Justice Jose C. Reyes,
Jr., with Associate Justices Francisco P. Acosta and Eduardo B.
Peralta, Jr., concurring.
4  Id., at pp. 53-65. Issued by petitioner Ombudsman Conchita
Carpio-Morales.
5  Id., at pp. 50-51.

 
 
452
452 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED
Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the CA, ordering the Ombudsman to comment on

Binay, Jr.’s petition for contempt6 in C.A.-G.R. S.P.
No. 139504.
Pursuant to the Resolution7 dated April 6, 2015,
the CA issued a writ of preliminary injunction8
(WPI) in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 which further
enjoined the implementation of the preventive
suspension order, prompting the Ombudsman to file
a supplemental petition9 on April 13, 2015.

The Facts
 
On July 22, 2014, a complaint/affidavit10 was filed
by Atty. Renato L. Bondal and Nicolas “Ching”
Enciso VI before the Office of the Ombudsman
against Binay, Jr. and other public officers and
employees of the City Government of Makati (Binay,
Jr., et al.), accusing them of Plunder11 and violation
of Republic Act No. (RA) 3019,12 otherwise known as
“The Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act,” in
connection with the five (5) phases of the
procurement and construction of the Makati City
Hall Parking Building (Makati Parking Building).13
On September 9, 2014, the Ombudsman
constituted a Special Panel of Investigators14 to
conduct a fact-finding investigation, submit an
investigation report, and file the necessary
complaint, if warranted (1st Special Panel).15
Pursuant to the

_______________

6   Dated March 18, 2015. Id., at pp. 362-373.

7   Id., at pp. 613-627.
8   Id., at pp. 629-630. Signed by Division Clerk of Court
Miriam Alfonso Bautista.
 9   For certiorari and prohibition with prayer for the issuance of
a TRO and/or WPI. Id., at pp. 606-611.
10  See Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 749-757.
11   RA 7080, entitled “An Act Defining and Penalizing the
Crime of Plunder” (approved on July 12, 1991).
12  Approved on August 17, 1960.
13  Rollo (Vol. II), p. 647.
14  Id.
15  Through Ombudsman Office Order No. 546, which was later
on amended through Officer Order No. 546-A dated November 18,
2014. Id., at pp. 758-759.

 
 
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Ombudsman’s directive, on March 5, 2015, the 1st

Special Panel filed a complaint16 (OMB Complaint)
against Binay, Jr., et al., charging them with six (6)
administrative cases17 for Grave Misconduct, Serious
Dishonesty, and Conduct Prejudicial to the Best
Interest of the Service, and six (6) criminal cases18
for violation of Section 3(e) of RA 3019, Malversation
of Public Funds, and Falsification of Public
Documents (OMB Cases).19
As to Binay, Jr., the OMB Complaint alleged that
he was involved in anomalous activities attending
the following procurement and construction phases
of the Makati Parking Building project, committed
during his previous and present terms as City Mayor
of Makati:

_______________

16  Dated March 3, 2015. Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 66-100.

 17   Docketed as OMB-C-A-15-0058, OMB-C-A-15-0059, OMB-
C-A-15-0060, OMB-C-A-15-0061, OMB-C-A-15-0062, and OMB-C-
A-15-0063. Id., at pp. 53-58.
18   Docketed as OMB-C-C-15-0059, OMB-C-C-15-0060, OMB-
C-C-15-0061, OMB-C-C-15-0062, OMB-C-C-15-0063, and OMB-C-
C-15-0064. Id., at p. 66. See also Rollo (Vol. II), p. 674.
19  As for Binay, Jr., only four (4) administrative cases and four
(4) criminal cases were filed against him, particularly: (a) for
administrative cases (1) OMB-C-A-15-0058; (2) OMB-C-A-15-0061;
(3) OMB-C-A-15-0062; and (4) OMB-C-A-15-0063; and (b) for
criminal cases (1) OMB-C-C-15-0059, for violation of Section 3(e)
of RA 3019 and Malversation of Public Funds involving the
design, architectural, and engineering services of MANA
Architecture & Interior Design Co. covering the Makati Parking
Building project, (2) OMB-C-C-15-0062, for violation of Section
3(e) of RA 3019 and two (2) counts of Falsification of Public
Documents under Article 171 of the Revised Penal Code in
connection with Phase III of the Makati Parking Building project
involving Hilmarc’s, (3) OMB-C-C-15-0063, for violation of Section
3(e) of RA 3019 and two (2) counts of Falsification of Public
Documents in connection with Phase IV of the Makati Parking
Building project involving Hilmarc’s; and (4) OMB-C-C-15-0064,
for violation of Section 3(e) of RA 3019 and two (2) counts of
Falsification of Public Documents in connection with Phase V of
the Makati Parking Building project involving Hilmarcs. (Rollo
[Vol. I], p. 12; Rollo [Vol. II], p. 647)

 
 
454

454 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

Binay, Jr.’s First Term (2010 to 2013)20

 
 (a) On September 21, 2010, Binay, Jr.
issued the Notice of Award21 for Phase III of
the Makati Parking Building project to
Hilmarc’s Construction Corporation
(Hilmarc’s), and consequently, executed the
corresponding contract22 on September 28,
2010,23 without the required publication and
the lack of architectural design,24 and approved
the release of funds therefor in the following
amounts as follows: (1) P130,518,394.80 on
December 15, 2010;25 (2) P134,470,659.64 on
January 19, 2011;26 (3) P92,775,202.27 on
February 25, 2011;27 (4) P57,148,625.51 on
March 28, 2011;28 (5) P40,908,750.61 on May
3, 2011;29 and (6) P106,672,761.90 on July 7,
2011;30
(b) On August 11, 2011, Binay, Jr. issued
the Notice of Award31 for Phase IV of the
Makati Parking Building

_______________

20   Specific period covered by his first term is from Noon of

June 30, 2010 to Noon of June 30, 2013.
21  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 247.
22  Id., at pp. 248-250.
23  The original contract amount was P599,395,613.34. Due to
a change order, this was later increased to P599,994,021.05. See
Disbursement Voucher; id., at p. 284.
24  Id., at pp. 86-87.
25  See Disbursement Voucher for 26% completion of Phase III;
id., at p. 270.
26  See Disbursement Voucher for 52.49% completion of Phase
III; id., at p. 273.
27  See Disbursement Voucher for 69% completion of Phase III;
id., at p. 276.
28  See Disbursement Voucher for 79.17% completion of Phase
III; id., at p. 278.
 29  See Disbursement Voucher for 86.45% completion of Phase
III; id., at p. 281.
30   See Disbursement Voucher for 100% completion of Phase
III; id., at p. 284.
31  Id., at p. 312.

 
 
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project to Hilmarc’s, and consequently,

executed the corresponding contract32 on
August 18, 2011,33 without the required
publication and the lack of architectural
design,34 and approved the release of funds
therefor in the following amounts as follows: (1)
P182,325,538.97 on October 4, 2011;35 (2)
P173,132,606.91 on October 28, 2011;36 (3)
P80,408,735.20 on December 12, 2011;37 (4)
P62,878,291.81 on February 10, 2012;38 and
(5) P59,639,167.90 on October 1, 2012;39
(c) On September 6, 2012, Binay, Jr.
issued the Notice of Award40 for Phase V of the
Makati Parking Building project to Hilmarc’s,
and consequently, executed the corresponding
contract41 on September 13, 2012,42 without
the required publication and the lack of
architectural design,43 and approved the
release of the funds therefor in

_______________

32  Id., at pp. 290-292.

33   The original contract amount was P649,275,681.73. This
was later increased to P649,934,440.96. See Disbursement
Voucher; id., at p. 320.
34  Id., at p. 88.
35  See Disbursement Voucher for 33.53% completion of Phase
IV; id., at p. 315.
36  See Disbursement Voucher for 63.73% completion of Phase
IV; id., at p. 316.
37  See Disbursement Voucher for 76.94% completion of Phase
IV; id., at p. 317.
38  See Disbursement Voucher for 87.27% completion of Phase
IV; id., at p. 318.
39   See Disbursement Voucher for 100% completion of Phase
IV; id., at p. 320.
40  Id., at p. 334.
41  Id., at pp. 323-325.
42  The original contract amount was P141,649,366.00. Due to
a change order, this was later increased to P143,806,161.00. See
Disbursement Voucher; id., at p. 349.
43  Id., at p. 91.

 
 
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456 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the amounts of P32,398,220.0544 and

P30,582,629.3045 on December 20, 2012; and
 
Binay, Jr.’s Second Term (2013 to
2016)46
 
(d) On July 3, 2013 and July 4, 2013,
Binay, Jr. approved the release of funds for the
remaining balance of the September 13, 2012
contract with Hilmarc’s for Phase V of the
 Makati Parking Building project in the amount
of P27,443,629.97;47 and
(e) On July 24, 2013, Binay, Jr. approved
the release of funds for the remaining balance
of the contract48 with MANA Architecture &
Interior Design Co. (MANA) for the design and
architectural services covering the Makati
Parking Building project in the amount of
P429,011.48.49
On March 6, 2015, the Ombudsman created
another Special Panel of Investigators to
conduct a preliminary investigation and
administrative adjudication on the OMB Cases
(2nd Special Panel).50 Thereafter, on March 9,
2015, the 2nd Special Panel issued separate
orders51 for each of the OMB Cases,

_______________

44  See Disbursement Voucher for 27.31% completion of Phase

V; id., at p. 340. Id., at pp. 337-339.
45  See Disbursement Voucher for 52.76% completion of Phase
V; id., at p. 344. Id., at pp. 341-343.
46  Specific period covered by his second term is from Noon of
June 30, 2013 to Noon of June 30, 2016.
47  See Disbursement Voucher for 100% completion of Phase V;
Rollo, p. 349. Id., at pp. 346-349.
48   For the contract amount of P11,974,900.00. Dated
November 28, 2007. Id., at pp. 108-113.
49   See Disbursement Voucher for 100% completion of the
MANA contract; id., at p. 126.
50  Through Ombudsman Office Order No. 178, which was later
on amended through Office Order No. 180 dated March 9, 2015.
See Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 647-648.
51  Not attached to the Rollos.

 
 
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requiring Binay, Jr., et al. to file their respective

counter-affidavits.52
Before Binay, Jr., et al.’s filing of their counter-
affidavits, the Ombudsman, upon the
recommendation of the 2nd Special Panel, issued on
March 10, 2015, the subject preventive suspension
order, placing Binay, Jr., et al. under preventive
suspension for not more than six (6) months without
pay, during the pendency of the OMB Cases.53 The
Ombudsman ruled that the requisites for the
preventive suspension of a public officer are
present,54 finding that: (a) the evidence of Binay, Jr.,
et al.’s guilt was strong given that (1) the losing
bidders and members of the Bids and Awards
Committee of Makati City had attested to the
irregularities attending the Makati Parking Building
project; (2) the documents on record negated the
publication of bids; and (3) the disbursement
vouchers, checks, and official receipts showed the
release of funds; and (b) (1) Binay, Jr., et al. were
administratively charged with Grave Misconduct,
Serious Dishonesty, and Conduct Prejudicial to the
Best Interest of the Service; (2) said charges, if
proven to be true, warrant removal from public
service under the Revised Rules on Administrative
Cases in the Civil Service (RRACCS); and (3) Binay,
Jr., et al.’s respective positions give them access to
public records and allow them to influence possible
witnesses; hence, their continued stay in office may
prejudice the investigation relative to the OMB
Cases filed against them.55 Consequently, the
Ombudsman directed the Department of the Interior
and Local Government (DILG), through Secretary
Manuel A. Roxas II (Secretary Roxas), to
immediately implement the preventive suspension
order against Binay, Jr., et al., upon receipt of the
same.56

_______________

52  Rollo (Vol. II), p. 648.

53  See Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 62 and 480.
54  Id., at p. 61.
55  Id.
56  Id., at pp. 63 and 480. See also Ombudsman’s Indorsement
letter dated March 11, 2015; id., at p. 351.

 
 
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458 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

On March 11, 2015, a copy of the preventive

suspension order was sent to the Office of the City
Mayor, and received by Maricon Ausan, a member of
Binay, Jr.’s staff.57
 
The Proceedings Before the CA
 
58
On even date, Binay, Jr. filed a petition for
certiorari59 before the CA, docketed as C.A.-G.R.
S.P. No. 139453, seeking the nullification of the
preventive suspension order, and praying for the
issuance of a TRO and/or WPI to enjoin its
implementation.60 Primarily, Binay, Jr. argued
that he could not be held administratively
liable for any anomalous activity attending any of
the five (5) phases of the Makati Parking Building
project since: (a) Phases I and II were undertaken
before he was elected Mayor of Makati in 2010; and
(b) Phases III to V transpired during his first term
and that his reelection as City Mayor of Makati
for a second term effectively condoned his
administrative liability therefor, if any, thus
rendering the administrative cases against him moot
and academic.61 In any event, Binay, Jr. claimed
that the Ombudsman’s preventive suspension
order failed to show that the evidence of guilt
presented against him is strong, maintaining
that he did not participate in any of the purported
irregularities.62 In support of his prayer for
injunctive relief, Binay, Jr. argued that he has a
clear and unmistakable right to hold public office,
having won by landslide vote in the 2010 and 2013
elections, and

_______________

57  See Personal Delivery Receipt; id., at p. 350; p. 12.

59  Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 403-427.
60  Id., at pp. 425-426.
61  Id., at p. 404.
62  Id., at pp. 404-405.

 
 
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that, in view of the condonation doctrine, as well

as the lack of evidence to sustain the charges against
him, his suspension from office would undeservedly
deprive the electorate of the services of the person
they have conscientiously chosen and voted into
office.63
 On March 16, 2015, at around 8:24 a.m.,
Secretary Roxas caused the implementation of the
preventive suspension order through the DILG
National Capital Region-Regional Director, Renato
L. Brion, CESO III (Director Brion), who posted a
copy thereof on the wall of the Makati City Hall after
failing to personally serve the same on Binay, Jr. as
the points of entry to the Makati City Hall were
closed. At around 9:47 a.m., Assistant City
Prosecutor of Makati Billy C. Evangelista
administered the oath of office on Makati City Vice
Mayor Romulo V. Peña, Jr. (Peña, Jr.) who
thereupon assumed office as Acting Mayor.64
At noon of the same day, the CA issued a
Resolution65 (dated March 16, 2015), granting
Binay, Jr.’s prayer for a TRO,66 notwithstanding
Peña, Jr.’s assumption of duties as Acting Mayor
earlier that day.67 Citing the case of Governor
Garcia, Jr. v. CA,68 the CA found that it was more
prudent on its part to issue a TRO in view of the
extreme urgency of the matter and seriousness of the
issues raised, considering that if it were established
that the acts subject of the administrative cases
against Binay, Jr. were all committed during his
prior term, then, applying the condonation doctrine,
Binay, Jr.’s reelection meant that he can no longer be
administra-
58   See Binay, Jr.’s Comment/Opposition dated
April 6, 2005; id., at p. 481. See also Binay, Jr.’s
Memorandum dated May 21, 2015; Rollo (Vol. II), p.
806. The Ombudsman, however, claims that the said
petition was filed on March 12, 2015; see Rollo (Vol.
II), p. 648.

_______________

63  Id., at pp. 424-425.

64   Id., at pp. 12-13. See also Director Brion’s Memorandum
dated March 16, 2015; id., at pp. 352-353.
 65  Id., at pp. 43-47.
66  Id., at p. 47.
67  Id., at p. 13.
68  604 Phil. 677; 586 SCRA 799 (2009).

 
 
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460 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

tively charged.69 The CA then directed the

Ombudsman to comment on Binay, Jr.’s petition for
certiorari.70
On March 17, 2015, the Ombudsman manifested71
that the TRO did not state what act was being
restrained and that since the preventive suspension
order had already been served and implemented,
there was no longer any act to restrain.72
On the same day, Binay, Jr. filed a petition for
contempt,73 docketed as C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139504,
accusing Secretary Roxas, Director Brion, the
officials of the Philippine National Police, and Peña,
Jr. of deliberately refusing to obey the CA, thereby
allegedly impeding, obstructing, or degrading the
administration of justice.74 The Ombudsman and
Department of Justice Secretary Leila M. De Lima
were subsequently impleaded as additional
respondents upon Binay, Jr.’s filing of the amended
and supplemental petition for contempt75 (petition
for contempt) on March 19, 2015.76 Among others,
Binay, Jr. accused the Ombudsman and other
respondents therein for willfully and maliciously
ignoring the TRO issued by the CA against the
preventive suspension order.77
In a Resolution78 dated March 20, 2015, the
CA ordered the consolidation of C.A.-G.R. S.P. No.
139453 and C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139504, and, without
necessarily giving due course to Binay, Jr.’s
petition for contempt, directed the

_______________

69  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 46.

70   Which directive the Ombudsman complied with on March
30, 2015 (Rollo [Vol. II], p. 650). See also Rollo (Vol. I), p. 47.
71  See Manifestation dated March 17, 2015; Rollo (Vol. I), pp.
357-360.
72  Id., at p. 358.
73  Not attached to the Rollos.
74  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 14; Rollo (Vol. II), p. 649.
75  Dated March 18, 2015. Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 362-373.
76  Id.
77  Id., at p. 370.
78  Id., at pp. 50-51.

 
 

461

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Ombudsman to file her comment thereto.79 The

cases were set for hearing of oral arguments on
March 30 and 31, 2015.80
 
The Proceedings Before the Court
 
Prior to the hearing of the oral arguments before
the CA, or on March 25, 2015, the Ombudsman filed
the present petition before this Court, assailing the
CA’s March 16, 2015 Resolution, which granted
Binay, Jr.’s prayer for TRO in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No.
139453, and the March 20, 2015 Resolution directing
her to file a comment on Binay, Jr.’s petition for
contempt in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139504.81 The
Ombudsman claims that: (a) the CA had no
jurisdiction to grant Binay, Jr.’s prayer for a TRO,
citing Section 14 of RA 6770,82 or “The Ombudsman
Act of 1989,” which states that no injunctive writ
could be issued to delay the Ombudsman’s
investigation unless there is prima facie evidence
that the subject matter thereof is outside the latter’s
jurisdiction;83 and (b) the CA’s directive for the
Ombudsman to comment on Binay, Jr.’s petition for
contempt is illegal and improper, considering that
the Ombudsman is an impeachable officer, and
therefore, cannot be subjected to contempt
proceedings.84

_______________

79   Which the Ombudsman complied with on March 26, 2015

(Rollo [Vol. II], p. 650). See also Rollo (Vol. I), p. 50.
80   The CA heard oral arguments with respect to Binay, Jr.’s
application for a WPI on March 30, 2015. On the other hand, the
CA heard oral arguments with respect to Binay, Jr.’s petition for
contempt on March 31, 2015 (see Rollo [Vol. II], p. 650). See also
Rollo (Vol. I), p. 51.
81  Rollo (Vol. II), p. 650.
82   Entitled “An Act Providing for the Functional and
Structural Organization of the Office of the Ombudsman, and for
Other Purposes,” approved on November 17, 1989.
83  See Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 17-21.
84  Id., at pp. 21-24.

 
 

462

462 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)
 In his comment85 filed on April 6, 2015, Binay, Jr.
argues that Section 1, Article VIII of the 1987
Constitution specifically grants the CA judicial
power to review acts of any branch or
instrumentality of government, including the Office
of the Ombudsman, in case of grave abuse of
discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction,
which he asserts was committed in this case when
said office issued the preventive suspension order
against him.86 Binay, Jr. posits that it was
incumbent upon the Ombudsman to have been
apprised of the condonation doctrine as this would
have weighed heavily in determining whether there
was strong evidence to warrant the issuance of the
preventive suspension order.87 In this relation,
Binay, Jr. maintains that the CA correctly enjoined
the implementation of the preventive suspension
order given his clear and unmistakable right to
public office, and that it is clear that he could not be
held administratively liable for any of the charges
against him since his subsequent reelection in 2013
operated as a condonation of any administrative
offenses he may have committed during his previous
term.88 As regards the CA’s order for the
Ombudsman to comment on his petition for
contempt, Binay, Jr. submits that while the
Ombudsman is indeed an impeachable officer and,
hence, cannot be removed from office except by way
of impeachment, an action for contempt imposes the
penalty of fine and imprisonment, without
necessarily resulting in removal from office. Thus,
the fact that the Ombudsman is an impeachable
officer should not deprive the CA of its inherent
power to punish contempt.89
Meanwhile, the CA issued a Resolution90 dated
April 6, 2015, after the oral arguments before it
were held,91 granting

_______________
 85   See Comment/Opposition dated April 6, 2015; id., at pp.
477-522.
86  Id., at pp. 478-479.
87  Id., at pp. 492-493.
88  Id., at pp. 497-505.
89  Id., at p. 511.
90  Id., at pp. 613-627.
91  Id., at p. 615.

 
 
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Binay, Jr.’s prayer for a WPI, which further

enjoined the implementation of the preventive
suspension order. In so ruling, the CA found that
Binay, Jr. has an ostensible right to the final relief
prayed for, namely, the nullification of the
preventive suspension order, in view of the
condonation doctrine, citing Aguinaldo v. Santos.92
Particularly, it found that the Ombudsman can
hardly impose preventive suspension against Binay,
Jr. given that his reelection in 2013 as City Mayor of
Makati condoned any administrative liability arising
from anomalous activities relative to the Makati
Parking Building project from 2007 to 2013.93 In this
regard, the CA added that, although there were acts
which were apparently committed by Binay, Jr.
beyond his first term — namely, the alleged
payments on July 3, July 4, and July 24, 2013,94
corresponding to the services of Hilmarc’s and
MANA — still, Binay, Jr. cannot be held
administratively liable therefor based on the cases of
Salalima v. Guingona, Jr.,95 and Mayor Garcia
v. Mojica,96 wherein the condonation doctrine was
still applied by the Court although the payments
were made after the official’s reelection, reasoning
that the payments were merely effected pursuant to
contracts executed before said reelection.97 To this,
the CA added that there was no concrete evidence of
Binay, Jr.’s participation for the alleged payments
made on July 3, 4, and 24, 2013.98
In view of the CA’s supervening issuance of a WPI
pursuant to its April 6, 2015 Resolution, the
Ombudsman filed a supplemental petition99 before
this Court, arguing that the

_______________

92  G.R. No. 94115, August 21, 1992, 212 SCRA 768.

93  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 619.
94  All of which pertains to the payment of Phase V. Id., at
pp. 346-349; p. 623.
95  326 Phil. 847; 257 SCRA 55 (1996).
96  372 Phil. 892; 314 SCRA 207 (1999).
97  See Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 619-620.
98  Id., at p. 623.
99  Id., at pp. 606-611.

 
 
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464 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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condonation doctrine is irrelevant to the

determination of whether the evidence of guilt is
strong for purposes of issuing preventive suspension
orders. The Ombudsman also maintained that a
reliance on the condonation doctrine is a matter of
defense, which should have been raised by Binay, Jr.
before it during the administrative proceedings, and
that, at any rate, there is no condonation because
Binay, Jr. committed acts subject of the OMB
Complaint after his reelection in 2013.100
On April 14 and 21, 2015,101 the Court conducted
hearings for the oral arguments of the parties.
Thereafter, they were required to file their respective
memoranda.102 In compliance thereto, the
103
Ombudsman filed her Memorandum on May 20,
2015, while Binay, Jr. submitted his Memorandum
the following day.104
Pursuant to a Resolution105 dated June 16, 2015,
the Court directed the parties to comment on each
other’s memoranda, and the OSG to comment on the
Ombudsman’s Memorandum, all within ten (10) days
from receipt of the notice.
On July 15, 2015, both parties filed their
respective comments to each other’s memoranda.106
Meanwhile, on July 16, 2015, the OSG filed its
Manifestation In Lieu of Comment,107 simply stating
that it was mutually agreed upon that the

_______________

100  Id., at p. 609.

101  See Court Resolutions dated April 7, 2015 (id., at pp. 524-
525) and April 14, 2015 (id., at pp. 634-638).
102  See Resolution dated April 21, 2015; id., at pp. 639-640.
103  Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 646-745.
104  Dated May 21, 2015. Id., at pp. 803-865.
105  Id., at pp. 951-952.
106  See Ombudsman’s Comment to Binay, Jr.’s Memorandum
dated July 3, 2015; id., at pp. 1109-1161. See also Binay, Jr.’s
Comment (to Petitioners’ Memorandum) dated July 3, 2015; id., at
pp. 2203-2240.
107  Id., at pp. 959-960.

 
 

465
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Office of the Ombudsman would file its

Memorandum, consistent with its desire to state its
“institutional position.”108 In her Memorandum and
Comment to Binay, Jr.’s Memorandum, the
Ombudsman pleaded, among others, that this Court
abandon the condonation doctrine.109 In view of the
foregoing, the case was deemed submitted for
resolution.
 
The Issues Before the Court
 
Based on the parties’ respective pleadings, and as
raised during the oral arguments conducted before
this Court, the main issues to be resolved in seriatim
are as follows:
 
I. Whether or not the present petition, and not
motions for reconsideration of the assailed CA
issuances in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 and C.A.-G.R.
S.P. No. 139504, is the Ombudsman’s plain, speedy,
and adequate remedy;
II. Whether or not the CA has subject matter
jurisdiction over the main petition for certiorari in
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453;
III. Whether or not the CA has subject matter
jurisdiction to issue a TRO and/or WPI enjoining the
implementation of a preventive suspension order
issued by the Ombudsman;
IV. Whether or not the CA gravely abused its
discretion in issuing the TRO and eventually, the
WPI in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 enjoining the
implementation of

_______________
 108  Id., at p. 959. See also Manifestation dated May 14, 2015;
id., at p. 641.
109   See discussions on the condonation doctrine in the
Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 708-733 and in
the Ombudsman’s Comment to Binay, Jr.’s Memorandum, Rollo
(Vol. II), pp. 1144-1149, 1153-1155, and 1158-1159.

 
 
466

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the preventive suspension order against Binay, Jr.

based on the condonation doctrine; and
V. Whether or not the CA’s directive for the
Ombudsman to comment on Binay, Jr.’s petition for
contempt in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139504 is improper
and illegal.
 
The Ruling of the Court
 
The petition is partly meritorious.
 
I.
 
A common requirement to both a petition for
certiorari and a petition for prohibition taken under
Rule 65 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure is that
the petitioner has no other plain, speedy, and
adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law.
Sections 1 and 2 thereof provide:
 
Section 1. Petition for certiorari.—When
any tribunal, board or officer exercising judicial
or quasi-judicial functions has acted without or
in excess of its or his jurisdiction, or with grave
 abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess
of jurisdiction, and there is no appeal, nor any
plain, speedy, and adequate remedy in the
ordinary course of law, a person aggrieved
thereby may file a verified petition in the
proper court, alleging the facts with certainty
and praying that judgment be rendered
annulling or modifying the proceedings of such
tribunal, board or officer, and granting such
incidental reliefs as law and justice may
require.
x x x x
Section 2. Petition for prohibition.—When
the proceedings of any tribunal, corporation,
board, officer or person, whether exercising
judicial, quasi-judicial or ministerial functions,
are without or in excess of its or his
jurisdiction, or with grave abuse of discretion
amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction, and
there is no appeal, or any other plain,
speedy, and adequate remedy in
 
 
467

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the ordinary course of law, a person

aggrieved thereby may file a verified petition in
the proper court, alleging the facts with
certainty and praying that judgment be
rendered commanding the respondent to desist
from further proceedings in the action or
matter specified therein, or otherwise granting
such incidental reliefs as law and justice may
require.
x x x x (Emphases supplied)
  
Hence, as a general rule, a motion for
reconsideration must first be filed with the lower
court prior to resorting to the extraordinary remedy
of certiorari or prohibition since a motion for
reconsideration may still be considered as a plain,
speedy, and adequate remedy in the ordinary course
of law. The rationale for the prerequisite is to grant
an opportunity for the lower court or agency to
correct any actual or perceived error attributed to it
by the reexamination of the legal and factual
circumstances of the case.110
Jurisprudence states that “[i]t is [the] inadequacy,
[and] not the mere absence of all other legal
remedies and the danger of failure of justice without
the writ, that must usually determine the propriety
of certiorari [or prohibition]. A remedy is plain,
speedy[,] and adequate if it will promptly relieve the
petitioner from the injurious effects of the judgment,
order, or resolution of the lower court or agency.
x x x.”111
In this light, certain exceptions were crafted to
the general rule requiring a prior motion for
reconsideration before the filing of a petition for
certiorari, which exceptions also apply

_______________

110  See Republic v. Bayao, G.R. No. 179492, June 5, 2013, 697
SCRA 313, 322-323.
111   See Bordomeo v. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 161596,
February 20, 2013, 691 SCRA 269, 286, citing Heirs of Spouses
Teofilo M. Reterta and Elisa Reterta v. Mores, 671 Phil. 346, 359;
655 SCRA 580, 594-595 (2011).

 
 
468
468 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED
Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

to a petition for prohibition.112 These are: (a)

where the order is a patent nullity, as where the
court a quo has no jurisdiction; (b) where the
questions raised in the certiorari proceedings have
been duly raised and passed upon by the lower court,
or are the same as those raised and passed upon in
the lower court; (c) where there is an urgent
necessity for the resolution of the question and
any further delay would prejudice the interests
of the Government or of the petitioner or the
subject matter of the action is perishable; (d) where,
under the circumstances, a motion for
reconsideration would be useless; (e) where
petitioner was deprived of due process and there is
extreme urgency for relief; (f) where, in a criminal
case, relief from an order of arrest is urgent and the
granting of such relief by the trial court is
improbable; (g) where the proceedings in the lower
court are a nullity for lack of due process; (h) where
the proceedings were ex parte or in which the
petitioner had no opportunity to object; and (i)
where the issue raised is one purely of law or
where public interest is involved.113
In this case, it is ineluctably clear that the above
highlighted exceptions attend since, for the first
time, the question on the authority of the CA — and
of this Court, for that matter — to enjoin the
implementation of a preventive suspension order
issued by the Office of the Ombudsman is put to the
fore. This case tests the constitutional and statutory
limits of the fundamental powers of key government
institutions — namely, the Office of the
Ombudsman, the Legislature, and the Judiciary —
and hence, involves an issue of transcendental public
importance that demands no less than a careful but
_______________

112  See AFP Mutual Benefit Association, Inc. v. Regional Trial

Court, Marikina City, Branch 193, 658 Phil. 68, 79; 642 SCRA
720, 725 (2011), citing Diamond Builders Conglomeration v.
Country Bankers Insurance Corporation, 564 Phil. 756, 769-770;
540 SCRA 194, 210 (2007).
113  Supra note 110 at p. 323, citing Siok Ping Tang v. Subic
Bay Distribution, Inc., 653 Phil. 124, 136-137; 638 SCRA 457, 470
(2010).

 
 
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expeditious resolution. Also raised is the equally

important issue on the propriety of the continuous
application of the condonation doctrine as invoked by
a public officer who desires exculpation from
administrative liability. As such, the Ombudsman’s
direct resort to certiorari and prohibition before this
Court, notwithstanding her failure to move for the
prior reconsideration of the assailed issuances in
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 and C.A.-G.R. S.P. No.
139504 before the CA, is justified.
 
II.
 
Albeit raised for the first time by the Ombudsman
in her Memorandum,114 it is nonetheless proper to
resolve the issue on the CA’s lack of subject matter
jurisdiction over the main petition for certiorari in
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453, in view of the well-
established rule that a court’s jurisdiction over the
subject matter may be raised at any stage of the
proceedings. The rationale is that subject matter
jurisdiction is conferred by law, and the lack of it
affects the very authority of the court to take
cognizance of and to render judgment on the
action.115 Hence, it should be preliminarily
determined if the CA indeed had subject matter
jurisdiction over the main C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453
petition, as the same determines the validity of all
subsequent proceedings relative thereto. It is
noteworthy to point out that Binay, Jr. was given the
opportunity by this Court to be heard on this
issue,116 as he, in fact, duly submitted his opposition
through his comment to the

_______________

114   See Ombudsman’s Memorandum dated May 14, 2015;

Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 661-669.
115   Francel Realty Corporation v. Sycip, 506 Phil. 407, 415;
469 SCRA 424, 431 (2005).
116  See Court Resolution dated June 16, 2015; Rollo (Vol. II),
pp. 951-952.

 
 
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Ombudsman’s Memorandum.117 That being said,

the Court perceives no reasonable objection against
ruling on this issue.
The Ombudsman’s argument against the CA’s
lack of subject matter jurisdiction over the main
petition, and her corollary prayer for its dismissal, is
based on her interpretation of Section 14, RA 6770,
or the Ombudsman Act,118 which reads in full:
 Section 14. Restrictions.—No writ of
injunction shall be issued by any court to delay
an investigation being conducted by the
Ombudsman under this Act, unless there is a
prima facie evidence that the subject matter of
the investigation is outside the jurisdiction of
the Office of the Ombudsman.
No court shall hear any appeal or
application for remedy against the decision or
findings of the Ombudsman, except the
Supreme Court, on pure question of law.
 
The subject provision may be dissected into two
(2) parts.
The first paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 is
a prohibition against any court (except the Supreme
Court)119 from issuing a writ of injunction to delay
an investigation being conducted by the Office of the
Ombudsman. Generally speaking, “[i]njunction is a
judicial writ, process or proceeding whereby a party
is ordered to do or refrain from doing a certain act. It
may be the main action or merely a provisional
remedy for and as an incident in the main action.”120
Considering the textual qualifier “to delay,” which
connotes a suspension of an action while the main
case remains pending, the “writ of injunction”
mentioned in this paragraph could only

_______________

117  Id., at pp. 2203-2240.

118  Id., at pp. 662-666 and 98.
119   As the Ombudsman herself concedes; see Main Petition,
Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 17-18; see also Ombudsman’s Memorandum,
Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 661-666.
120  Bacolod City Water District v. Labayen, 487 Phil. 335, 346;
446 SCRA 110, 122 (2004).
  
 
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refer to injunctions of the provisional kind,

consistent with the nature of a provisional injunctive
relief.
The exception to the no injunction policy is when
there is prima facie evidence that the subject matter
of the investigation is outside the office’s jurisdiction.
The Office of the Ombudsman has disciplinary
authority over all elective and appointive officials of
the government and its subdivisions,
instrumentalities, and agencies, with the exception
only of impeachable officers, Members of Congress,
and the Judiciary.121 Nonetheless, the Ombudsman
retains the power to investigate any serious
misconduct in office allegedly committed by officials
removable by impeachment, for the purpose of filing
a verified complaint for impeachment, if
122
warranted. Note that the Ombudsman has
concurrent jurisdiction over certain

_______________

121  Section 21, RA 6770 states:

Section 21. Official Subject to Disciplinary Authority;
Exceptions.—The Office of the Ombudsman shall have disciplinary
authority over all elective and appointive officials of the
Government and its subdivisions, instrumentalities and agencies,
including Members of the Cabinet, local government, government-
owned or -controlled corporations and their subsidiaries, except
over officials who may be removed only by impeachment or over
Members of Congress, and the Judiciary.
122  Section 22, RA 6770 states:
 Section 22. Investigatory Power.—The Office of the
Ombudsman shall have the power to investigate any serious
misconduct in office allegedly committed by officials removable by
impeachment, for the purpose of filing a verified complaint for
impeachment, if warranted.
In all cases of conspiracy between an officer or employee of the
government and a private person, the Ombudsman and his
Deputies shall have jurisdiction to include such private person in
the investigation and proceed against such private person as the
evidence may warrant. The officer or employee and the private
person shall be tried jointly and shall be subject to the same
penalties and liabilities.

 
 
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administrative cases which are within the

jurisdiction of the regular courts or administrative
agencies, but has primary jurisdiction to investigate
any act or omission of a public officer or employee
who is under the jurisdiction of the
123
Sandiganbayan.
On the other hand, the second paragraph of
Section 14, RA 6770 provides that no appeal or
application for remedy may be heard against the
decision or findings of the Ombudsman, with the
exception of the Supreme Court on pure questions of
law. This paragraph, which the Ombudsman
particularly relies on in arguing that the CA had no
jurisdiction over the main C.A-G.R. S.P. No. 139453
petition, as it is supposedly this Court which has the
sole jurisdiction to conduct a judicial review of its
decisions or findings, is vague for two (2) reasons: (1)
it is unclear what the phrase “application for
remedy” or the word “findings” refers to; and (2) it
does not specify what procedural remedy is solely
allowable to this Court, save that the same be taken
only against a pure question of law. The task then, is
to apply the relevant principles of statutory
construction to resolve the ambiguity.
“The underlying principle of all construction is
that the intent of the legislature should be sought in
the words employed to express it, and that when
found[,] it should be made to govern, x  x  x. If the
words of the law seem to be of doubtful import, it
may then perhaps become necessary to look beyond
them in order to ascertain what was in the
legislative mind at the time the law was enacted;
what the circumstances were, under which the action
was taken; what evil, if any, was meant to be
redressed; x  x  x [a]nd where the law has
contemporaneously been put into operation, and in
doing so a construction has necessarily been put
upon it, this construction, especially if followed for
some considerable period, is entitled

_______________

123   See Alejandro v. Office of the Ombudsman Fact-Finding

and Intelligence Bureau, G.R. No. 173121, April 3, 2013, 695
SCRA 35, 44-46.

 
 
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to great respect, as being very probably a true

expression of the legislative purpose, and is not
lightly to be overruled, although it is not
conclusive.”124
As an aid to construction, courts may avail
themselves of the actual proceedings of the
legislative body in interpreting a statute of doubtful
meaning. In case of doubt as to what a provision of a
statute means, the meaning put to the provision
during the legislative deliberations may be
adopted,125 albeit not controlling in the
interpretation of the law.126

A. The Senate deliberations cited by

the Ombudsman do not per-
tain to the second paragraph
of Section 14, RA 6770.
 
The Ombudsman submits that the legislative
intent behind Section 14, RA 6770, particularly on
the matter of judicial review of her office’s decisions
or findings, is supposedly clear from the following
Senate deliberations:127

Senator [Edgardo J.] Angara.

x x x. On page 15, Mr. President, line 14, after the phrase “petition
for” delete the word “review” and in lieu thereof, insert the
word CERTIORARI. So that, review or appeal from the
decision of the Ombudsman would only be taken not on a
petition for review, but on certiorari.
The President [Jovito R. Salonga].
What is the practical effect of that? Will it be more difficult
to reverse the decision under review?

_______________

124  Molina v. Rafferty, 38 Phil. 167, 169 (1918).

125   See National Police Commission v. De Guzman, Jr., G.R.
No. 106724, February 9, 1994, 229 SCRA 801, 807.
126   See Espino v. Cleofe, 152 Phil. 80, 87; 52 SCRA 92, 98
(1973).
 127   Records of the Senate, Vol. II, No. 6, August 2, 1998, pp.
174-187. As cited also in Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol.
II), p. 662.

 
 
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Senator Angara.
It has two practical effect ways, Mr. President. First is that the
findings of facts of the Ombudsman would be almost
conclusive if supported by substantial evidence. Second,
we would not unnecessarily clog the docket of the
Supreme Court. So, it in effect will be a very strict
appeal procedure.
x x x x
Senator [Teofisto T.] Guingona, [Jr.].
Does this mean that, for example, if there are exhaustive remedies
available to a respondent, the respondent himself has the
right to exhaust the administrative remedies available to
him?
Senator Angara.
Yes, Mr. President, that is correct.
Senator Guingona.
And he himself may cut the proceeding short by appealing to the
Supreme Court only on certiorari?
Senator Angara.
On question of law, yes.
Senator Guingona.
And no other remedy is available to him?
Senator Angara.
Going to the Supreme Court, Mr. President?
Senator Guingona.
Yes. What I mean to say is, at what stage, for example, if he is a
presidential appointee who is the respondent, if there is no
 certiorari available, is the respondent given the right to
exhaust his administrative remedies first before the
Ombudsman can take the appropriate action?
Senator Angara.
Yes, Mr. President, because we do not intend to change the
administrative law principle that before one can go to court,
he must exhaust all administra-

 
 
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tive remedies x  x  x available to him before he goes and seeks

judicial review.
x x x x
Senator [Neptali A.] Gonzales.
What is the purpose of the Committee in changing the
method of appeal from one of a petition for review to a
petition for certiorari?
Senator Angara.
To make it consistent, Mr. President, with the provision here
in the bill to the effect that the finding of facts of the
Ombudsman is conclusive if supported by substantial
evidence.
Senator Gonzales.
A statement has been made by the Honorable Presiding Officer to
which I concur, that in an appeal by certiorari, the
appeal is more difficult. Because in certiorari it is a
matter of discretion on the part of the court, whether to
give due course to the petition or dismiss it outright. Is
that not correct, Mr. President?
Senator Angara.
That is absolutely correct, Mr. President.
Senator Gonzales.
 And in a petition for certiorari, the issue is limited to
whether or not the Ombudsman here has acted without
jurisdiction and has committed a grave abuse of
discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction. Is that not
the consequence, Mr. President.
Senator Angara.
That is correct, Mr. President.
Senator Gonzales.
And it is, therefore, in this sense that the intention of the
Committee is to make it harder to have a judicial
review, but should be limited only to cases that I have
enumerated.

 
 
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Senator Angara.
Yes, Mr. President.
Senator Gonzales.
I think, Mr. President, our Supreme Court has made a distinction
between a petition for review and a petition for certiorari;
because before, under the 1935 Constitution appeal from any
order, ruling or decision of the COMELEC shall be by means
of review. But under the Constitution it is now by certiorari
and the Supreme Court said that by this change, the court
exercising judicial review will not inquire into the facts, into
the evidence, because we will not go deeply by way of review
into the evidence on record but its authority will be limited to
a determination of whether the administrative agency acted
without, or in excess of, jurisdiction, or committed a grave
abuse of discretion. So, I assume that that is the purpose of
this amendment, Mr. President.
Senator Angara.
The distinguished Gentleman has stated it so well.
 Senator Gonzales.
 I just want to put that in the Record.
Senator Angara.
It is very well stated, Mr. President.
x x x x
The President.
It is evident that there must be some final authority to
render decisions. Should it be the Ombudsman or
should it be the Supreme Court?
Senator Angara.
As I understand it, under our scheme of government, Mr.
President, it is and has to be the Supreme Court to make
the final determination.

 
 

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The President.
Then if that is so, we have to modify Section 17.
Senator Angara.
That is why, Mr. President, some of our Colleagues have made a
reservation to introduce an appropriate change during the
period of Individual Amendments.
x x x x
The President.
All right. Is there any objection to the amendment inserting the
word CERTIORARI instead of “review?” [Silence] Hearing
none, the same is approved.128

 
Upon an assiduous scrutiny of these deliberations,
the Court is, however, unconvinced that the
provision debated on was Section 14, RA 6770, as the
Ombudsman invokes. Note that the exchange begins
with the suggestion of Senator Angara to delete the
word “review” that comes after the phrase “petition
for review” and, in its stead, insert the word
“certiorari” so that the “review or appeal from the
decision of the Ombudsman would not only be taken
on a petition for review, but on certiorari.” The
ensuing exchange between Senators Gonzales and
Angara then dwells on the purpose of changing the
method of review from one of a petition for review to
a petition for certiorari — that is, to make “the
appeal x  x  x more difficult.” Ultimately, the
amendment to the change in wording, from “petition
for review” to “petition for certiorari” was approved.
Noticeably, these references to a “petition for
review” and the proposed “petition for certiorari” are
nowhere to be found in the text of Section 14, RA
6770. In fact, it was earlier men-

_______________

128  Records of the Senate, Vol. II, No. 10, August 9, 1988, pp.
282-286 (full names of the senators in brackets supplied). See also
Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 662-665,
emphases and underscoring in the original.

 
 
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tioned that this provision, particularly its second

paragraph, does not indicate what specific
procedural remedy one should take in assailing a
decision or finding of the Ombudsman; it only
reveals that the remedy be taken to this Court based
on pure questions of law. More so, it was even
commented upon during the oral arguments of this
case129 that there was no debate or clarification
made on the current formulation of the second
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 per the available
excerpts of the Senate deliberations. In any case, at
least for the above cited deliberations, the Court
finds no adequate support to sustain the
Ombudsman’s entreaty that the CA had no subject
matter jurisdiction over the main C.A.-G.R. S.P. No.
139453 petition.
On the contrary, it actually makes greater sense
to posit that these deliberations refer to another
Ombudsman Act provision, namely Section 27, RA
6770. This is because the latter textually reflects the
approval of Senator Angara’s suggested amendment,
i.e., that the Ombudsman’s decision or finding may
be assailed in a petition for certiorari to this Court
(fourth paragraph), and further, his comment on the
conclusive nature of the factual findings of the
Ombudsman, if supported by substantial evidence
(third paragraph):
Section 27. Effectivity and Finality of
Decisions.—(1) All provisionary orders of the
Office of the Ombudsman are immediately
effective and executory.
A motion for reconsideration of any order,
directive or decision of the Office of the
Ombudsman must be filed within five (5) days
after receipt of written notice and shall be
entertained only on any of the following
grounds:
(1) New evidence has been discovered
which materially affects the order,
directive or decision;

_______________

129  See Associate Justice Francis H. Jardeleza’s interpellation;

TSN of the Oral Arguments, April 14, 2015, p. 7.
  
 

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(2) Errors of law or irregularities have

been committed prejudicial to the interest
of the movant. The motion for
reconsideration shall be resolved within
three (3) days from filing: Provided, That
only one motion for reconsideration shall
be entertained.
Findings of fact by the Office of the
Ombudsman when supported by substantial
evidence are conclusive. Any order, directive or
decision imposing the penalty of public censure
or reprimand, suspension of not more than one
(1) month’s salary shall be final and
unappealable.
In all administrative disciplinary cases,
orders, directives, or decisions of the
Office of the Ombudsman may be
appealed to the Supreme Court by filing a
petition for certiorari within ten (10) days
from receipt of the written notice of the
order, directive or decision or denial of
the motion for reconsideration in
accordance with Rule 45 of the Rules of
Court.
The above rules may be amended or
modified by the Office of the Ombudsman as
the interest of justice may require. (Emphasis
and underscoring supplied)
 
At first blush, it appears that Section 27, RA 6770
is equally ambiguous in stating that a “petition for
certiorari” should be taken in accordance with Rule
45 of the Rules of Court, as it is well-known that
under the present 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure,
petitions for certiorari are governed by Rule 65 of the
said Rules. However, it should be discerned that the
Ombudsman Act was passed way back in 1989130
and, hence, before the advent of the 1997 Rules of
Civil Procedure.131 At that time, the governing 1964
Rules of Court,132 consistent with Section 27, RA
6770, referred to the appeal

_______________

130  Approved on November 17, 1989.

131  Effective July 1, 1997.
132  Effective January 1, 1964.

 
 

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480 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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taken thereunder as a petition for certiorari, thus

possibly explaining the remedy’s textual
denomination, at least in the provision’s final
approved version:
 
RULE 45
Appeal from Court of Appeals to Supreme Court
 
SECTION 1. Filing of Petition with
Supreme Court.—A party may appeal by
certiorari, from a judgment of the Court of
Appeals, by filing with the Supreme Court a
petition for certiorari, within fifteen (15)
days from notice of judgment or of the denial of
 his motion for reconsideration filed in due time,
and paying at the same time, to the clerk of
said court the corresponding docketing fee. The
petition shall not be acted upon without proof of
service of a copy thereof to the Court of
Appeals. (Emphasis supplied)

B. Construing the second paragraph of Section

14, RA 6770.
 
The Senate deliberations’ lack of discussion on the
second paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770
notwithstanding, the other principles of statutory
construction can apply to ascertain the meaning of
the provision.
To recount, the second paragraph of Section 14,
RA 6770 states that “[n]o court shall hear any
appeal or application for remedy against the
decision or findings of the Ombudsman, except
the Supreme Court, on pure question of law.”
As a general rule, the second paragraph of
Section 14, RA 6770 bans the whole range of
remedies against issuances of the Ombudsman,
by prohibiting: (a) an appeal against any decision or
finding of the Ombudsman, and (b) “any application
of remedy” (subject to the exception below) against
the same. To clarify, the phrase “application for
remedy,” being a generally worded provision, and
being separated

_______________

129  See Associate Justice Francis H. Jardeleza’s interpellation;

TSN of the Oral Arguments, April 14, 2015, p. 7.

 
 
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from the term “appeal” by the disjunctive “or,”133

refers to any remedy (whether taken mainly or
provisionally), except an appeal, following the maxim
generalia verba sunt generaliter intelligenda: general
words are to be understood in a general sense.134 By
the same principle, the word “findings,” which is also
separated from the word “decision” by the disjunctive
“or,” would therefore refer to any finding made by
the Ombudsman (whether final or provisional),
except a decision.
The subject provision, however, crafts an
exception to the foregoing general rule. While the
specific procedural vehicle is not explicit from its
text, it is fairly deducible that the second paragraph
of Section 14, RA 6770 excepts, as the only allowable
remedy against “the decision or findings of the
Ombudsman,” a Rule 45 appeal, for the reason
that it is the only remedy taken to the Supreme
Court on “pure questions of law,” whether under
the 1964 Rules of Court or the 1997 Rules of Civil
Procedure:
 
Rule 45, 1964 Rules of Court
RULE 45
Appeal from Court of Appeals to Supreme Court
x x x x
Section 2. Contents of Petition.—The
petition shall contain a concise statement of the
matters involved, the assignment of errors
made in the court below, and the reasons relied
on for the allowance of the petition, and it
should be accompanied with a true copy of the
judgment sought to be reviewed, together with
twelve (12) copies of
_______________

133   “The word ‘or’ x  x  x is a disjunctive term signifying

disassociation and independence of one thing from the other
things enumerated; it should, as a rule, be construed in the sense
in which it ordinarily implies, as a disjunctive word.” (Dayao v.
Commission on Elections, G.R. Nos. 193643 and 193704, January
29, 2013, 689 SCRA 412, 428-429)
134  Black’s Law Dictionary, 8th ed., p. 1720.

 
 
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the record on appeal, if any, and of the

petitioner’s brief as filed in the Court of
Appeals. A verified statement of the date when
notice of judgment and denial of the motion for
reconsideration, if any, were received shall
accompany the petition.
Only questions of law may be raised in
the petition and must be distinctly set forth.
If no record on appeal has been filed in the
Court of Appeals, the clerk of the Supreme
Court, upon admission of the petition, shall
demand from the Court of Appeals the
elevation of the whole record of the case.
(Emphasis and underscoring supplied)
 
Rule 45, 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure
 
RULE 45
Appeal by Certiorari to the Supreme Court
 
 Section 1. Filing of petition with Supreme
Court.—A party desiring to appeal by certiorari
from a judgment, final order or resolution of the
Court of Appeals, the Sandiganbayan, the
Court of Tax Appeals, the Regional Trial Court
or other courts, whenever authorized by law,
may file with the Supreme Court a verified
petition for review on certiorari. The petition
may include an application for a writ of
preliminary injunction or other provisional
remedies and shall raise only questions of
law, which must be distinctly set forth.
The petitioner may seek the same provisional
remedies by verified motion filed in the same
action or proceeding at any time during its
pendency. (Emphasis and underscoring
supplied)
 
That the remedy excepted in the second
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 could be a petition
for certiorari under Rule 65 of the 1964 Rules of
Court or the 1997 Rules of Procedure is a suggestion
that defies traditional norms of procedure. It is basic
procedural law that a Rule 65 petition is based on
errors of jurisdiction, and not errors of judgment to
which the
 
 
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classifications of (a) questions of fact, (b) questions

of law, or (c) questions of mixed fact and law, relate
to. In fact, there is no procedural rule, whether in the
old or new Rules, which grounds a Rule 65 petition
on pure questions of law. Indeed, it is also a
statutory construction principle that the lawmaking
body cannot be said to have intended the
establishment of conflicting and hostile systems on
the same subject. Such a result would render
legislation a useless and idle ceremony, and subject
the laws to uncertainty and unintelligibility.135
There should then be no confusion that the second
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 refers to a Rule 45
appeal to this Court, and no other. In sum, the
appropriate construction of this Ombudsman Act
provision is that all remedies against issuances of
the Office of the Ombudsman are prohibited, except
the above stated Rule 45 remedy to the Court on
pure questions of law.
 
C. Validity of the second paragraph
of Section 14, RA 6770.
 
Of course, the second paragraph of Section 14, RA
6770’s extremely limited restriction on remedies is
inappropriate since a Rule 45 appeal — which is
within the sphere of the rules of procedure
promulgated by this Court — can only be taken
against final decisions or orders of lower courts,136
and

_______________

135   Bagatsing v. Ramirez, 165 Phil. 909, 914-915; 74 SCRA

306, 312-313 (1976).
136   Section 1, Rule 45 of the 1997 Rules of Procedure states
that a “party desiring to appeal by certiorari from a judgment,
final order or resolution of the Court of Appeals, the
Sandiganbayan, the Court of Tax Appeals, the Regional
Trial Court or other courts, whenever authorized by law, may
file with the Supreme Court a verified petition for review on
certiorari.” (Emphasis and underscoring supplied)
This is consistent with Item (e), Section 5(2), Article VIII of the
1987 Constitution which reads:
  
 

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484 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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not against “findings” of quasi-judicial agencies.

As will be later elaborated upon, Congress cannot
interfere with matters of procedure; hence, it cannot
alter the scope of a Rule 45 appeal so as to apply to
interlocutory “findings” issued by the Ombudsman.
More significantly, by confining the remedy to a
Rule 45 appeal, the provision takes away the
remedy of certiorari, grounded on errors of
jurisdiction, in denigration of the judicial power
constitutionally vested in courts. In this light, the
second paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 also
increased this Court’s appellate jurisdiction, without
a showing, however, that it gave its consent to the
same. The provision is, in fact, very similar to the
fourth paragraph of Section 27, RA 6770 (as above
cited), which was invalidated in the case of Fabian v.
Desierto137 (Fabian).138
In Fabian, the Court struck down the fourth
paragraph of Section 27, RA 6770 as
unconstitutional since it had the effect

_______________

Section 5. The Supreme Court shall have the following

powers:
x x x x
(2) Review, revise, reverse, modify, or affirm on appeal or
certiorari, as the law or the Rules of Court may provide, final
judgments and orders of lower courts in:
(e) All cases in which only an error or question of law is
involved.
 137  356 Phil. 787; 295 SCRA 470 (1998).
138   Note that “[o]ur ruling in the case of Fabian v. Desierto
invalidated Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6770 and Section 7,
Rule III of Administrative Order No. 07 and any other provision of
law implementing the aforesaid Act only insofar as they provide
for appeals in administrative disciplinary cases from the Office of
the Ombudsman to the Supreme Court. The only provision
affected by the Fabian ruling is the designation of the Court of
Appeals as the proper forum and of Rule 43 of the Rules of Court
as the proper mode of appeal. All other matters included in said
Section 27, including the finality or non-finality of decisions, are
not affected and still stand.” (Lapid v. Court of Appeals, 390 Phil.
236, 248; 334 SCRA 738, 750 [2000])

 
 

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of increasing the appellate jurisdiction of the

Court without its advice and concurrence in violation
of Section 30, Article VI of the 1987 Constitution.139
Moreover, this provision was found to be inconsistent
with Section 1, Rule 45 of the present 1997 Rules of
Procedure which, as above intimated, applies only to
a review of “judgments or final orders of the Court of
Appeals, the Sandiganbayan, the Court of Tax
Appeals, the Regional Trial Court, or other courts
authorized by law”; and not of quasi-judicial
agencies, such as the Office of the Ombudsman, the
remedy now being a Rule 43 appeal to the
Court of Appeals. In Ruivivar v. Office of the
Ombudsman,140 the Court’s ratiocinations and ruling
in Fabian were recounted:
 
 The case of Fabian v. Desierto arose from the
doubt created in the application of Section 27 of
R.A. No. 6770 (The Ombudsman’s Act) and
Section 7, Rule III of A.O. No. 7 (Rules of
Procedure of the Office of the Ombudsman) on
the availability of appeal before the Supreme
Court to assail a decision or order of the
Ombudsman in administrative cases. In
Fabian, we invalidated Section 27 of R.A.
No. 6770 (and Section 7, Rule III of A.O.
No. 7 and the other rules implementing
the Act) insofar as it provided for appeal
by certiorari under Rule 45 from the
decisions or orders of the Ombudsman in
administrative cases. We held that Section
27 of R.A. No. 6770 had the effect, not only
of increasing the appellate jurisdiction of
this Court without its advice and
concurrence in violation of Section 30,
Article VI of the Constitution; it was also
inconsistent with Section 1, Rule 45 of the
Rules of Court which provides that a
petition for review on certiorari shall
apply only to a review of “judgments or
final orders of the Court of Appeals,

_______________

139   Section 30. No law shall be passed increasing the

appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court as provided in this
Constitution without its advice and concurrence.
140  587 Phil. 100; 565 SCRA 324 (2008).

 
 
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486 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the Sandiganbayan, the Court of Tax

Appeals, the Regional Trial Court, or
other courts authorized by law.” We
pointedly said:
As a consequence of our ratiocination that
Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6770 should be
struck down as unconstitutional, and in line
with the regulatory philosophy adopted in
appeals from quasi-judicial agencies in the
1997 Revised Rules of Civil Procedure, appeals
from decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman
in administrative disciplinary cases should be
taken to the CA under the provisions of Rule
43.141 (Emphasis supplied)
 
Since the second paragraph of Section 14, RA
6770 limits the remedy against “decision or findings”
of the Ombudsman to a Rule 45 appeal and thus —
similar to the fourth paragraph of Section 27, RA
6770142 — attempts to effectively increase the
Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction without its
advice and concurrence,143 it is therefore concluded
that the former provision is also unconstitutional
and perforce, invalid. Contrary to the Ombudsman’s
posturing,144 Fabian should

_______________

141  Id., at pp. 111-112; p. 335.

142  For ease of reference, the provision is restated:
“In all administrative disciplinary cases, orders, directives, or
decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman may be appealed to the
Supreme Court by filing a petition for certiorari within ten (10)
days from receipt of the written notice of the order, directive or
decision or denial of the motion for reconsideration in accordance
with Rule 45 of the Rules of Court.”
 143  There should be no statement on the Court’s lack of advice
and concurrence with respect to the second paragraph of Section
14, RA 6770 since the deliberations are, in fact, silent on the said
provision.
144  See Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 666-
667. Note that nowhere does the fourth paragraph of Section 27
delimit the phrase “orders, directives or decisions” to those
rendered by the

 
 
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squarely apply since the above stated

Ombudsman Act provisions are in pari materia in
that they “cover the same specific or particular
subject matter,”145 that is, the manner of judicial
review over issuances of the Ombudsman.
Note that since the second paragraph of Section
14, RA 6770 is clearly determinative of the existence
of the CA’s subject matter jurisdiction over the main
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 petition, including all
subsequent proceedings relative thereto, as the
Ombudsman herself has developed, the Court deems
it proper to resolve this issue ex mero motu (on its
own motion).146 This procedure, as was similarly
adopted in Fabian, finds its bearings in settled case
law:

The conventional rule, however, is that a

challenge on constitutional grounds must be
raised by a party to the case, neither of whom
did so in this case, but that is not an inflexible
rule, as we shall explain.
 Since the constitution is intended for the
observance of the judiciary and other
departments of the government and the judges
are sworn to support its provisions, the courts
are not at liberty to overlook or disregard its
commands or countenance evasions thereof.
When it is clear that a statute transgresses the
authority vested in a legislative body, it is the
duty of the courts to declare that the
constitution, and not the statute, governs in a
case before them for judgment.
Thus, while courts will not ordinarily pass
upon constitutional questions which are not
raised in the pleadings, the rule has been
recognized to admit of certain exceptions. It
does not preclude a court from inquiring into its
own jurisdiction or compel it to enter a judg-

_______________

Ombudsman at the conclusion of the administrative proceedings,

as the Ombudsman submits.

145   See Philippine Economic Zone Authority v. Green Asia

Construction & Development Corporation, 675 Phil. 846, 857; 659
SCRA 756, 764 (2011).
146  See Black’s Law Dictionary, 8th ed., p. 615.

 
 
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ment that it lacks jurisdiction to enter. If a

statute on which a court’s jurisdiction in a
proceeding depends is unconstitutional, the
 court has no jurisdiction in the proceeding, and
since it may determine whether or not it has
jurisdiction, it necessarily follows that it may
inquire into the constitutionality of the statute.
Constitutional questions, not raised in
the regular and orderly procedure in the
trial are ordinarily rejected unless the
jurisdiction of the court below or that of
the appellate court is involved in which
case it may be raised at any time or on the
court’s own motion. The Court ex mero motu
may take cognizance of lack of jurisdiction at
any point in the case where that fact is
developed. The court has a clearly recognized
right to determine its own jurisdiction in any
proceeding.147 (Emphasis supplied)

D. Consequence of invalidity.
 
In this case, the Rule 65 petition for certiorari in
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 was filed by Binay, Jr.
before the CA in order to nullify the preventive
suspension order issued by the Ombudsman, an
interlocutory order,148 hence, unappealable.149
In several cases decided after Fabian, the Court
has ruled that Rule 65 petitions for certiorari against
unappelable issu-

_______________

147  Fabian v. Desierto, supra note 137 at pp. 800-801; pp. 482-
483.
148   A preventive suspension is a mere preventive measure,
and not a penalty (see Quimbo v. Gervacio, 503 Phil. 886, 891; 466
SCRA 277, 281 [2005]); and hence, interlocutory in nature since it
“does not terminate or finally dismiss or finally dispose of the
case, but leaves something to be done by [the adjudicating body]
before the case is finally decided on the merits.” (Metropolitan
Bank & Trust Company v. Court of Appeals, 408 Phil. 686, 694;
356 SCRA 563, 570 [2001]; see also Bañares II v. Balising, 384
Phil. 567, 577; 328 SCRA 36, 44 [2000])
149  Gonzales v. Court of Appeals, 409 Phil. 684, 689; 357 SCRA
599, 602 (2001).

 
 
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ances150 of the Ombudsman should be filed before

the CA, and not directly before this Court:
  In Office of the Ombudsman v. Capulong151
(March 12, 2014), wherein a preventive suspension
order issued by the Office of the Ombudsman was —
similar to this case — assailed through a Rule 65
petition for certiorari filed by the public officer before
the CA, the Court held that “[t]here being a finding
of grave abuse of discretion on the part of the
Ombudsman, it was certainly imperative for the CA
to grant incidental reliefs, as sanctioned by Section 1
of Rule 65.”152
  In Dagan v. Office of the Ombudsman153
(November 19, 2013), involving a Rule 65 petition for
certiorari assailing a final and unappealable order of
the Office of the Ombudsman in an administrative
case, the Court remarked that “petitioner employed
the correct mode of review in this case, i.e., a special
civil action for certiorari before the Court of
Appeals.”154 In this relation, it stated that while “a
special civil action for Certiorari is within the
concurrent original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court
and the Court of Appeals, such petition should be
initially filed with the Court of Appeals in
observance of the doctrine of hierarchy of courts.”
Further, the Court upheld Barata v. Abalos, Jr.155
(June 6, 2001), wherein it was ruled that the remedy
against final and unappealable orders of the Office of
the Ombudsman in an admin-

_______________

150   Includes interlocutory orders, such as preventive

suspension orders, as well as final and unappealable decisions or
orders under Section 27, RA 6770 which states that “[a]ny order,
directive or decision imposing the penalty of public censure or
reprimand, suspension of not more than one (1) month’s salary
shall be final and unappealable.”
151  G.R. No. 201643, March 12, 2014, 719 SCRA 209.
152  Id., at p. 219.
153  G.R. No. 184083, November 19, 2013, 709 SCRA 681.
154  Id., at p. 693.
155  411 Phil. 204; 358 SCRA 575 (2001).

 
 

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istrative case was a Rule 65 petition to the CA.

The same verdict was reached in Ruivivar156
(September 16, 2008).
Thus, with the unconstitutionality of the second
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770, the Court,
consistent with existing jurisprudence, concludes
that the CA has subject matter jurisdiction over the
main C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 petition. That being
said, the Court now examines the objections of the
Ombudsman, this time against the CA’s authority to
issue the assailed TRO and WPI against the
implementation of the preventive suspension order,
incidental to that main case.
  
III.
 
From the inception of these proceedings, the
Ombudsman has been adamant that the CA has no
jurisdiction to issue any provisional injunctive writ
against her office to enjoin its preventive suspension
orders. As basis, she invokes the first paragraph
of Section 14, RA 6770 in conjunction with her
office’s independence under the 1987 Constitution.
She advances the idea that “[i]n order to further
ensure [her office’s] independence, [RA 6770]
likewise insulated it from judicial intervention,”157
particularly, “from injunctive reliefs traditionally
obtainable from the courts,”158 claiming that said
writs may work “just as effectively as direct
harassment or political pressure would.”159

A. The concept of Ombudsman independence.

 
Section 5, Article XI of the 1987 Constitution
guarantees the independence of the Office of the
Ombudsman:

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156  Ruivivar v. Office of the Ombudsman, supra note 140.

157  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 18.
158  Id.
159  Id.

 
 
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 Section 5. There is hereby created the
independent Office of the Ombudsman,
composed of the Ombudsman to be known as
Tanodbayan, one overall Deputy and at least
one Deputy each for Luzon, Visayas[,] and
Mindanao. A separate Deputy for the military
establishment may likewise be appointed.
(Emphasis supplied)
 
In Gonzales III v. Office of the President160
(Gonzales III), the Court traced the historical
underpinnings of the Office of the Ombudsman:
 
Prior to the 1973 Constitution, past
presidents established several Ombudsman-
like agencies to serve as the people’s medium
for airing grievances and for direct redress
against abuses and misconduct in the
government. Ultimately, however, these
agencies failed to fully realize their objective for
lack of the political independence necessary for
the effective performance of their function as
government critic.
It was under the 1973 Constitution that the
Office of the Ombudsman became a
constitutionally-mandated office to give it
political independence and adequate powers to
enforce its mandate. Pursuant to the 1973
Constitution, President Ferdinand Marcos
enacted Presidential Decree (PD) No. 1487, as
amended by PD No. 1607 and PD No. 1630,
creating the Office of the Ombudsman to be
known as Tanodbayan. It was tasked
principally to investigate, on complaint or motu
proprio, any administrative act of any
administrative agency, including any
government-owned or -controlled corporation.
When the Office of the Tanodbayan was
reorganized in 1979, the powers previously
 vested in the Special Prosecutor were
transferred to the Tanodbayan himself. He was
given the exclusive authority to conduct
preliminary investigation of all cases cognizable
by the Sandiganbayan, file the corresponding
information, and control the prosecution of
these cases.

_______________

160   G.R. Nos. 196231 and 196232, January 28, 2014, 714
SCRA 611.

 
 
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With the advent of the 1987 Constitution, a

new Office of the Ombudsman was created by
constitutional fiat. Unlike in the 1973
Constitution, its independence was
expressly and constitutionally
guaranteed. Its objectives are to enforce the
state policy in Section 27, Article II and the
standard of accountability in public service
under Section 1, Article XI of the 1987
Constitution. These provisions read:
Section 27. The State shall maintain
honesty and integrity in the public service
and take positive and effective measures
against graft and corruption.
Section 1. Public office is a public
trust. Public officers and employees must,
at all times, be accountable to the people,
serve them with utmost responsibility,
 integrity, loyalty, and efficiency; act with
patriotism and justice, and lead modest
lives.161 (Emphasis supplied)
 
  More significantly, Gonzales III explained the
broad scope of the office’s mandate, and in
correlation, the impetus behind its independence:
 
Under Section 12, Article XI of the 1987
Constitution, the Office of the Ombudsman is
envisioned to be the “protector of the people”
against the inept, abusive, and corrupt in the
Government, to function essentially as a
complaints and action bureau. This
constitutional vision of a Philippine
Ombudsman practically intends to make the
Ombudsman an authority to directly check and
guard against the ills, abuses and excesses of
the bureaucracy. Pursuant to Section 13(8),
Article XI of the 1987 Constitution, Congress
enacted RA No. 6770 to enable it to further
realize the vision of the Constitution. Section
21 of RA No. 6770 provides:
Section 21. Official Subject to
Disciplinary Authority; Exceptions.—The
Office of the Ombuds-

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161  Id., at pp. 639-641.

 
 

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 man shall have disciplinary authority
over all elective and appointive officials of
the Government and its subdivisions,
instrumentalities, and agencies, including
Members of the Cabinet, local
government, government-owned or -
controlled corporations and their
subsidiaries, except over officials who may
be removed only by impeachment or over
Members of Congress, and the Judiciary.
As the Ombudsman is expected to be an
“activist watchman,” the Court has upheld its
actions, although not squarely falling under the
broad powers granted [to] it by the Constitution
and by RA No. 6770, if these actions are
reasonably in line with its official function and
consistent with the law and the Constitution.
The Ombudsman’s broad investigative and
disciplinary powers include all acts of
malfeasance, misfeasance, and nonfeasance of
all public officials, including Members of the
Cabinet and key Executive officers, during
their tenure. To support these broad powers,
the Constitution saw it fit to insulate the
Office of the Ombudsman from the
pressures and influence of officialdom and
partisan politics and from fear of external
reprisal by making it an “independent”
office. x x x.
x x x x
Given the scope of its disciplinary authority,
the Office of the Ombudsman is a very powerful
government constitutional agency that is
considered “a notch above other grievance-
handling investigative bodies.” It has powers,
both constitutional and statutory, that are
commensurate with its daunting task of
enforcing accountability of public officers.162
(Emphasis and underscoring supplied)
  
Gonzales III is the first case which grappled with
the meaning of the Ombudsman’s independence vis-
à-vis the

_______________

162  Id., at pp. 641-642.

 
 
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independence of the other constitutional bodies.

Pertinently, the Court observed:
(1) “[T]he independence enjoyed by the Office of
the Ombudsman and by the Constitutional
Commissions shares certain characteristics — they
do not owe their existence to any act of
Congress, but are created by the Constitution
itself; additionally, they all enjoy fiscal
autonomy. In general terms, the framers of the
Constitution intended that these ‘independent’
bodies be insulated from political pressure to
the extent that the absence of ‘independence’ would
result in the impairment of their core
functions”;163
(2) “[T]he Judiciary, the Constitutional
Commissions, and the Ombudsman must have the
independence and flexibility needed in the discharge
of their constitutional duties. The imposition of
restrictions and constraints on the manner the
independent constitutional offices allocate and
utilize the funds appropriated for their
operations is anathema to fiscal autonomy and
violative not only [of] the express mandate of the
Constitution, but especially as regards the Supreme
Court, of the independence and separation of powers
upon which the entire fabric of our constitutional
system is based”;164 and
(3) “[T]he constitutional deliberations explain
the Constitutional Commissions’ need for
independence. In the deliberations of the 1973
Constitution, the delegates amended the 1935
Constitution by providing for a constitutionally-
created Civil Service Commission, instead of one
created by law, on the premise that the
effectivity of this body is dependent on its
freedom from the tentacles of politics. In a
similar manner, the deliberations of the 1987
Constitution on the Commission on Audit
highlighted the developments in the

_______________

163  Id., at p. 643 (emphases supplied).

164  Id., at p. 644, citing Bengzon v. Drilon, G.R. No. 103524,
April 15, 1992, 208 SCRA 133, 150. (emphasis supplied)

 
 
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past Constitutions geared towards insulating

the Commission on Audit from political
pressure.”165
At bottom, the decisive ruling in Gonzales III,
however, was that the independence of the Office of
the Ombudsman, as well as that of the foregoing
independent bodies, meant freedom from control
or supervision of the Executive Department:
[T]he independent constitutional
commissions have been consistently intended
by the framers to be independent from
executive control or supervision or any
form of political influence. At least insofar
as these bodies are concerned, jurisprudence is
not scarce on how the “independence” granted
to these bodies prevents presidential
interference.
In Brillantes, Jr. v. Yorac (G.R. No. 93867,
December 18, 1990, 192 SCRA 358), we
emphasized that the Constitutional
Commissions, which have been characterized
under the Constitution as “independent,” are
not under the control of the President,
even if they discharge functions that are
executive in nature. The Court declared as
unconstitutional the President’s act of
temporarily appointing the respondent in that
case as Acting Chairman of the [Commission on
Elections] “however well-meaning” it might
have been.
In Bautista v. Senator Salonga (254 Phil.
156, 179 [1989]), the Court categorically stated
that the tenure of the commissioners of the
independent Commission on Human Rights
could not be placed under the
discretionary power of the President.
x x x x
The kind of independence enjoyed by the
Office of the Ombudsman certainly cannot be
inferior — but is similar in degree and kind —
to the independence similarly guaranteed by
the Constitution to the Constitu-

_______________
 165  Id., at pp. 644-645. (emphases supplied)

 
 
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tional Commissions since all these offices fill

the political interstices of a republican
democracy that are crucial to its existence and
proper functioning.166 (Emphases and
underscoring supplied)
 
Thus, in Gonzales III, the Court declared Section
8(2), RA 6770, which provides that “[a] Deputy or the
Special Prosecutor, may be removed from office by
the President for any of the grounds provided for the
removal of the Ombudsman, and after due process,”
partially unconstitutional insofar as it subjected the
Deputy Ombudsman to the disciplinary authority of
the President for violating the principle of
independence. Meanwhile, the validity of Section
8(2), RA 6770 was maintained insofar as the Office of
the Special Prosecutor was concerned since said
office was not considered to be constitutionally
within the Office of the Ombudsman and is, hence,
not entitled to the independence the latter enjoys
under the Constitution.167
As may be deduced from the various discourses in
Gonzales III, the concept of Ombudsman’s
independence covers three (3) things:
First: creation by the Constitution, which
means that the office cannot be abolished, nor its
constitutionally specified functions and privileges, be
removed, altered, or modified by law, unless the
Constitution itself allows, or an amendment thereto
is made;
Second: fiscal autonomy, which means that the
office may not be obstructed from [its] freedom to use
or dispose of [its] funds for purposes germane to [its]
functions;168 hence, its budget cannot be strategically
decreased by officials of the

_______________

166  Id., at pp. 646-648.

167  Id., at pp. 648-657.
168  See Re: COA Opinion on the Computation of the Appraised
Value of the Properties Purchased by the Retired Chief/Associate
Justices of the Supreme Court, A.M. No. 11-7-10-SC, July 31, 2012,
678 SCRA 1, 13.

 
 

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political branches of government so as to impair

said functions; and
Third: insulation from executive supervision
and control, which means that those within the
ranks of the office can only be disciplined by an
internal authority.
Evidently, all three aspects of independence
intend to protect the Office of the Ombudsman from
political harassment and pressure, so as to free
it from the “insidious tentacles of politics.”169
That being the case, the concept of Ombudsman
independence cannot be invoked as basis to insulate
the Ombudsman from judicial power constitutionally
vested unto the courts. Courts are apolitical bodies,
which are ordained to act as impartial tribunals and
apply even justice to all. Hence, the Ombudsman’s
notion that it can be exempt from an incident of
judicial power — that is, a provisional writ of
injunction against a preventive suspension order —
clearly strays from the concept’s rationale of
insulating the office from political harassment or
pressure.
 
B. The first paragraph of Section 14,
RA 6770 in light of the powers of
Congress and the Court under the
1987 Constitution.
 
The Ombudsman’s erroneous abstraction of her
office’s independence notwithstanding, it remains
that the first paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770
textually prohibits courts from extending provisional
injunctive relief to delay any investigation conducted
by her office. Despite the usage of the general phrase
“[n]o writ of injunction shall be issued by any court,”
the Ombudsman herself concedes that the
prohibition does

_______________

169  See Gonzales III v. Office of the President, supra note 160
at p. 650, citing the Record of the Constitutional Commission, Vol.
II, July 26, 1986, p. 294.

 
 
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498 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)
 not cover the Supreme Court.170 As support, she
cites the following Senate deliberations:
Senator [Ernesto M.] Maceda.
Mr. President, I do not know if an amendment is necessary. I
would just like to inquire for the record whether below
the Supreme Court, it is understood that there is no
injunction policy against the Ombudsman by lower
courts. Or, is it necessary to have a special paragraph
for that?
Senator Angara.
Well, there is no provision here, Mr. President, that will prevent
an injunction against the Ombudsman being issued.
Senator Maceda.
In which case, I think that the intention, this being one of
the highest constitutional bodies, is to subject this only
to certiorari to the Supreme Court. I think an
injunction from the Supreme Court is, of course, in
order but no lower courts should be allowed to interfere.
We had a very bad experience with even, let us say, the
Forestry Code where no injunction is supposed to be issued
against the Department of Natural Resources. Injunctions
are issued right and left by RTC judges all over the
country.
The President.
Why do we not make an express provision to that effect?
Senator Angara.
We would welcome that, Mr. President.
The President.
No [writs of injunction] from the trial courts other than the
Supreme Court.

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170  See Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 670-671.

 
 
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Senator Maceda.
I so move, Mr. President, for that amendment.
The President.
Is there any objection? [Silence] Hearing none, the same is
approved.171

 
Further, she acknowledges that by virtue of
Sections 1 and 5(1), Article VIII of the 1987
Constitution, acts of the Ombudsman, including
interlocutory orders, are subject to the Supreme
Court’s power of judicial review. As a corollary, the
Supreme Court may issue ancillary injunctive writs
or provisional remedies in the exercise of its power of
judicial review over matters pertaining to ongoing
investigations by the Office of the Ombudsman.
Respecting the CA, however, the Ombudsman begs
to differ.172
With these submissions, it is therefore apt to
examine the validity of the first paragraph of Section
14, RA 6770 insofar as it prohibits all courts, except
this Court, from issuing provisional writs of
injunction to enjoin an Ombudsman investigation.
That the constitutionality of this provision is the lis
mota of this case has not been seriously disputed. In
fact, the issue anent its constitutionality was
properly raised and presented during the course of
these proceedings.173 More importantly, its
resolution is clearly necessary to the complete
disposition of this case.174

_______________

171   Records of the Senate, August 24, 1988, p. 619. See also
Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 670-671 (emphases and underscoring in the
original).
 172  Rollo (Vol. II), p. 672.
173  See discussions in Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol.
II), pp. 670-678 and Binay, Jr.’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), pp.
825-833. See also TSN of the Oral Arguments, April 14, 2015, p. 5-
9.
174  See People v. Vera, 65 Phil. 56, 82 (1937), citing McGirr v.
Hamilton and Abreu, 30 Phil. 563, 568 (1915); 6 R. C. L., pp. 76,
77; 12 C. J., pp. 780-782, 783.

 
 

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In the enduring words of Justice Laurel in Angara

v. The Electoral Commission (Angara),175 the
“Constitution has blocked out with deft strokes and
in bold lines, allotment of power to the executive, the
legislative[,] and the judicial departments of the
government.”176 The constitutional demarcation of
the three fundamental powers of government is more
commonly known as the principle of separation of
powers. In the landmark case of Belgica v. Ochoa, Jr.
(Belgica),177 the Court held that “there is a violation
of the separation of powers principle when one
branch of government unduly encroaches on the
domain of another.”178 In particular, “there is a
violation of the principle when there is impermissible
(a) interference with and/or (b) assumption of
another department’s functions.”179
Under Section 1, Article VIII of the 1987
Constitution, judicial power is allocated to the
Supreme Court and all such lower courts:
 
Section 1. The judicial power shall be
vested in one Supreme Court and in such lower
 courts as may be established by law.
Judicial power includes the duty of the
courts of justice to settle actual controversies
involving rights which are legally demandable
and enforceable, and to determine whether or
not there has been a grave abuse of discretion
amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction on
the part of any branch or instrumentality of the
Government.
 
This Court is the only court established by the
Constitution, while all other lower courts may
be established by laws passed by Congress.
Thus, through the passage of

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175  63 Phil. 139 (1936).

176  Id., at p. 157.
177   G.R. Nos. 208566, 208493, and 209251, November 19,
2013, 710 SCRA 1.
178  Id., at p. 108.
179  Id.

 
 
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Batas Pambansa Bilang (BP) 129,180 known as

“The Judiciary Reorganization Act of 1980,” the
Court of Appeals,181 the Regional Trial Courts,182
and the Metropolitan Trial Courts, Municipal Trial
Courts, and Municipal Circuit Trial Courts183 were
established. Later, through the passage of RA
1125,184 and Presidential Decree No. (PD) 1486,185
the Court of Tax Appeals, and the Sandiganbayan
were respectively established.
In addition to the authority to establish lower
courts, Section 2, Article VIII of the 1987
Constitution empowers Congress to define,
prescribe, and apportion the jurisdiction of all
courts, except that it may not deprive the
Supreme Court of its jurisdiction over cases
enumerated in Section 5186 of the same Article:

_______________

180   Entitled “An Act Reorganizing the Judiciary,

Appropriating Funds Therefor, and for Other Purposes” (approved
on August 14, 1981).
181  See Section 3, Chapter I, BP 129.
182  See Section 13, Chapter II, BP 129.
183  See Section 25, Chapter III, BP 129.
184   Entitled “An Act Creating the Court of Tax Appeals”
(approved on June 16, 1954), which was later amended by RA
9282 (approved on March 30, 2004) and RA 9503 (approved on
June 12, 2008).
185   Entitled “Creating a Special Court to be Known as
‘Sandiganbayan’ and for Other Purposes” (approved on June 11,
1978), which was later amended by PD 1606 (approved on
December 10, 1978), RA 7975 (approved on March 30, 1995), and
RA 8249 (approved on February 5, 1997).
186   Section 5, Article VIII of the 1987 Constitution provides:
Section 5. The Supreme Court shall have the following powers:
(1) Exercise original jurisdiction over cases affecting
ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and over
petitions for certiorari, prohibition, mandamus, quo warranto, and
habeas corpus.
(2) Review, revise, reverse, modify, or affirm on appeal or
certiorari, as the law or the Rules of Court may provide, final
judgments and orders of lower courts in:

 
 
 502

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

Section 2. The Congress shall have the

power to define, prescribe, and apportion the
jurisdiction of the various courts but may not
deprive the Supreme Court of its jurisdiction
over cases enumerated in Section 5 hereof.
x x x x
 
Jurisdiction, as hereinabove used, more
accurately pertains to jurisdiction over the subject
matter of an action. In The Diocese of Bacolod v.
Commission on Elections,187 subject matter
jurisdiction was defined as “the authority ‘to hear
and determine cases of the general class to
which the proceedings in question belong and
is conferred by the sovereign authority which
organizes the court and defines its powers.’”
Among others, Congress defined, prescribed, and
apportioned the subject matter jurisdiction of this
Court (subject to the aforementioned constitutional
limitations), the Court of Appeals, and the trial
courts, through the passage of BP 129, as amended.

_______________

(a)      All cases in which the constitutionality or validity

of any treaty, international or executive agreement, law,
presidential decree, proclamation, order, instruction,
ordinance, or regulation is in question.
(b)      All cases involving the legality of any tax, impost,
assessment, or toll, or any penalty imposed in relation
thereto.
(c)          All cases in which the jurisdiction of any lower
court is in issue.
 (d)      All criminal cases in which the penalty imposed is
reclusion perpetua or higher.
(e)      All cases in which only an error or question of law
is involved.
187   See G.R. No. 205728, January 21, 2015, 747 SCRA 1,
citing Reyes v. Diaz, 73 Phil. 484, 486 (1941).

 
 

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In this case, the basis for the CA’s subject

matter jurisdiction over Binay, Jr.’s main petition
for certiorari in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 is
Section 9(1), Chapter I of BP 129, as amended:
 
Section 9. Jurisdiction.—The Court of
Appeals shall exercise:
1. Original jurisdiction to issue writs of
mandamus, prohibition, certiorari, habeas
corpus, and quo warranto, and auxiliary
writs or processes, whether or not in aid of
its appellate jurisdiction[.]
 
Note that the CA’s certiorari jurisdiction, as above
stated, is not only original but also concurrent
with the Regional Trial Courts (under Section 21[1],
Chapter II of BP 129), and the Supreme Court
(under Section 5, Article VIII of the 1987 Philippine
Constitution). In view of the concurrence of these
courts’ jurisdiction over petitions for certiorari, the
doctrine of hierarchy of courts should be
followed. In People v. Cuaresma,188 the doctrine was
explained as follows:
 
 [T]his concurrence of jurisdiction is not
x x x to be taken as according to parties seeking
any of the writs an absolute, unrestrained
freedom of choice of the court to which
application therefor will be directed. There is
after all a hierarchy of courts. That
hierarchy is determinative of the venue of
appeals, and should also serve as a general
determinant of the appropriate forum for
petitions for the extraordinary writs. A
becoming regard for that judicial hierarchy
most certainly indicates that petitions for the
issuance of extraordinary writs against first
level (“inferior”) courts should be filed with the
Regional Trial Court, and those against the
latter, with the Court of Appeals.189

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188  254 Phil. 418; 172 SCRA 415 (1989).

189  Id., at p. 427; pp. 423-424.

 
 
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When a court has subject matter jurisdiction

over a particular case, as conferred unto it by law,
said court may then exercise its jurisdiction
acquired over that case, which is called judicial
power.
Judicial power, as vested in the Supreme Court
and all other courts established by law, has been
defined as the “totality of powers a court
exercises when it assumes jurisdiction and
hears and decides a case.”190 Under Section 1,
Article VIII of the 1987 Constitution, it includes “the
duty of the courts of justice to settle actual
controversies involving rights which are
legally demandable and enforceable, and to
determine whether or not there has been a
grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or
excess of jurisdiction on the part of any branch
or instrumentality of the Government.”
In Oposa v. Factoran, Jr.191 the Court explained
the expanded scope of judicial power under the 1987
Constitution:
 
The first part of the authority represents the
traditional concept of judicial power, involving
the settlement of conflicting rights as conferred
by law. The second part of the authority
represents a broadening of judicial power to
enable the courts of justice to review what was
before forbidden territory, to wit, the discretion
of the political departments of the government.
As worded, the new provision vests in the
judiciary, and particularly the Supreme Court,
the power to rule upon even the wisdom of the
decisions of the executive and the legislature
and to declare their acts invalid for lack or
excess of jurisdiction because they are tainted
with grave abuse of discretion. The catch, of
course, is the meaning of “grave abuse of
discretion,” which is a very

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190   Bernas, Joaquin G., S.J., The 1987 Constitution of the

Republic of the Philippines: A Commentary, p. 959, 2009 ed., as
cited also in the Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), p.
661.
191  G.R. No. 101083, July 30, 1993, 224 SCRA 792.

 
  

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elastic phrase that can expand or contract

according to the disposition of the judiciary.192
 
Judicial power is never exercised in a vacuum. A
court’s exercise of the jurisdiction it has
acquired over a particular case conforms to the
limits and parameters of the rules of procedure
duly promulgated by this Court. In other words,
procedure is the framework within which judicial
power is exercised. In Manila Railroad Co. v.
Attorney-General,193 the Court elucidated that “[t]he
power or authority of the court over the subject
matter existed and was fixed before procedure in a
given cause began. Procedure does not alter or
change that power or authority; it simply
directs the manner in which it shall be fully
and justly exercised. To be sure, in certain cases, if
that power is not exercised in conformity with the
provisions of the procedural law, purely, the court
attempting to exercise it loses the power to exercise
it legally. This does not mean that it loses
jurisdiction of the subject matter.”194
While the power to define, prescribe, and
apportion the jurisdiction of the various courts is, by
constitutional design, vested unto Congress, the
power to promulgate rules concerning the
protection and enforcement of constitutional
rights, pleading, practice, and procedure in all
courts belongs exclusively to this Court. Section
5(5), Article VIII of the 1987 Constitution reads:
 
 Section 5. The Supreme Court shall
have the following powers:
x x x x

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192  Id., at p. 810, citing Cruz, Isagani A., Philippine Political

Law, pp. 226-227, 1991 ed.
193  20 Phil. 523 (1911).
194  Id., at pp. 530-531.

 
 
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506 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

(5) Promulgate rules concerning the

protection and enforcement of constitutional
rights, pleading, practice, and procedure in all
courts, the admission to the practice of law, the
Integrated Bar, and legal assistance to the
underprivileged. Such rules shall provide a
simplified and inexpensive procedure for the speedy
disposition of cases, shall be uniform for all courts of
the same grade, and shall not diminish, increase, or
modify substantive rights. Rules of procedure of
special courts and quasi-judicial bodies shall remain
effective unless disapproved by the Supreme Court.
(Emphases and underscoring supplied)
In Echegaray v. Secretary of Justice195
(Echegaray), the Court traced the evolution of its
rule-making authority, which, under the 1935196 and
1973 Constitutions,197 had been priorly

_______________
 195  361 Phil. 73, 86-91; 301 SCRA 96, 109-111 (1999).
196  Article VIII, Section 13 of the 1935 Constitution provides:
Section 13. The Supreme Court shall have the power
to promulgate rules concerning pleading, practice and
procedure in all courts, and the admission to the practice of
law. Said rules shall be uniform for all courts of the same
grade and shall not diminish, increase, or modify
substantive rights. The existing laws on pleading, practice
and procedure are hereby repealed as statutes, and are
declared Rules of Courts, subject to the power of the
Supreme Court to alter and modify the same. The
National Assembly shall have the power to repeal,
alter or supplement the rules concerning pleading,
practice and procedure, and the admission to the
practice of law in the Philippines. (Emphasis supplied)
197  Article X, Section 5(5) of the 1973 Constitution provides:
Section 5. The Supreme Court shall have the following
powers.
x x x x
(5) Promulgate rules concerning
pleading, practice, and procedure in all
courts, the

 
 

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subjected to a power-sharing scheme with

Congress.198 As it now stands, the 1987 Constitution
textually altered the old provisions by deleting
the concurrent power of Congress to amend
the rules, thus solidifying in one body the
Court’s rule-making powers, in line with the
Framers’ vision of institutionalizing a “[s]tronger
and more independent judiciary.”199
 The records of the deliberations of the
Constitutional Commission would show200 that the
Framers debated on whether or not the Court’s rule-
making powers should be shared with Congress.
There was an initial suggestion to insert the
sentence “The National Assembly may repeal, alter,
or supplement the said rules with the advice and
concurrence of the Supreme Court,” right after the
phrase “Promulgate rules concerning the protection
and enforcement of constitutional rights, pleading,
practice, and procedure in all courts, the admission
to the practice of law, the integrated bar, and legal
assistance to the underprivileged[,]” in the
enumeration of powers of the Supreme Court. Later,
Commissioner Felicitas S. Aquino proposed to

_______________

admission to the practice of law, and the

integration of the Bar, which, however, may be
repealed, altered, or supplemented by the
Batasang Pambansa. Such rules shall provide a
simplified and inexpensive procedure for the speedy
disposition of cases, shall be uniform for all courts of
the same grade, and shall not diminish, increase, or
modify substantive rights. (Emphasis supplied)
198   See Re: Petition for Recognition of the Exemption of the
Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) from Payment of
Legal Fees, 626 Phil. 93, 106-109; 612 SCRA 193, 206-208 (2010).
199   Baguio Market Vendors Multi-Purpose Cooperative
(BAMARVEMPCO) v. Cabato-Cortes, 627 Phil. 543, 549; 613
SCRA 733, 740 (2010).
200   See discussions as in the Records of the Constitutional
Commission, July 14, 1986, pp. 491-492.

 
 
508
508 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED
Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

delete the former sentence and, instead, after the

word “[under]privileged,” place a comma (,) to be
followed by “the phrase with the concurrence of the
National Assembly.” Eventually, a compromise
formulation was reached wherein (a) the Committee
members agreed to Commissioner Aquino’s proposal
to delete the phrase “the National Assembly may
repeal, alter, or supplement the said rules with the
advice and concurrence of the Supreme Court” and
(b) in turn, Commissioner Aquino agreed to
withdraw his proposal to add “the phrase with the
concurrence of the National Assembly.” The
changes were approved, thereby leading to the
present lack of textual reference to any form of
Congressional participation in Section 5(5),
Article VIII, supra. The prevailing
consideration was that “both bodies, the
Supreme Court and the Legislature, have their
inherent powers.”201
Thus, as it now stands, Congress has no authority
to repeal, alter, or supplement rules concerning
pleading, practice, and procedure. As pronounced in
Echegaray:
 
The rule-making power of this Court was
expanded. This Court for the first time was
given the power to promulgate rules concerning
the protection and enforcement of
constitutional rights. The Court was also
granted for the first time the power to
disapprove rules of procedure of special courts
and quasi-judicial bodies. But most
importantly, the 1987 Constitution took
away the power of Congress to repeal,
alter, or supplement rules concerning
pleading, practice and procedure. In fine,
 the power to promulgate rules of pleading,
practice and procedure is no longer
shared by this Court with Congress, more
so with the Executive.202 (Emphasis and
underscoring supplied)
 
Under its rule-making authority, the Court has
periodically passed various rules of procedure,
among others, the current

_______________

201  Id., at p. 492.

202  Echegaray v. Secretary of Justice, supra note 195 at p. 88;
p. 112.

 
 

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1997 Rules of Civil Procedure. Identifying the

appropriate procedural remedies needed for
the reasonable exercise of every court’s
judicial power, the provisional remedies of
temporary restraining orders and writs of
preliminary injunction were thus provided.
A temporary restraining order and a writ of
preliminary injunction both constitute temporary
measures availed of during the pendency of the
action. They are, by nature, ancillary because they
are mere incidents in and are dependent upon the
result of the main action. It is well-settled that the
sole object of a temporary restraining order or
a writ of preliminary injunction, whether
prohibitory or mandatory, is to preserve the
status quo203 until the merits of the case can be
heard. They are usually granted when it is made to
appear that there is a substantial controversy
between the parties and one of them is committing
an act or threatening the immediate commission of
an act that will cause irreparable injury or destroy
the status quo of the controversy before a full hearing
can be had on the merits of the case. In other words,
they are preservative remedies for the protection of
substantive rights or interests, and, hence, not a
cause of action in itself, but merely adjunct to a main
suit.204 In a sense, they are regulatory processes
meant to prevent a case from being mooted by the
interim acts of the parties.
Rule 58 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure
generally governs the provisional remedies of a TRO
and a WPI. A prelimi

_______________

203  “Status quo is the last actual, peaceable and uncontested

situation which precedes a controversy.” (See Dolmar Real Estate
Development Corporation v. Court of Appeals, 570 Phil. 434, 439;
547 SCRA 114, 120 [2008] and Preysler, Jr. v. Court of Appeals,
527 Phil. 129, 136; 494 SCRA 547, 553 [2006])
204   See The Incorporators of Mindanao Institute, Inc. v. The
United Church of Christ in the Philippines, G.R. No. 171765,
March 21, 2012, 668 SCRA 637, 647.

 
 

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nary injunction is defined under Section 1,205 Rule

58, while Section 3206 of the same Rule enumerates
the grounds for its issuance. Meanwhile, under
Section 5207 thereof, a TRO may

_______________

205   Section 1, Rule 58 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure

provides:
Section 1. Preliminary injunction defined; classes.—A
preliminary injunction is an order granted at any stage of
an action or proceeding prior to the judgment or final order,
requiring a party or a court, agency or a person to refrain
from a particular act or acts. It may also require the
performance of a particular act or acts, in which case it
shall be known as a preliminary mandatory injunction.
206   Section 3, Rule 58 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure
provides:
Section 3. Grounds for issuance of preliminary
injunction.—A preliminary injunction may be granted
when it is established:
(a) That the applicant is entitled to the relief
demanded, and the whole or part of such relief
consists in restraining the commission or
continuance of the act or acts complained of, or in
requiring the performance of an act or acts, either
for a limited period or perpetually;
(b) That the commission, continuance or
nonperformance of the act or acts complained of
during the litigation would probably work injustice
to the applicant; or
(c) That a party, court, agency or a person is
doing, threatening, or is attempting to do, or is
procuring or suffering to be done, some act or acts
probably in violation of the rights of the applicant
respecting the subject of the action or proceeding,
and tending to render the judgment ineffectual.
207   Section 5, Rule 58 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure
provides:
Section 5. Preliminary injunction not granted without
notice; exception.—No preliminary injunction shall be
 granted without hearing and prior notice to the party or
person sought to be enjoined. If it shall appear

 
 

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be issued as a precursor to the issuance of a writ

of preliminary injunction under certain procedural
parameters.
The power of a court to issue these provisional
injunctive reliefs coincides with its inherent power
to issue all auxiliary writs, processes, and
other means necessary to carry its acquired
jurisdiction into effect under Section 6, Rule
135 of the Rules of Court which reads:
 
Section 6. Means to carry jurisdiction into
effect.—When by law jurisdiction is conferred
on a court or judicial officer, all auxiliary writs,
processes and other means necessary to carry it
into effect may be employed by such court or
officer; and if the procedure to be followed in
the exercise of such jurisdiction is not
specifically pointed out by law208 or by these
rules, any suitable

_______________

from facts shown by affidavits or by the verified application

that great or irreparable injury would result to the applicant
before the matter can be heard on notice, the court to which the
application for preliminary injunction was made, may issue ex
parte a temporary restraining order to be effective only for a
period of twenty (20) days from service on the party or person
sought to be enjoined, except as herein provided. x x x.
However, subject to the provisions of the preceding sections, if
the matter is of extreme urgency and the applicant will suffer
grave injustice and irreparable injury, the executive judge of a
multiple-sala court or the presiding judge of a single-sala court
may issue ex parte a temporary restraining order effective for only
seventy-two (72) hours from issuance but shall immediately
comply with the provisions of the next preceding section as to
service of summons and the documents to be served therewith.
x x x.
x x x x (Emphases supplied)
208   Rules of procedure of special courts and quasi-judicial
bodies may be specifically pointed out by law and thus, remain
effective unless the Supreme Court disapproves the same
pursuant to Section 5(5), Article VIII of the 1987 Constitution:

 
 

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512 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

process or mode of proceeding may be

adopted which appears comfortable to the spirit
of the said law or rules.
In City of Manila v. Grecia-Cuerdo,209 which is a
case involving “[t]he supervisory power or
jurisdiction of the [Court of Tax Appeals] to issue a
writ of certiorari in aid of its appellate
jurisdiction”210 over “decisions, orders or resolutions
of the RTCs in local tax cases originally decided or
resolved by them in the exercise of their original or
appellate jurisdiction,”211 the Court ruled that said
power “should coexist with, and be a complement to,
its appellate jurisdiction to review, by appeal, the
final orders and decisions of the RTC, in order to
have complete supervision over the acts of the
latter:”212
 
A grant of appellate jurisdiction implies that
there is included in it the power necessary to
exercise it effectively, to make all orders
that will preserve the subject of the
action, and to give effect to the final
determination of the appeal. It carries with it
the power to protect that jurisdiction and to
make the decisions of the court thereunder
effective. The court, in aid of its appellate
jurisdiction, has authority to control all
auxiliary and incidental matters necessary to
the efficient and proper exercise of that
jurisdiction. For this purpose, it may, when
necessary, prohibit or restrain the performance
of any act which might interfere with the
proper exercise of its rightful jurisdiction in
cases pending before it.213 (Emphasis supplied)

_______________

Section 5. The Supreme Court shall have the following

powers:
(5) x x x. Rules of procedure of special courts and quasi-
judicial bodies shall remain effective unless disapproved
by the Supreme Court. (Emphasis and underscoring supplied)
209  G.R. No. 175723, February 4, 2014, 715 SCRA 182.
210  Id., at p. 204.
211  Id., at p. 197.
212  Id., at p. 204.
213  Id., at pp. 204-205.

 
 

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In this light, the Court expounded on the inherent

powers of a court endowed with subject matter
jurisdiction:
 
[A] court which is endowed with a particular
jurisdiction should have powers which are
necessary to enable it to act effectively within
such jurisdiction. These should be regarded
as powers which are inherent in its
jurisdiction and the court must possess
them in order to enforce its rules of
practice and to suppress any abuses of its
process and to defeat any attempted
thwarting of such process.
x x x x
Indeed, courts possess certain inherent
powers which may be said to be implied from
a general grant of jurisdiction, in addition
to those expressly conferred on them. These
inherent powers are such powers as are
necessary for the ordinary and efficient
exercise of jurisdiction; or are essential to
the existence, dignity and functions of the
courts, as well as to the due
administration of justice; or are directly
appropriate, convenient and suitable to
the execution of their granted powers; and
include the power to maintain the court’s
jurisdiction and render it effective in
behalf of the litigants.214 (Emphases and
underscoring supplied)
 
Broadly speaking, the inherent powers of the
courts resonates the long-entrenched constitutional
principle, articulated way back in the 1936 case of
Angara, that “where a general power is conferred or
duty enjoined, every particular power necessary for
the exercise of the one or the performance of the
other is also conferred.”215
In the United States, the “inherent powers
doctrine refers to the principle by which the courts
deal with diverse

_______________

214  Id., at p. 205.

215  Angara v. The Electoral Commission, supra note 175 at p.
177, citing Cooley, Constitutional Limitations, 8th ed., Vol. I, pp.
138-139.

 
 

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matters over which they are thought to have

intrinsic authority like procedural [rule-making] and
general judicial housekeeping. To justify the
invocation or exercise of inherent powers, a court
must show that the powers are reasonably
necessary to achieve the specific purpose for
which the exercise is sought. Inherent powers
enable the judiciary to accomplish its
constitutionally mandated functions.”216
In Smothers v. Lewis217 (Smothers), a case
involving the constitutionality of a statute which
prohibited courts from enjoining the enforcement of a
revocation order of an alcohol beverage license
pending appeal,218 the Supreme Court of Kentucky
held:
[T]he Court is x  x  x vested with certain
“inherent” powers to do that which is
 reasonably necessary for the
administration of justice within the scope
of their jurisdiction. x  x  x [W]e said while
considering

_______________

216   http://definitions.uslegal.com/i/inherent-powers-doctrine/
(last visited July 27, 2015). See also Black’s Law Dictionary, 8th
ed., p. 798.
217  672 S.W.2d 62 (1984).
218  The particular statute [KRS 243.580(2) and (3)] reads:
(2) If a license is revoked or suspended by an order of the
board, the licensee shall at once suspend all operations authorized
under his license, except as provided by KRS 243.540, though he
files an appeal in the Franklin Circuit Court from the order of
revocation of suspension.
(3) No court may enjoin the operation of an order of
revocation or suspension pending an appeal. If upon appeal
to the Franklin Circuit Court an order of suspension or revocation
is upheld, or if an order refusing to suspend or revoke a license is
reversed, and an appeal is taken to the Court of Appeals, no court
may enjoin the operation of the judgment of the Franklin Circuit
Court pending the appeal. (See Smothers, id.; emphasis supplied)

 
 
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the rule-making power and the judicial

power to be one and the same that “. . . the
grant of judicial power [rule making
power] to the courts by the constitution
carries with it, as a necessary incident,
the right to make that power effective in
 the administration of justice.” (Emphases
supplied)
 
Significantly, Smothers characterized a court’s
issuance of provisional injunctive relief as an
exercise of the court’s inherent power, and to this
end, stated that any attempt on the part of Congress
to interfere with the same was constitutionally
impermissible:
 
It is a result of this foregoing line of thinking
that we now adopt the language framework of
28 Am. Jur. 2d, Injunctions, Section 15, and
once and for all make clear that a court, once
having obtained jurisdiction of a cause of
action, has, as an incidental to its
constitutional grant of power, inherent power to
do all things reasonably necessary to the
administration of justice in the case before it.
In the exercise of this power, a court,
when necessary in order to protect or
preserve the subject matter of the
litigation, to protect its jurisdiction and to
make its judgment effective, may grant or
issue a temporary injunction in aid of or
ancillary to the principal action.
The control over this inherent judicial
power, in this particular instance the
injunction, is exclusively within the
constitutional realm of the courts. As
such, it is not within the purview of the
legislature to grant or deny the power nor
is it within the purview of the legislature
to shape or fashion circumstances under
which this inherently judicial power may
be or may not be granted or denied.
This Court has historically recognized
constitutional limitations upon the power of the
legislature to interfere with or to inhibit the
 performance of constitutionally granted and
inherently provided judicial functions. x x x
 
 

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516 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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x x x x
We reiterate our previously adopted
language, “… a court, once having obtained
jurisdiction of a cause of action, has, as
incidental to its general jurisdiction, inherent
power to do all things reasonably necessary to
the administration of justice in the case before
it…” This includes the inherent power to
issue injunctions. (Emphases supplied)
 
Smothers also pointed out that the legislature’s
authority to provide a right to appeal in the statute
does not necessarily mean that it could control the
appellate judicial proceeding:
 
However, the fact that the legislature
statutorily provided for this appeal does not
give it the right to encroach upon the
constitutionally granted powers of the
judiciary. Once the administrative action
has ended and the right to appeal arises
the legislature is void of any right to
control a subsequent appellate judicial
proceeding. The judicial rules have come
into play and have preempted the field.219
(Emphasis supplied)
 
With these considerations in mind, the Court
rules that when Congress passed the first paragraph
of Section 14, RA 6770 and, in so doing, took away
from the courts their power to issue a TRO and/or
WPI to enjoin an investigation conducted by the
Ombudsman, it encroached upon this Court’s
constitutional rule-making authority. Clearly, these
issuances, which are, by nature, provisional reliefs
and auxiliary writs created under the provisions of
the Rules of Court, are matters of procedure
which belong exclusively within the province of this
Court. Rule 58 of the Rules of Court did not create,
define, and regulate a right but merely prescribed
the means of implementing an existing right220 since
it only pro-

_______________

219  Id.
220   “Substantive law is that part of the law which creates,
defines and regulates rights, or which regulates the right and
duties which give rise to a cause of action; that part of the law
which courts

 
 
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vided for temporary reliefs to preserve the

applicant’s right in esse which is threatened to be
violated during the course of a pending litigation. In
the case of Fabian,221 it was stated that:
 
If the rule takes away a vested right, it is
not procedural. If the rule creates a right such
as the right to appeal, it may be classified as a
substantive matter; but if it operates as a
 means of implementing an existing right then
the rule deals merely with procedure.
 
Notably, there have been similar attempts on the
part of Congress, in the exercise of its legislative
power, to amend the Rules of Court, as in the cases
of: (a) In Re: Exemption of The National Power
Corporation from Payment of Filing/Docket Fees;222
(b) Re: Petition for Recognition of the Exemption of
the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS)
from Payment of Legal Fees;223 and (c) Baguio
Market Vendors Multi-Purpose Cooperative
224
(BAMARVEMPCO) v. Cabato-Cortes. While these
cases involved legislative enactments exempting
government-owned and -controlled corporations and
cooperatives from paying filing fees, thus, effectively
modifying Rule 141 of the Rules of Court (Rule on
Legal Fees), it was, nonetheless, ruled that the
prerogative to amend, repeal or even establish
new rules of procedure225 solely belongs to the
Court, to the exclusion of the legislative and
executive
 
  are established to administer; as opposed to
adjective or remedial law, which prescribes the
method of enforcing rights or obtain redress for their
invasions.” (Primicias v. Ocampo, 93 Phil. 446, 452
[1953], citing Bustos v. Lucero, [46 Off. Gaz., January
Supp., pp. 445, 448], further citing 36 C. J. 27; 52 C.
J. S. 1026); see also Fabian v. Desierto, supra note
137.

_______________

221  Fabian v. Desierto, id., at p. 809; p. 492.

222  629 Phil. 1; 615 SCRA 1 (2010).
223  Supra note 198.
224  Supra note 199.
 225  Neypes v. Court of Appeals, 506 Phil. 613, 626; 469 SCRA
633, 643-644 (2005).

 
 
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branches of government. On this score, the

Court described its authority to promulgate rules on
pleading, practice, and procedure as exclusive and
“[o]ne of the safeguards of [its] institutional
independence.”226
That Congress has been vested with the authority
to define, prescribe, and apportion the jurisdiction of
the various courts under Section 2, Article VIII,
supra, as well as to create statutory courts under
Section 1, Article VIII, supra, does not result in an
abnegation of the Court’s own power to promulgate
rules of pleading, practice, and procedure under
Section 5(5), Article VIII, supra. Albeit operatively
interrelated, these powers are nonetheless
institutionally separate and distinct, each to be
preserved under its own sphere of authority. When
Congress creates a court and delimits its
jurisdiction, the procedure for which its
jurisdiction is exercised is fixed by the Court
through the rules it promulgates. The first
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770 is not a
jurisdiction-vesting provision, as the Ombudsman
misconceives,227 because it does not define, prescribe,
and apportion the subject matter jurisdiction of
courts to act on certiorari cases; the certiorari
jurisdiction of courts, particularly the CA, stands
under the relevant sections of BP 129 which were not
shown to have been repealed. Instead, through this
provision, Congress interfered with a
provisional remedy that was created by this
Court under its duly promulgated rules of
procedure, which utility is both integral and
inherent to every court’s exercise of judicial
power. Without the Court’s consent to the
proscription, as may be manifested by an
adoption of the same as part of the rules of
procedure through an administrative circular
issued therefor, there thus, stands to be a
violation of the separation of powers principle.

_______________

226  Supra note 199 at p. 550; p. 741.

227  See Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 668-
669.

 
 
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In addition, it should be pointed out that the

breach of Congress in prohibiting provisional
injunctions, such as in the first paragraph of Section
14, RA 6770, does not only undermine the
constitutional allocation of powers; it also
practically dilutes a court’s ability to carry out
its functions. This is so since a particular case
can easily be mooted by supervening events if
no provisional injunctive relief is extended
while the court is hearing the same. Accordingly,
the court’s acquired jurisdiction, through which it
exercises its judicial power, is rendered nugatory.
Indeed, the force of judicial power, especially under
the present Constitution, cannot be enervated due to
a court’s inability to regulate what occurs during a
proceeding’s course. As earlier intimated, when
jurisdiction over the subject matter is accorded by
law and has been acquired by a court, its exercise
thereof should be unclipped. To give true meaning to
the judicial power contemplated by the Framers of
our Constitution, the Court’s duly promulgated rules
of procedure should therefore remain unabridged,
this, even by statute. Truth be told, the policy
against provisional injunctive writs in whatever
variant should only subsist under rules of procedure
duly promulgated by the Court given its sole
prerogative over the same.
The following exchange between Associate Justice
Marvic Mario Victor F. Leonen (Justice Leonen) and
the Acting Solicitor General Florin T. Hilbay (Acting
Solicitor General Hilbay) mirrors the foregoing
observations:
JUSTICE LEONEN:
Okay. Now, would you know what rule covers injunction in the
Rules of Court?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Rule 58, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
58, that is under the general rubric if Justice Bersamin will
correct me if I will be mistaken under the rubric of what is
called provisional remedies, our resident expert because
Justice Peralta is not

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)
here so Justice Bersamin for a while. So provisional remedy you
have injunction. x x x.
x x x x
JUSTICE LEONEN:
Okay, Now, we go to the Constitution. Section 5, subparagraph 5
of Article VIII of the Constitution, if you have a copy of the
Constitution, can you please read that provision? Section 5,
Article VIII the Judiciary, subparagraph 5, would you kindly
read that provision?
ACTING SOLICTOR GENERAL HILBAY:
“Promulgate rules concerning the protection and enforcement of
constitutional rights, pleading, practice and procedure in all
courts…”
JUSTICE LEONEN:
Okay, we can stop with that, promulgate rules concerning
pleading, practice and procedure in all courts. This is the
power, the competence, the jurisdiction of what constitutional
organ?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
The Supreme Court, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
The Supreme Court. This is different from Article VIII, Sections 1
and 2 which we’ve already been discussed with you by my
other colleagues, is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Correct, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
Okay, so in Section 2, [apportion] jurisdiction that is the power of
Congress, is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Correct, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
On the other hand, the power to promulgate rules is with the
Court, is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Correct, Your Honor.

 
 
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JUSTICE LEONEN:
A TRO and a writ of preliminary injunction, would it be a separate
case or is it part of litigation in an ordinary case?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
It is an ancillary remedy, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
In fact, it originated as an equitable remedy, is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Correct, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
In order to preserve the power of a court so that at the end
of litigation, it will not be rendered moot and
academic, is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Correct, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
In that view, isn’t Section 14, first paragraph, unconstitutional?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
No, Your Honor.
x x x x
JUSTICE LEONEN:
Can Congress say that a Court cannot prescribe Motions to
Dismiss under Rule 16?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Your Honor, Congress cannot impair the power of the
Court to create remedies. x x x.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
What about bill [of] particulars, can Congress say, no Court shall
have the power to issue the supplemental pleading called the
bill of particular[s]? It cannot, because that’s part of
procedure…
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
That is true.
  
 

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JUSTICE LEONEN:
…or for that matter, no Court shall act on a Motion to Quash, is
that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Correct.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
So what’s different with the writ of injunction?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Writ of injunction, Your Honor, requires the existence of
jurisdiction on the part of a court that was created by
Congress. In the absence of jurisdiction… (interrupted)
JUSTICE LEONEN:
No, writ of injunction does not attach to a court. In other words,
when they create a special agrarian court it has all procedures
with it but it does not attach particularly to that particular
court, is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICTOR GENERAL HILBAY:
When Congress, Your Honor, creates a special court…
JUSTICE LEONEN:
Again, Counsel, what statute provides for a TRO, created the
concept of a TRO? It was a Rule. A rule of procedure and the
Rules of Court, is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Yes, Your Honor.
JUSTICE LEONEN:
And a TRO and a writ of preliminary injunction does not exist
unless it is [an] ancillary to a particular injunction in a court,
is that not correct?
ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL HILBAY:
Correct, Your Honor.
x x x x228 (Emphasis supplied)
_______________

228  TSN of the Oral Arguments, April 14, 2015, pp. 64-68.

 
 
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In Biraogo v. The Philippine Truth Commission of

2010,229 the Court instructed that “[i]t is through the
Constitution that the fundamental powers of
government are established, limited and defined, and
by which these powers are distributed among the
several departments. The Constitution is the basic
and paramount law to which all other laws must
conform and to which all persons, including the
highest officials of the land, must defer.” It would
then follow that laws that do not conform to the
Constitution shall be stricken down for being
unconstitutional.230
However, despite the ostensible breach of the
separation of powers principle, the Court is not
oblivious to the policy considerations behind the first
paragraph of Section 14, RA 6770, as well as other
statutory provisions of similar import. Thus, pending
deliberation on whether or not to adopt the same, the
Court, under its sole prerogative and authority over
all matters of procedure, deems it proper to declare
as ineffective the prohibition against courts other
than the Supreme Court from issuing provisional
injunctive writs to enjoin investigations conducted by
the Office of the Ombudsman, until it is adopted as
part of the rules of procedure through an
administrative circular duly issued therefor.
 Hence, with Congress interfering with matters of
procedure (through passing the first paragraph of
Section 14, RA 6770) without the Court’s consent
thereto, it remains that the CA had the authority to
issue the questioned injunctive writs enjoining the
implementation of the preventive suspension order
against Binay, Jr. At the risk of belaboring the point,
these issuances were merely ancillary to the exercise
of the CA’s certiorari jurisdiction conferred to it
under Section 9(1), Chapter I of BP 129, as amended,
and which it had already acquired over the main
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 case.

_______________

229  651 Phil. 374, 427; 637 SCRA 78, 137 (2010).
230   See Manila Prince Hotel v. GSIS, 335 Phil. 82, 114; 267
SCRA 408, 444 (1997).

 
 

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IV.
 
The foregoing notwithstanding, the issue of
whether or not the CA gravely abused its jurisdiction
in issuing the TRO and WPI in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No.
139453 against the preventive suspension order is a
persisting objection to the validity of said injunctive
writs. For its proper analysis, the Court first
provides the context of the assailed injunctive writs.

A. Subject matter of the CA’s injunctive writs is

the preventive suspension order.
  
By nature, a preventive suspension order is
not a penalty but only a preventive measure. In
Quimbo v. Acting Ombudsman Gervacio,231 the
Court explained the distinction, stating that its
purpose is to prevent the official to be
suspended from using his position and the
powers and prerogatives of his office to
influence potential witnesses or tamper with
records which may be vital in the prosecution
of the case against him:
 
Jurisprudential law establishes a clear-cut
distinction between suspension as preventive
measure and suspension as penalty. The
distinction, by considering the purpose aspect
of the suspensions, is readily cognizable as they
have different ends sought to be achieved.
Preventive suspension is merely a
preventive measure, a preliminary step in
an administrative investigation. The
purpose of the suspension order is to
prevent the accused from using his
position and the powers and prerogatives
of his office to influence potential
witnesses or tamper with records which
may be vital in the prosecution of the case
against him. If after such investigation, the
charge is established and the person
investigated is found guilty of acts warranting
his suspension or removal, then he is
suspended, removed or dismissed. This is the
penalty.

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231  Quimbo v. Gervacio, supra note 148.

 
 
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That preventive suspension is not a penalty

is in fact explicitly provided by Section 24 of
Rule XIV of the Omnibus Rules Implementing
Book V of the Administrative Code of 1987
(Executive Order No. 292) and other Pertinent
Civil Service Laws.
Section 24. Preventive suspension is
not a punishment or penalty for
misconduct in office but is considered to
be a preventive measure. (Emphasis
supplied)
Not being a penalty, the period within which
one is under preventive suspension is not
considered part of the actual penalty of
suspension. So Section 25 of the same Rule XIV
provides:
Section 25. The period within which
a public officer or employee charged is
placed under preventive suspension shall
not be considered part of the actual
penalty of suspension imposed upon
the employee found guilty.232 (Emphases
supplied)
 
The requisites for issuing a preventive suspension
order are explicitly stated in Section 24, RA 6770:
 
Section 24. Preventive Suspension.—The
Ombudsman or his Deputy may preventively
suspend any officer or employee under his
authority pending an investigation, if in his
judgment the evidence of guilt is strong,
and (a) the charge against such officer or
 employee involves dishonesty, oppression
or grave misconduct or neglect in the
performance of duty; (b) the charges
would warrant removal from the service;
or (c) the respondent’s continued stay in
office may prejudice the case filed against
him.
The preventive suspension shall continue
until the case is terminated by the Office of the
Ombudsman but not more than six (6) months,
without pay, except when the delay in the
disposition of the case by the Office of

_______________

232  Id., at pp. 891-892; pp. 281-282.

 
 
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526 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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the Ombudsman is due to the fault,

negligence or petition of the respondent, in
which case the period of such delay shall not be
counted in computing the period of suspension
herein provided. (Emphasis and underscoring
supplied)
 
In other words, the law sets forth two (2)
conditions that must be satisfied to justify the
issuance of an order of preventive suspension
pending an investigation, namely:
(1) The evidence of guilt is strong; and
(2) Either of the following circumstances coexist
with the first requirement:
 (a) The charge involves dishonesty,
oppression or grave misconduct or neglect in
the performance of duty;
(b) The charge would warrant removal from
the service; or
(c) The respondent’s continued stay in office
may prejudice the case filed against him.233

B. The basis of the CA’s injunctive writs is the

condonation doctrine.
 
Examining the CA’s Resolutions in C.A.-G.R. S.P.
No. 139453 would, however, show that the
Ombudsman’s noncompliance with the requisites
provided in Section 24, RA 6770 was not the basis for
the issuance of the assailed injunctive writs.
The CA’s March 16, 2015 Resolution which
directed the issuance of the assailed TRO was based
on the case of Governor Garcia, Jr. v. CA234
(Governor Garcia, Jr.), wherein the

_______________

233   The Ombudsman v. Valeroso, 548 Phil. 688, 695; 520

SCRA 140, 146-147 (2007).
234   Garcia, Jr. v. Court of Appeals, supra note 68. See also
Rollo (Vol. I), p. 45.

 
 

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Court emphasized that “if it were established in

the CA that the acts subject of the administrative
complaint were indeed committed during petitioner
[Garcia’s] prior term, then, following settled
jurisprudence, he can no longer be administratively
charged.”235 Thus, the Court, contemplating the
application of the condonation doctrine, among
others, cautioned, in the said case, that “it would
have been more prudent for [the appellate court] to
have, at the very least, on account of the extreme
urgency of the matter and the seriousness of the
issues raised in the certiorari petition, issued a
TRO x  x  x”236 during the pendency of the
proceedings.
Similarly, the CA’s April 6, 2015 Resolution which
directed the issuance of the assailed WPI was based
on the condonation doctrine, citing the case of
Aguinaldo v. Santos.237 The CA held that Binay,
Jr. has an ostensible right to the final relief prayed
for, i.e., the nullification of the preventive suspension
order, finding that the Ombudsman can hardly
impose preventive suspension against Binay, Jr.
given that his reelection in 2013 as City Mayor of
Makati condoned any administrative liability arising
from anomalous activities relative to the Makati
Parking Building project from 2007 to 2013.238
Moreover, the CA observed that although there were
acts which were apparently committed by Binay, Jr.
beyond his first term, i.e., the alleged payments on
July 3, 4, and 24, 2013,239 corresponding to the
services of Hilmarc’s and MANA — still, Binay, Jr.
cannot be held administratively liable therefor based
on the cases of Salalima v. Guingona, Jr.,240 and
Mayor Garcia v. Mojica,241 wherein the
condonation

_______________

235  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 46.

236  Garcia, Jr. v. Court of Appeals, supra note 68 at p. 690; p.
811.
237  Aguinaldo v. Santos, supra note 92.
 238  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 619.
239  All of which pertains to the payment of Phase V. Id., at
pp. 346-349; p. 623.
240  Salalima v. Guingona, Jr., supra note 95.
241  Garcia v. Mojica, supra note 96.

 
 

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doctrine was applied by the Court although the

payments were made after the official’s election,
reasoning that the payments were merely effected
pursuant to contracts executed before said
reelection.242
The Ombudsman contends that it was
inappropriate for the CA to have considered the
condonation doctrine since it was a matter of defense
which should have been raised and passed upon by
her office during the administrative disciplinary
proceedings.243 However, the Court agrees with the
CA that it was not precluded from considering the
same given that it was material to the propriety of
according provisional injunctive relief in conformity
with the ruling in Governor Garcia, Jr., which was
the subsisting jurisprudence at that time. Thus,
since condonation was duly raised by Binay, Jr. in
his petition in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453,244 the CA
did not err in passing upon the same. Note that
although Binay, Jr. secondarily argued that the
evidence of guilt against him was not strong in his
petition in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453,245 it appears
that the CA found that the application of the
condonation doctrine was already sufficient to enjoin
the implementation of the preventive suspension
order. Again, there is nothing aberrant with this
since, as remarked in the same case of Governor
Garcia, Jr., if it was established that the acts subject
of the administrative complaint were indeed
committed during Binay, Jr.’s prior term, then,
following the condonation doctrine, he can no longer
be administratively charged. In other words, with
condonation having been invoked by Binay, Jr. as an
exculpatory affirmative defense at the onset, the CA
deemed it unnecessary to determine if the evidence
of guilt against him was strong, at least for the
purpose of issuing the subject injunctive writs.

_______________

242  Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 619-620.

243  See Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 703-
704.
244  See Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 410-415.
245  Id., at pp. 415-422.

 
 
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With the preliminary objection resolved and the

basis of the assailed writs herein laid down, the
Court now proceeds to determine if the CA gravely
abused its discretion in applying the condonation
doctrine.

C. The origin of the condonation doctrine.

 
Generally speaking, condonation has been defined
as “[a] victim’s express or implied forgiveness of an
offense, [especially] by treating the offender as if
there had been no offense.”246
The condonation doctrine — which connotes this
same sense of complete extinguishment of liability as
will be herein elaborated upon — is not based on
statutory law. It is a jurisprudential creation that
originated from the 1959 case of Pascual v. Hon.
Provincial Board of Nueva Ecija,247 (Pascual),
which was therefore decided under the 1935
Constitution.
In Pascual, therein petitioner, Arturo Pascual,
was elected Mayor of San Jose, Nueva Ecija,
sometime in November 1951, and was later reelected
to the same position in 1955. During his second
term, or on October 6, 1956, the Acting Provincial
Governor filed administrative charges before the
Provincial Board of Nueva Ecija against him for
grave abuse of authority and usurpation of judicial
functions for acting on a criminal complaint in
Criminal Case No. 3556 on December 18 and 20,
1954. In defense, Arturo Pascual argued that he
cannot be made liable for the acts charged against
him since they were committed during his previous
term of office, and therefore, invalid grounds for
disciplining him during his second term. The
Provincial Board, as well as the Court of First
Instance of Nueva Ecija, later decided against Arturo
Pascual, and when the case reached this Court on
appeal, it

_______________

246  Black’s Law Dictionary, 8th ed., p. 315.

247  106 Phil. 466 (1959).

 
 

530
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

recognized that the controversy posed a novel

issue — that is, whether or not an elective official
may be disciplined for a wrongful act committed by
him during his immediately preceding term of office.
As there was no legal precedent on the issue
at that time, the Court, in Pascual, resorted to
American authorities and “found that cases on the
matter are conflicting due in part, probably, to
differences in statutes and constitutional provisions,
and also, in part, to a divergence of views with
respect to the question of whether the subsequent
election or appointment condones the prior
misconduct.”248 Without going into the variables
of these conflicting views and cases, it proceeded
to state that:
 
The weight of authorities x x x seems to
incline toward the rule denying the right
to remove one from office because of
misconduct during a prior term, to which
we fully subscribe.249 (Emphasis and
underscoring supplied)
 
The conclusion is at once problematic since this
Court has now uncovered that there is really no
established weight of authority in the United States
(US) favoring the doctrine of condonation, which, in
the words of Pascual, theorizes that an official’s
reelection denies the right to remove him from office
due to a misconduct during a prior term. In fact, as
pointed out during the oral arguments of this case, at
least seventeen (17) states in the US have
abandoned the condonation doctrine.250 The
Ombudsman aptly cites several rulings of various US
State courts, as well as literature published on the
matter, to demonstrate the fact that the doctrine is
not uniformly

_______________

248  Id., at p. 471.

249  Id.
250   See Chief Justice Maria Lourdes P. A. Sereno’s (Chief
Justice Sereno) Interpellation, TSN of the Oral Arguments, April
21, 2015, p. 191.

 
 

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applied across all state jurisdictions. Indeed, the

treatment is nuanced:
(1) For one, it has been widely recognized that
the propriety of removing a public officer from his
current term or office for misconduct which he
allegedly committed in a prior term of office is
governed by the language of the statute or
constitutional provision applicable to the facts of a
particular case (see In Re Removal of Member of
Council Coppola).251 As an example, a Texas statute,
on the one hand, expressly allows removal only for
an act committed during a present term: “no officer
shall be prosecuted or removed from office for any act
he may have committed prior to his election to office”
(see State ex rel. Rawlings v. Loomis).252 On the
other hand, the Supreme Court of Oklahoma allows
removal from office for “acts of commission, omission,
or neglect committed, done or omitted during a
previous or preceding term of office” (see State v.
Bailey).253 Meanwhile, in some states where the
removal statute is silent or unclear, the case’s
resolution was contingent upon the interpretation of
the phrase “in office.” On one end, the Supreme
Court of Ohio strictly construed a removal statute
containing the phrase “misfeasance of malfeasance
in office” and thereby declared that, in the absence of
clear legislative language making, the word “office”
must be limited to the single term during which the
offense charged against the public officer occurred
(see State ex rel. Stokes v.

_______________

251   155 Ohio St. 329; 98 N.E.2d 807 (1951); cited in Goger,
Thomas, J.D., Removal of public officers for misconduct during
previous term, 42 A.L.R.3d 691 (1972), published by Thomson
Reuters (2015), p. 11.
252   Tex Civ App 29 SW 415 (1895), cited in Goger, Thomas,
J.D., id., at p. 16, and in Silos, Miguel U., A Reexamination of the
Doctrine of Condonation of Public Officers, 84 Phil. L.J. 22, 33
(2009).
253  1956 OK 338; 305 P.2d 548 (1956); cited in Goger, Thomas,
J.D., id., at p. 15.

 
 
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532 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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Probate Court of Cuyahoga County).254 Similarly,

the Common Pleas Court of Allegheny County,
Pennsylvania decided that the phrase “in office” in
its state constitution was a time limitation with
regard to the grounds of removal, so that an officer
could not be removed for misbehaviour which
occurred prior to the taking of the office (see
Commonwealth v. Rudman).255 The opposite was
construed in the Supreme Court of Louisiana which
took the view that an officer’s inability to hold an
office resulted from the commission of certain
offenses, and at once rendered him unfit to continue
in office, adding the fact that the officer had been
reelected did not condone or purge the offense (see
State ex rel. Billon v. Bourgeois).256 Also, in the
Supreme Court of New York, Appellate Division,
Fourth Department, the court construed the words
“in office” to refer not to a particular term of office
but to an entire tenure; it stated that the whole
purpose of the legislature in enacting the statute in
question could easily be lost sight of, and the intent
of the lawmaking body be thwarted, if an unworthy
official could not be removed during one term for
misconduct for a previous one (Newman v.
Strobel).257
  (2) For another, condonation depended on
whether or not the public officer was a successor in
the same office for which he has been
administratively charged. The “own-successor
theory,” which is recognized in numerous States as
an exception to condonation doctrine, is premised on
the idea that each term of a reelected incumbent is
not taken as separate and distinct, but rather,
regarded as one continuous term of office. Thus,
infractions committed in a previous term are
grounds

_______________

254  22 Ohio St. 2d 120; 258 N.E.2d 594 (1970); cited in Goger,
Thomas, J.D., id., at pp. 11 and 22.
255  1946 Pa. Dist. & Cnty.; 56 Pa. D. & C. 393 (1946); cited in
Goger, Thomas, J.D., id., at p. 11.
256  45 La Ann 1350, 14 So 28 (1893); cited in Goger, Thomas,
J.D., id., at p. 26.
 257   236 App Div 371, 259 NYS 402 (1932); cited in Goger,
Thomas, J.D., id., at p. 27.

 
 

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for removal because a reelected incumbent has no

prior term to speak of258 (see Attorney-General v.
Tufts;259 State v. Welsh;260 Hawkins v. Common
Council of Grand Rapids;261 Territory v. Sanches;262
and Tibbs v. City of Atlanta).263
(3) Furthermore, some State courts took into
consideration the continuing nature of an offense in
cases where the condonation doctrine was invoked.
In State ex rel. Douglas v. Megaarden,264 the public
officer charged with malversation of public funds was
denied the defense of condonation by the Supreme
Court of Minnesota, observing that “the large sums
of money illegally collected during the previous years
are still retained by him.” In State ex rel. Beck v.
Harvey,265 the Supreme Court of Kansas ruled that
“there is no necessity” of applying the condonation
doctrine since “the misconduct continued in the
present term of office[;] [thus] there was a duty upon
defendant to restore this money on demand of the
county commissioners.” Moreover, in State ex rel.
Londerholm v. Schroeder,266 the Supreme Court of
Kansas held that “insofar as nondelivery and
excessive prices are concerned, x x x there remains a
continuing duty on the part of the defendant to make
restitution to the country x  x  x, this duty extends
into the present term, and neglect to discharge it
constitutes misconduct.”
_______________

258   See Ombudsman’s Memorandum p. 70, Rollo (Vol. II), p.

715, citing Silos, Miguel U., supra note 252 at p. 69.
259  239 Mass. 458; 132 N.E. 322 (1921).
260  109 Iowa 19; 79 N.W. 369 (1899).
261  192 Mich. 276; 158 N.W. 953 (1916).
262  14 N.M. 493; 1908-NMSC-022 (1908).
263  125 Ga. 18; 53 S.E. 811 (1906).
264  85 Minn. 41; 88 N.W. 412 (1901), cited in Silos, Miguel U.,
supra at p. 69.
265   148 Kan. 166; 80 P.2d 1095 (1938); cited in Silos, Miguel
U., id., at p. 70.
266   199 Kan. 403; 430 P.2d 304 (1967), applying State ex rel.
Beck v. Harvey, id.

 
 
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534 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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Overall, the foregoing data clearly contravenes

the preliminary conclusion in Pascual that there is a
“weight of authority” in the US on the condonation
doctrine. In fact, without any cogent exegesis to show
that Pascual had accounted for the numerous factors
relevant to the debate on condonation, an outright
adoption of the doctrine in this jurisdiction would not
have been proper.
At any rate, these US cases are only of persuasive
value in the process of this Court’s decision-making.
“[They] are not relied upon as precedents, but as
guides of interpretation.”267 Therefore, the ultimate
analysis is on whether or not the condonation
doctrine, as espoused in Pascual, and carried over in
numerous cases after, can be held up against
prevailing legal norms. Note that the doctrine of
stare decisis does not preclude this Court from
revisiting existing doctrine. As adjudged in the case
of Belgica, the stare decisis rule should not operate
when there are powerful countervailing
considerations against its application.268 In other
words, stare decisis becomes an intractable rule only
when circumstances exist to preclude reversal of
standing precedent.269 As the Ombudsman correctly
points out, jurisprudence, after all, is not a rigid,
atemporal abstraction; it is an organic creature that
develops and devolves along with the society within
which it thrives.270 In the words of a recent US
Supreme Court Decision, “[w]hat we can decide, we
can undecide.”271

_______________

267   Southern Cross Cement Corporation v. Cement

Manufacturers Association of the Philippines, 503 Phil. 485; 465
SCRA 532 (2005).
268  Belgica v. Ochoa, Jr., supra note 177.
269   See Ombudsman Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), p. 718,
citing Cardozo, Benjamin N., The Nature of the Judicial Process,
p. 149 (1921), cited in Christopher P. Banks, Reversal of Precedent
and Judicial Policy-Making: How Judicial Conceptions of Stare
Decisis in the U.S. Supreme Court Influence Social Change, 32
Akron L. Rev. 233 (1999).
270  Id., at pp. 722-723.
271  Kimble v. Marvel Entertainment, L.L.C., 135 S. Ct. 2401;
192 L. Ed.; 192 L. Ed. 2d 463 (2015).

 
 

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 In this case, the Court agrees with the
Ombudsman that since the time Pascual was
decided, the legal landscape has radically shifted.
Again, Pascual was a 1959 case decided under the
1935 Constitution, which dated provisions do not
reflect the experience of the Filipino People under
the 1973 and 1987 Constitutions. Therefore, the
plain difference in setting, including, of course, the
sheer impact of the condonation doctrine on public
accountability, calls for Pascual’s judicious
reexamination.

D. Testing the Condonation Doctrine.

 
Pascual’s ratio decidendi may be dissected into
three (3) parts:
First, the penalty of removal may not be extended
beyond the term in which the public officer was
elected for each term is separate and distinct:
 
Offenses committed, or acts done,
during previous term are generally held
not to furnish cause for removal and this is
especially true where the constitution provides
that the penalty in proceedings for removal
shall not extend beyond the removal from
office, and disqualification from holding
office for the term for which the officer
was elected or appointed. (67 C.J.S.,
p. 248, citing Rice v. State, 161 S.W. 2d. 401;
Montgomery v. Nowell, 40 S.W. 2d. 418; People
ex rel. Bagshaw v. Thompson, 130 P. 2d. 237;
Board of Com’rs of Kingfisher County v.
Shutler, 281 P. 222; State v. Blake, 280 P. 388;
In re Fudula, 147 A. 67; State v. Ward, 43 S.W.
2d. 217)
The underlying theory is that each term is
separate from other terms x x x.272
_______________

272   Pascual v. Provincial Board of Nueva Ecija, supra note

247 at p. 471.

 
 
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 Second, an elective official’s reelection serves as

a condonation of previous misconduct, thereby
cutting the right to remove him therefor; and
 
[T]hat the reelection to office operates as
a condonation of the officer’s previous
misconduct to the extent of cutting off the
right to remove him therefor. (43 Am. Jur.,
p. 45, citing Atty. Gen. v. Hasty, 184 Ala. 121,
63 So. 559, 50 L.R.A. [NS] 553).273 (emphasis
supplied)
 
Third, courts may not deprive the electorate, who
are assumed to have known the life and character of
candidates, of their right to elect officers:
 
As held in Conant v. Grogan (1887) 6
N.Y.S.R. 322, cited in 17 A.I.R. 281, 63 So. 559,
50 LRA (NS) 553 —
The Court should never remove a
public officer for acts done prior to his
present term of office. To do otherwise
would be to deprive the people of their
right to elect their officers. When the
people have elected a man to office, it
must be assumed that they did this
 with knowledge of his life and
character, and that they disregarded
or forgave his faults or misconduct, if
he had been guilty of any. It is not for
the court, by reason of such faults or
misconduct to practically overrule the will
of the people.274 (Emphases supplied)
 
The notable cases on condonation following
Pascual are as follows:

_______________

273  Id., at pp. 471-472.

274  Id., at p. 472.

 
 

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(1) Lizares v. Hechanova275 (May 17, 1966) —

wherein the Court first applied the condonation
doctrine, thereby quoting the above stated passages
from Pascual in verbatim.
(2) Ingco v. Sanchez, et al.276 (December 18,
1967) — wherein the Court clarified that the
condonation doctrine does not apply to a criminal
case. It was explained that a criminal case is
different from an administrative case in that the
former involves the People of the Philippines as a
community, and is a public wrong to the State at
large; whereas, in the latter, only the populace of the
constituency he serves is affected. In addition, the
Court noted that it is only the President who
may pardon a criminal offense.
 (3) Aguinaldo v. Santos277 (Aguinaldo; August
21, 1992) — a case decided under the 1987
Constitution wherein the condonation doctrine was
applied in favor of then Cagayan Governor Rodolfo
E. Aguinaldo although his reelection merely
supervened the pendency of the proceedings.
(4) Salalima v. Guingona, Jr.278 (Salalima;
May 22, 1996) — wherein the Court reinforced the
condonation doctrine by stating that the same
is justified by “sound public policy.” According
to the Court, condonation prevented the elective
official from being “hounded” by administrative cases
filed by his “political enemies” during a new term, for
which he has to defend himself “to the detriment of
public service.” Also, the Court mentioned that the
administrative liability condoned by reelection
covered the execution of the contract and the
incidents related therewith.279

_______________

275  123 Phil. 916; 17 SCRA 58 (1966).

276   129 Phil. 553; 21 SCRA 1292 (1967). See also Luciano v.
The Provincial Governor, 138 Phil. 546; 28 SCRA 517 (1969) and
Oliveros v. Villaluz, 156 Phil. 137; 57 SCRA 163 (1974).
277  Aguinaldo v. Santos, supra note 92.
278  Salalima v. Guingona, Jr., supra note 95.
279  Id., at p. 921; pp. 115-116.

 
 

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(5) Mayor Garcia v. Mojica280 (Mayor Garcia;

September 10, 1999) — wherein the benefit of the
doctrine was extended to then Cebu City Mayor
Alvin B. Garcia who was administratively charged
for his involvement in an anomalous contract for the
supply of asphalt for Cebu City, executed only four
(4) days before the upcoming elections. The Court
ruled that notwithstanding the timing of the
contract’s execution, the electorate is presumed to
have known the petitioner’s background and
character, including his past misconduct; hence, his
subsequent reelection was deemed a condonation of
his prior transgressions. More importantly, the
Court held that the determinative time element in
applying the condonation doctrine should be the time
when the contract was perfected; this meant that
as long as the contract was entered into during
a prior term, acts which were done to
implement the same, even if done during a
succeeding term, do not negate the application
of the condonation doctrine in favor of the
elective official.
(6) Salumbides, Jr. v. Office of the
Ombudsman281 (Salumbides, Jr.; April 23, 2010) —
wherein the Court explained the doctrinal
innovations in the Salalima and Mayor Garcia
rulings, to wit:
 
Salalima v. Guingona, Jr. and Mayor Garcia
v. Hon. Mojica reinforced the doctrine. The
condonation rule was applied even if the
administrative complaint was not filed
before the reelection of the public official,
and even if the alleged misconduct
occurred four days before the elections,
respectively. Salalima did not distinguish as
to the date of filing of the administrative
complaint, as long as the alleged misconduct
was committed during the prior term, the
precise timing or period of which Garcia did not
 further distinguish, as long as the wrongdoing
that gave rise to the public offi

_______________

280  Garcia v. Mojica, supra note 96.

281  633 Phil. 325; 619 SCRA 313 (2010).

 
 
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cial’s culpability was committed prior to the

date of reelection.282 (Emphasis supplied)
 
The Court, citing Civil Service Commission v.
Sojor,283 also clarified that the condonation
doctrine would not apply to appointive
officials since, as to them, there is no sovereign will
to disenfranchise.
(7) And finally, the above discussed case of
Governor Garcia, Jr. — wherein the Court
remarked that it would have been prudent for the
appellate court therein to have issued a temporary
restraining order against the implementation of a
preventive suspension order issued by the
Ombudsman in view of the condonation doctrine.
A thorough review of the cases post-1987, among
others, Aguinaldo, Salalima, Mayor Garcia, and
Governor Garcia, Jr. — all cited by the CA to justify
its March 16, 2015 and April 6, 2015 Resolutions
directing the issuance of the assailed injunctive writs
— would show that the basis for condonation under
the prevailing constitutional and statutory
framework was never accounted for. What remains
apparent from the text of these cases is that the
basis for condonation, as jurisprudential doctrine,
was — and still remains — the above cited
postulates of Pascual, which was lifted from rulings
of US courts where condonation was amply
supported by their own state laws. With respect to
its applicability to administrative cases, the core
premise of condonation — that is, an elective
official’s reelection cuts off the right to remove him
for an administrative offense committed during a
prior term — was adopted hook, line, and sinker in
our jurisprudence largely because the legality of that
doctrine was never tested against existing legal
norms. As in the US, the propriety of condonation is
— as it should be — dependent on the legal
foundation of the adjudicating jurisdiction. Hence,
the Court

_______________

282  Id., at p. 335; p. 325.

283  577 Phil. 52, 72; 554 SCRA 160, 180 (2008).

 
 
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540 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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undertakes an examination of our current laws in

order to determine if there is legal basis for the
continued application of the doctrine of condonation.
The foundation of our entire legal system is the
Constitution. It is the supreme law of the land;284
thus, the unbending rule is that every statute should
be read in light of the Constitution.285 Likewise, the
Constitution is a framework of a workable
government; hence, its interpretation must take into
account the complexities, realities, and politics
attendant to the operation of the political branches of
government.286
As earlier intimated, Pascual was a decision
promulgated in 1959. Therefore, it was decided
within the context of the 1935 Constitution which
was silent with respect to public accountability, or of
the nature of public office being a public trust. The
provision in the 1935 Constitution that comes closest
in dealing with public office is Section 2, Article II
which states that “[t]he defense of the State is a
prime duty of government, and in the fulfillment of
this duty all citizens may be required by law to
render personal military or civil service.”287 Perhaps
owing to the 1935 Constitution’s silence on public
accountability, and considering the dearth of
jurisprudential rulings on the matter, as well as the
variance in the policy considerations, there was no
glaring objection confronting the Pascual Court in
adopting the condonation doctrine that originated
from select US cases existing at that time.
  With the advent of the 1973 Constitution, the
approach in dealing with public officers underwent a
significant change. The new charter introduced an
entire article on accountability

_______________

284  Chavez v. Judicial and Bar Council, G.R. No. 202242, July
17, 2012, 676 SCRA 579, 607.
285   Teehankee v. Rovira, 75 Phil. 634, 646 (1945), citing 11
Am. Jur., Constitutional Law, Section 96.
286  Philippine Constitution Association v. Enriquez, G.R. Nos.
113105, 113174, 113766, and 113888 August 19, 1994, 235 SCRA
506, 523.
287  See Silos, Miguel U., supra note 252 at p. 69; pp. 26-27.

 
 
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of public officers, found in Article XIII. Section 1

thereof positively recognized, acknowledged, and
declared that “[p]ublic office is a public trust.”
Accordingly, “[p]ublic officers and employees
shall serve with the highest degree of
responsibility, integrity, loyalty and efficiency,
and shall remain accountable to the people.”
After the turbulent decades of Martial Law rule,
the Filipino People have framed and adopted the
1987 Constitution, which sets forth in the
Declaration of Principles and State Policies in Article
II that “[t]he State shall maintain honesty and
integrity in the public service and take
positive and effective measures against graft
and corruption.”288 Learning how unbridled power
could corrupt public servants under the regime of a
dictator, the Framers put primacy on the integrity of
the public service by declaring it as a constitutional
principle and a State policy. More significantly, the
1987 Constitution strengthened and solidified what
has been first proclaimed in the 1973 Constitution by
commanding public officers to be accountable to the
people at all times:
 
Section 1. Public office is a public trust.
Public officers and employees must at all
times be accountable to the people, serve
them with utmost responsibility, integrity,
loyalty, and efficiency and act with
patriotism and justice, and lead modest
lives.
 
In Belgica, it was explained that:
  
[t]he aphorism forged under Section 1,
Article XI of the 1987 Constitution, which
states that “public office is a public trust,” is an
overarching reminder that every
instrumentality of government should exercise
their official functions only in accordance with
the principles of the Constitution which
embodies the parameters of the peo-

_______________

288  Section 27, Article II.

 
 
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542 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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ple’s trust. The notion of a public trust

connotes accountability x  x  x.289 (Emphasis
supplied)
 
The same mandate is found in the Revised
Administrative Code under the section of the Civil
Service Commission,290 and also, in the Code of
Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials
and Employees.291
For local elective officials like Binay, Jr., the
grounds to discipline, suspend or remove an
elective local official from office are stated in
Section 60 of Republic Act No.

_______________
 289   Belgica v. Ochoa, Jr., supra note 177 at p. 131, citing
Bernas, Joaquin G., S.J., The 1987 Constitution of the Republic of
the Philippines: A Commentary, p. 1108, 2003 ed.
290  Section 1. Declaration of Policy.—The State shall insure
and promote the Constitutional mandate that appointments in the
Civil Service shall be made only according to merit and fitness;
that the Civil Service Commission, as the central personnel
agency of the Government shall establish a career service, adopt
measures to promote morale, efficiency, integrity, responsiveness,
and courtesy in the civil service, strengthen the merit and rewards
system, integrate all human resources development programs for
all levels and ranks, and institutionalize a management climate
conducive to public accountability; that public office is a public
trust and public officers and employees must at all times
be accountable to the people; and that personnel functions
shall be decentralized, delegating the corresponding authority to
the departments, offices and agencies where such functions can be
effectively performed. (Section 1, Book V, Title I, subtitle A of the
Administrative Code of 1987; emphasis supplied)
291  Section 2. Declaration of Policies.—It is the policy of the
State to promote a high standard of ethics in public service.
Public officials and employees shall at all times be
accountable to the people and shall discharge their duties
with utmost responsibility, integrity, competence, and
loyalty, act with patriotism and justice, lead modest lives,
and uphold public interest over personal interest.
(Emphasis supplied) See Section 2, RA 6713 (approved on
February 20, 1989)

 
 

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7160,292 otherwise known as the “Local

Government Code of 1991” (LGC), which was
approved on October 10 1991, and took effect on
January 1, 1992:
 
Section 60. Grounds for Disciplinary
Action.—An elective local official may be
disciplined, suspended, or removed from office
on any of the following grounds:
(a) Disloyalty to the Republic of the
Philippines;
(b) Culpable violation of the
Constitution;
(c) Dishonesty, oppression,
misconduct in office, gross negligence, or
dereliction of duty;
(d) Commission of any offense
involving moral turpitude or an offense
punishable by at least prisión mayor;
(e) Abuse of authority;
(f) Unauthorized absence for fifteen
(15) consecutive working days, except in
the case of members of the sangguniang
panlalawigan, sangguniang panlungsod,
sangguniang bayan, and sangguniang
barangay;
(g) Application for, or acquisition of,
foreign citizenship or residence or the
status of an immigrant of another
country; and
(h) Such other grounds as may be
provided in this Code and other laws.
An elective local official may be removed
from office on the grounds enumerated above
by order of the proper court.
 
Related to this provision is Section 40(b) of the
LGC which states that those removed from office
as a result of an administrative case shall be
disqualified from running for any elective local
position:
  
Section 40. Disqualifications.—The
following persons are disqualified from running
for any elective local position:

_______________

292  Entitled “An Act Providing for a Local Government Code of

1991” (approved on October 10, 1991).

 
 
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544 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

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 x x x x
(b) Those removed from office as a
result of an administrative case.
x x x x (Emphasis supplied)
 
In the same sense, Section 52(a) of the RRACCS
provides that the penalty of dismissal from
service carries the accessory penalty of
perpetual disqualification from holding public
office:
 
Section 52. Administrative Disabilities
Inherent in Certain Penalties.—
a. The penalty of dismissal shall carry with
it cancellation of eligibility, forfeiture of
retirement benefits, perpetual disqualification
from holding public office, and bar from taking
the civil service examinations.
 
 In contrast, Section 66(b) of the LGC states that
the penalty of suspension shall not exceed the
unexpired term of the elective local official nor
constitute a bar to his candidacy for as long as he
meets the qualifications required for the office. Note,
however, that the provision only pertains to the
duration of the penalty and its effect on the official’s
candidacy. Nothing therein states that the
administrative liability therefor is
extinguished by the fact of reelection:
 
Section 66. Form and Notice of Decision.—
x x x.
x x x x
(b) The penalty of suspension shall not
exceed the unexpired term of the respondent or
a period of six (6) months for every
administrative offense, nor shall said penalty
be a bar to the candidacy of the respondent so
suspended as long as he meets the
qualifications required for the office.
 
 

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Reading the 1987 Constitution together with the

above cited legal provisions now leads this Court to
the conclusion that the doctrine of condonation is
actually bereft of legal bases.
To begin with, the concept of public office is a
public trust and the corollary requirement of
accountability to the people at all times, as
mandated under the 1987 Constitution, is plainly
inconsistent with the idea that an elective local
official’s administrative liability for a misconduct
committed during a prior term can be wiped off by
the fact that he was elected to a second term of office,
or even another elective post. Election is not a
mode of condoning an administrative offense,
and there is simply no constitutional or statutory
basis in our jurisdiction to support the notion that an
official elected for a different term is fully absolved of
any administrative liability arising from an offense
done during a prior term. In this jurisdiction,
liability arising from administrative offenses
may be condoned by the President in light of
Section 19, Article VII of the 1987 Constitution
which was interpreted in Llamas v. Orbos293 to apply
to administrative offenses:
 
The Constitution does not distinguish
between which cases executive clemency may
be exercised by the President, with the sole
exclusion of impeachment cases. By the same
token, if executive clemency may be exercised
only in criminal cases, it would indeed be
unnecessary to provide for the exclusion of
impeachment cases from the coverage of Article
VII, Section 19 of the Constitution. Following
petitioner’s proposed interpretation, cases of
impeachment are automatically excluded
inasmuch as the same do not necessarily
involve criminal offenses.
In the same vein, We do not clearly see any
valid and convincing reason why the President
cannot grant executive clemency in
administrative cases. It is Our

_______________

293  279 Phil. 920, 937; 202 SCRA 844, 857-858 (1991).

 
 
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considered view that if the President can

grant reprieves, commutations and pardons,
and remit fines and forfeitures in criminal
cases, with much more reason can she grant
executive clemency in administrative cases,
which are clearly less serious than criminal
offenses.
 
Also, it cannot be inferred from Section 60 of the
LGC that the grounds for discipline enumerated
therein cannot anymore be invoked against an
elective local official to hold him administratively
liable once he is reelected to office. In fact, Section
40(b) of the LGC precludes condonation since in the
first place, an elective local official who is meted with
the penalty of removal could not be reelected to an
elective local position due to a direct disqualification
from running for such post. In similar regard,
Section 52(a) of the RRACCS imposes a penalty of
perpetual disqualification from holding public office
as an accessory to the penalty of dismissal from
service.
To compare, some of the cases adopted in Pascual
were decided by US State jurisdictions wherein the
doctrine of condonation of administrative liability
was supported by either a constitutional or statutory
provision stating, in effect, that an officer cannot be
removed by a misconduct committed during a
previous term,294 or that the disqualification to
hold the

_______________
 294  In Fudula’s Petition (297 Pa. 364; 147 A. 67 [1929]), the
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania cited (a) 29 Cyc. 1410 which
states: “Where removal may be made for cause only, the cause
must have occurred during the present term of the officer.
Misconduct prior to the present term even during a
preceding term will not justify a removal”; and (b) x  x  x
Penal Code [Cal.], paragraph 772, providing for the removal of
officers for violation of duty, which states “a sheriff cannot be
removed from office, while serving his second term, for
offenses committed during his first term.” (Emphases
supplied)
In Board of Commissioners of Kingfisher County v.
Shutler (139 Okla. 52; 281 P. 222 [1929]), the Supreme Court of
Oklahoma held that “[u]nder Section 2405, C. O. S. 1921, the
only judgment a court can render on an officer being convicted of
malfea

 
 

547

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

office does not extend beyond the term in

which the official’s delinquency occurred.295 In
one case,296 the absence of a provision against the
reelection of an officer removed — unlike Section
40(b) of the LGC — was the justification behind
condonation. In another case,297 it was deemed

_______________

sance or misfeasance in office is removal from office and an

officer cannot be removed from office under said section
for acts committed by him while holding the same office in
a previous term.” (Emphases supplied)
 295  In State v. Blake (138 Okla. 241; 280 P. 833 [1929]), the
Supreme Court of Oklahoma cited State ex rel. Hill, County
Attorney, v. Henschel, 175 P. 393, wherein it was said: “Under the
Ouster Law (Section 7603 of the General Statutes of 1915-
Code Civ. Proc. 686a-), a public officer who is guilty of willful
misconduct in office forfeits his right to hold the office for the term
of his election or appointment; but the disqualification to hold
the office does not extend beyond the term in which his
official delinquency occurred.” (Emphases supplied)
296   In Rice v. State (204 Ark. 236; 161 S.W.2d 401 [1942]),
the Supreme Court of Arkansas cited (a) Jacobs v. Parham, 175
Ark. 86, 298 S.W. 483, which quoted a headnote, that “Under
Crawford Moses’ Dig. [(i.e., a digest of statutes in the jurisdiction
of Arkansas)] 10335, 10336, a public officer is not subject to
removal from office because of acts done prior to his present
term of office in view of Const., Arts. 7, 27, containing no
provision against reelection of officer removed for any of
the reasons named therein.” (Emphases supplied)
297   In State ex rel. Brickell v. Hasty (184 Ala. 121; 63 So.
559 [1913]), the Supreme Court of Alabama held: “x  x  x If an
officer is impeached and removed, there is nothing to prevent
his being elected to the identical office from which he was
removed for a subsequent term, and, this being true, a
reelection to the office would operate as a condonation
under the Constitution of the officer’s conduct during the
previous term, to the extent of cutting off the right to remove him
from subsequent term for said conduct during the previous term.
It seems to be the policy of our Constitution to make each term
independent of the other, and to disassociate the conduct under
one term from the qualification or right to fill another term, at
least, so far as the same may apply to

 
 

548

548 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

that condonation through reelection was a policy

under their constitution — which adoption in this
jurisdiction runs counter to our present
Constitution’s requirements on public accountability.
There was even one case where the doctrine of
condonation was not adjudicated upon but only
invoked by a party as a ground;298 while in another
case, which was not reported in full in the official
series, the crux of the disposition was that the
evidence of a prior irregularity in no way pertained
to the charge at issue and therefore, was deemed to
be incompetent.299 Hence, owing to either their
variance or inapplicability, none of these cases can
be used as basis for the continued adoption of the
condonation doctrine under our existing laws.

_______________

impeachment proceedings, and as distinguished from the right

to indict and convict an offending official.” (Emphasis supplied)
298  In State Ex Rel. V. Ward (163 Tenn. 265; 43 S.W.2d. 217
[1931]), decided by the Supreme Court of Tennessee, Knoxville, it
appears to be erroneously relied upon in Pascual, since the
proposition “[t]hat the Acts alleged in paragraph 4 of the petition
involved contracts made by defendant prior to his present term for
which he cannot now be removed from office” was not a court
ruling but an argument raised by the defendant in his demurrer.
299  In Conant v. Grogan (6 N.Y.S.R. 322 [1887]), which was
cited in Newman v. Strobel (236 A.D. 371; 259 N.Y.S. 402 [1932];
decided by the Supreme Court of New York, Appellate Division)
reads: “Our attention is called to Conant v. Grogan (6 N.Y. St.
Repr. 322; 43 Hun, 637) and Matter of King (25 N.Y. St. Repr.
792; 53 Hun, 631), both of which decisions are of the late General
Term, and neither of which is reported in full in the official
series. While there are expressions in each opinion which at
first blush might seem to uphold respondent’s theory, an
examination of the cases discloses the fact that the charge
against each official related to acts performed during his
then term of office, and evidence of some prior irregularity
was offered which in no way pertained to the charge in
issue. It was properly held that such evidence was
incompetent. The respondent was not called upon to answer
such charge, but an entirely separate and different one.”
(Emphases supplied)

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

At best, Section 66(b) of the LGC prohibits the

enforcement of the penalty of suspension
beyond the unexpired portion of the elective local
official’s prior term, and likewise allows said official
to still run for reelection. This treatment is similar to
People ex rel. Bagshaw v. Thompson300 and
Montgomery v. Nowell,301 both cited in Pascual,
wherein it was ruled that an officer cannot be
suspended for a misconduct committed during a
prior term. However, as previously stated, nothing in
Section 66(b) states that the elective local official’s
administrative liability is extinguished by the fact of
reelection. Thus, at all events, no legal provision
actually supports the theory that the liability is
condoned.
Relatedly, it should be clarified that there is no
truth in Pascual’s postulation that the courts would
be depriving the electorate of their right to elect their
officers if condonation were not to be sanctioned. In
political law, election pertains to the process by
which a particular constituency chooses an
individual to hold a public office. In this jurisdiction,
there is, again, no legal basis to conclude that
election automatically implies condonation. Neither
is there any legal basis to say that every democratic
and republican state has an inherent regime of
condonation. If condonation of an elective official’s

_______________

300   In People ex rel. Bagshaw v. Thompson (55 Cal. App.

2d 147; 130 P.2d.237 [1942]), the Court of Appeals of California,
First Appellate District cited Thurston v. Clark (107 Cal. 285, 40
P. 435), wherein it was ruled: “The Constitution does not
authorize the governor to suspend an incumbent of the office of
county commissioner for an act of malfeasance or misfeasance in
office committed by him prior to the date of the beginning of his
current term of office as such county commissioner.” (Emphasis
supplied)
301   Montgomery v. Nowell (183 Ark. 1116; 40 S.W.2d 418
[1931]); decided by the Supreme Court of Arkansas), the headnote
reads as follows: “Crawford & Moses’ Dig., 10, 335, providing for
suspension of an officer on presentment or indictment for certain
causes including malfeasance, in office does not provide for
suspension of an officer on being indicted for official misconduct
during a prior term of office.” (Emphasis supplied)

 
 
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550 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

administrative liability would perhaps, be allowed

in this jurisdiction, then the same should have been
provided by law under our governing legal
mechanisms. May it be at the time of Pascual or at
present, by no means has it been shown that such a
law, whether in a constitutional or statutory
provision, exists. Therefore, inferring from this
manifest absence, it cannot be said that the
electorate’s will has been abdicated.
Equally infirm is Pascual’s proposition that the
electorate, when reelecting a local official, are
assumed to have done so with knowledge of his life
and character, and that they disregarded or forgave
his faults or misconduct, if he had been guilty of any.
Suffice it to state that no such presumption exists
in any statute or procedural rule.302 Besides, it is
contrary to human experience that the electorate
would have full knowledge of a public official’s
misdeeds. The Ombudsman correctly points out the
reality that most corrupt acts by public officers are
shrouded in secrecy, and concealed from the public.
Misconduct committed by an elective official is
easily covered up, and is almost always
unknown to the electorate when they cast their
votes.303 At a conceptual level, condonation
presupposes that the condoner has actual knowledge
of what is to be condoned. Thus, there could be no
condonation of an act that is unknown. As
observed in Walsh v. City Council of Trenton304
decided by the New Jersey Supreme Court:
 
Many of the cases holding that reelection of
a public official prevents his removal for acts
done in a preceding term of office are reasoned
out on the theory of condonation. We cannot
subscribe to that theory because condonation,
implying as it does forgiveness, connotes

_______________

302   See Chief Justice Maria Lourdes P. A. Sereno’s

interpellation, TSN of the Oral Arguments, April 14, 2015, p. 43.
303   See Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), p. 716,
citing Silos, Miguel U., supra note 252 at p. 69; p. 67.
304  117 N.J.L. 64; 186 A. 818 (1936).

 
  

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

knowledge and in the absence of knowledge

there can be no condonation. One cannot
forgive something of which one has no
knowledge.
 
That being said, this Court simply finds no legal
authority to sustain the condonation doctrine in this
jurisdiction. As can be seen from this discourse, it
was a doctrine adopted from one class of US rulings
way back in 1959 and thus, out of touch from — and
now rendered obsolete by — the current legal
regime. In consequence, it is high time for this Court
to abandon the condonation doctrine that originated
from Pascual, and affirmed in the cases following the
same, such as Aguinaldo, Salalima, Mayor Garcia,
and Governor Garcia, Jr. which were all relied upon
by the CA.
It should, however, be clarified that this Court’s
abandonment of the condonation doctrine should be
prospective in application for the reason that
judicial decisions applying or interpreting the laws
or the Constitution, until reversed, shall form part of
the legal system of the Philippines.305 Unto this
Court devolves the sole authority to interpret what
the Constitution means, and all persons are bound to
follow its interpretation. As explained in De Castro v.
Judicial Bar Council:306
 
Judicial decisions assume the same
authority as a statute itself and, until
authoritatively abandoned, necessarily become,
to the extent that they are applicable, the
 criteria that must control the actuations, not
only of those called upon to abide by them, but
also of those duty-bound to enforce obedience to
them.307
 
Hence, while the future may ultimately uncover a
doctrine’s error, it should be, as a general rule,
recognized as

_______________

305  See Article 8 of the Civil Code.

306  632 Phil. 657; 618 SCRA 639 (2010).
307  Id., at p. 686; p. 658.

 
 
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552 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

“good law” prior to its abandonment.

Consequently, the people’s reliance thereupon should
be respected. The landmark case on this matter is
People v. Jabinal,308 wherein it was ruled:
 
[W]hen a doctrine of this Court is overruled
and a different view is adopted, the new
doctrine should be applied prospectively, and
should not apply to parties who had relied on
the old doctrine and acted on the faith thereof.
 
Later, in Spouses Benzonan v. CA,309 it was
further elaborated:

[P]ursuant to Article 8 of the Civil Code

“judicial decisions applying or interpreting the
 laws or the Constitution shall form a part of the
legal system of the Philippines.” But while our
decisions form part of the law of the land, they
are also subject to Article 4 of the Civil Code
which provides that “laws shall have no
retroactive effect unless the contrary is
provided.” This is expressed in the familiar
legal maxim lex prospicit, non respicit, the law
looks forward not backward. The rationale
against retroactivity is easy to perceive. The
retroactive application of a law usually divests
rights that have already become vested or
impairs the obligations of contract and hence, is
unconstitutional.310

Indeed, the lessons of history teach us that

institutions can greatly benefit from hindsight and
rectify its ensuing course. Thus, while it is truly
perplexing to think that a doctrine which is barren of
legal anchorage was able to endure in our
jurisprudence for a considerable length of time, this
Court, under a new membership, takes up the
cudgels and now abandons the condonation doctrine.

_______________

308  154 Phil. 565; 55 SCRA 607 (1974).

309  G.R. Nos. 97973 and 97998, January 27, 1992, 205 SCRA
515.
310  Id., at p. 527.

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)
 E. Consequence of ruling.
As for this section of the Decision, the issue to be
resolved is whether or not the CA committed
grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or
excess of jurisdiction in issuing the assailed
injunctive writs.
It is well-settled that an act of a court or tribunal
can only be considered as with grave abuse of
discretion when such act is done in a capricious
or whimsical exercise of judgment as is
equivalent to lack of jurisdiction. The abuse of
discretion must be so patent and gross as to amount
to an evasion of a positive duty or to a virtual refusal
to perform a duty enjoined by law, or to act at all in
contemplation of law, as where the power is
exercised in an arbitrary and despotic manner by
reason of passion and hostility.311 It has also been
held that “grave abuse of discretion arises when
a lower court or tribunal patently violates the
Constitution, the law or existing
312
jurisprudence.”
As earlier established, records disclose that the
CA’s resolutions directing the issuance of the
assailed injunctive writs were all hinged on cases
enunciating the condonation doctrine. To recount,
the March 16, 2015 Resolution directing the issuance
of the subject TRO was based on the case of Governor
Garcia, Jr., while the April 6, 2015 Resolution
directing the issuance of the subject WPI was based
on the cases of Aguinaldo, Salalima, Mayor Garcia,
and again, Governor Garcia, Jr. Thus, by merely
following settled precedents on the condonation
doctrine, which at that time, unwittingly remained
“good law,” it cannot be concluded that the CA
committed a grave abuse of discretion based on its
legal attri-

_______________
 311  Yu v. Reyes-Carpio, 667 Phil. 474, 481-482; 652 SCRA 341,
348 (2011).
312   Tagolino v. House of Representatives Electoral Tribunal,
G.R. No. 202202, March 19, 2013, 693 SCRA 574, 599-600.

 
 
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554 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

bution above. Accordingly, the WPI against the

Ombudsman’s preventive suspension order was
correctly issued.
With this, the ensuing course of action should
have been for the CA to resolve the main petition for
certiorari in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453 on the
merits. However, considering that the Ombudsman,
on October 9, 2015, had already found Binay, Jr.
administratively liable and imposed upon him the
penalty of dismissal, which carries the accessory
penalty of perpetual disqualification from holding
public office, for the present administrative charges
against him, the said CA petition appears to have
been mooted.313 As initially intimated, the
preventive suspension order is only an ancillary
issuance that, at its core, serves the purpose of
assisting the Office of the Ombudsman in its
investigation. It therefore has no more purpose —
and perforce, dissolves — upon the termination of
the office’s process of investigation in the instant
administrative case.

F. Exceptions to the mootness principle.

 
This notwithstanding, this Court deems it apt to
clarify that the mootness of the issue regarding the
validity of the preventive suspension order subject of
this case does not preclude any of its foregoing
determinations, particularly, its abandonment of the
condonation doctrine. As explained in Belgica, “‘the
moot and academic principle’ is not a magical
formula that can automatically dissuade the Court in
resolving a case. The Court will decide cases,
otherwise moot, if: first, there is a grave violation of
the Constitution; second, the exceptional character
of the situation and the paramount public interest is
involved; third, when the constitutional issue raised
requires formulation of controlling principles to
guide the bench, the bar, and the public; and fourth,
the case

_______________

313   See Press Release dated October 9, 2015 of the Office of

the Ombudsman, http://www.ombudsman.gov.ph/index.php?
home=1&pressId=NzE3 (visited November 9, 2015).

 
 

555

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is capable of repetition yet evading review.”314 All

of these scenarios obtain in this case:
First, it would be a violation of the Court’s own
duty to uphold and defend the Constitution if it were
not to abandon the condonation doctrine now that its
infirmities have become apparent. As extensively
discussed, the continued application of the
condonation doctrine is simply impermissible under
the auspices of the present Constitution which
explicitly mandates that public office is a public trust
and that public officials shall be accountable to the
people at all times.
Second, the condonation doctrine is a peculiar
jurisprudential creation that has persisted as a
defense of elective officials to escape administrative
liability. It is the first time that the legal intricacies
of this doctrine have been brought to light; thus, this
is a situation of exceptional character which this
Court must ultimately resolve. Further, since the
doctrine has served as a perennial obstacle against
exacting public accountability from the multitude of
elective local officials throughout the years, it is
indubitable that paramount public interest is
involved.
Third, the issue on the validity of the
condonation doctrine clearly requires the formulation
of controlling principles to guide the bench, the bar,
and the public. The issue does not only involve an in-
depth exegesis of administrative law principles, but
also puts to the forefront of legal discourse the
potency of the accountability provisions of the 1987
Constitution. The Court owes it to the bench, the
bar, and the public to explain how this controversial
doctrine came about, and now, its reasons for
abandoning the same in view of its relevance on the
parameters of public office.
And fourth, the defense of condonation has been
consistently invoked by elective local officials against
the administrative charges filed against them. To
provide a sample size,

_______________

314  Belgica v. Ochoa, Jr., supra note 177 at p. 93.

 
 

556
556 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED
Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the Ombudsman has informed the Court that “for

the period of July 2013 to December 2014 alone, 85
cases from the Luzon Office and 24 cases from the
Central Office were dismissed on the ground of
condonation. Thus, in just one and a half years, over
a hundred cases of alleged misconduct — involving
infractions such as dishonesty, oppression, gross
neglect of duty and grave misconduct — were placed
beyond the reach of the Ombudsman’s investigatory
and prosecutorial powers.”315 Evidently, this fortifies
the finding that the case is capable of repetition and
must therefore, not evade review.
In any event, the abandonment of a doctrine is
wholly within the prerogative of the Court. As
mentioned, it is its own jurisprudential creation and
may therefore, pursuant to its mandate to uphold
and defend the Constitution, revoke it
notwithstanding supervening events that render the
subject of discussion moot.
 
V.
 
With all matters pertaining to C.A.-G.R. S.P. No.
139453 passed upon, the Court now rules on the final
issue on whether or not the CA’s Resolution316 dated
March 20, 2015 directing the Ombudsman to
comment on Binay, Jr.’s petition for contempt in
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139504 is improper and illegal.
The sole premise of the Ombudsman’s contention
is that, as an impeachable officer, she cannot be the
subject of a charge for indirect contempt317 because
this action is criminal in nature and the penalty
therefor would result in her effective

_______________
 315  See Ombudsman’s Memorandum, Rollo (Vol. II), p. 85.
316  Rollo (Vol. I), pp. 50-51.
317   See Amended and Supplemental Petition for Contempt
dated March 18, 2015 wherein private respondent Binay, Jr.
charged, inter alia, the Ombudsman for acts constituting indirect
contempt under Section 3(b), (c), and (d) of Rule 71 of the Rules of
Court; id., at pp. 362-375.

 
 
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VOL. 774, NOVEMBER 10, 2015 557

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

removal from office.318 However, a reading of the

aforesaid March 20, 2015 Resolution does not show
that she has already been subjected to
contempt proceedings. This issuance, in fact,
makes it clear that notwithstanding the directive for
the Ombudsman to comment, the CA has not
necessarily given due course to Binay, Jr.’s
contempt petition:
 
Without necessarily giving due course
to the Petition for Contempt, respondents
[Hon. Conchita Carpio-Morales, in her capacity
as the Ombudsman, and the Department of the
Interior and Local Government] are hereby
DIRECTED to file Comment on the
Petition/Amended and Supplemental Petition
for Contempt (C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139504)
within an inextendible period of three (3) days
from receipt hereof.319 (Emphasis and
underscoring supplied)

Thus, even if the Ombudsman accedes to the CA’s

directive by filing a comment, wherein she may
properly raise her objections to the contempt
proceedings by virtue of her being an impeachable
officer, the CA, in the exercise of its sound judicial
discretion, may still opt not to give due course to
Binay, Jr.’s contempt petition and accordingly,
dismiss the same. Simply put, absent any indication
that the contempt petition has been given due course
by the CA, it would then be premature for this Court
to rule on the issue. The submission of the
Ombudsman on this score is perforce denied.
WHEREFORE, the petition is PARTLY
GRANTED. Under the premises of this Decision, the
Court resolves as follows:
(a) the second paragraph of Section 14 of
Republic Act No. 6770 is declared
UNCONSTITUTIONAL, while the policy against
the issuance of provisional injunctive writs by courts

_______________

318  See Rollo (Vol. II), pp. 734-743.

319  Rollo (Vol. I), p. 50.

 
 

558

558 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

other than the Supreme Court to enjoin an

investigation conducted by the Office of the
Ombudsman under the first paragraph of the said
provision is declared INEFFECTIVE until the
Court adopts the same as part of the rules of
procedure through an administrative circular duly
issued therefor;
 (b) The condonation doctrine is ABANDONED,
but the abandonment is PROSPECTIVE in effect;
(c) The Court of Appeals (CA) is DIRECTED to
act on respondent Jejomar Erwin S. Binay, Jr.’s
(Binay, Jr.) petition for certiorari in C.A.-G.R. S.P.
No. 139453 in light of the Office of the Ombudsman’s
supervening issuance of its Joint Decision dated
October 9, 2015 finding Binay, Jr. administratively
liable in the six (6) administrative complaints,
docketed as OMB-C-A-15-0058, OMB-C-A-15-0059’
OMB-C-A-15-0060’ OMB-C-A-15-0061, OMB-C-A-15-
0062 and OMB-C-A-15-0063; and
  (d) After the filing of petitioner Ombudsman
Conchita Carpio-Morales’s comment, the CA is
DIRECTED to resolve Binay, Jr.’s petition for
contempt in C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139504 with utmost
dispatch.
SO ORDERED.

Sereno (CJ.), Carpio, Leonardo-De Castro, Del

Castillo, Villarama, Jr., Perez, Reyes and Leonen,
JJ., concur.
Velasco, Jr., Peralta and Jardeleza, JJ., No part.
Brion, J., No part; On Leave.
Bersamin, J., Please see my Concurring and
Dissenting Opinion.
Mendoza, J., On Leave.

 
 

559

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CONCURRING AND DISSENTING OPINION

 
BERSAMIN, J.:
  
I am writing this separate opinion to memorialize
my concurrence with the declaration of the
ineffectiveness of the first paragraph of Section 14 of
Republic Act No. 6770, and of the unconstitutionality
of the second paragraph thereof. The main opinion
has been written well by our esteemed colleague,
Associate Justice Estela M. Perlas-Bernabe, who has
exhibited her scholarly bent once again. But let me
assure my colleagues in the Majority that if I submit
this concurrence, I do not mean to diminish in any
way or degree the forcefulness and correctness of the
justification for the declaration. I simply want to
underscore that Section 14 of Republic Act No. 6770
should be struck down for authorizing the undue
interference with the prerogatives of the courts of
law to adopt whatever means were allowed by law
and procedure to exercise their jurisdiction in the
cases properly cognizable by them.
My dissent focuses on the main opinion’s
reexamination of the doctrine of condonation. This
controversy does not call for the revisit of the
doctrine, and does not warrant its eventual
abandonment. For the Court to persist in the
reexamination, as it does now, and to announce its
abandonment of the doctrine despite the lack of the
premise of justiciability is to indulge in conjecture or
in unwarranted anticipation of future controversies.
We should refrain from the reexamination.
The Ombudsman’s supplemental petition raised
condonation for the first time but only to support her
insistence that the CA could not validly rely on the
doctrine of condonation to justify its issuance of the
injunction. She maintained then that condonation
was a matter of defense to be properly raised only in
the appropriate administrative proceeding, viz.:
 
6. It must be further emphasized that the
condonation doctrine is irrelevant in the
 Ombudsman’s determination of whether the
evidence of guilt is strong in is-
 
 
560

560 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

suing preventive suspension orders. Said

doctrine does not go into the heart of subject
matter jurisdiction. Neither can it oust the
Ombudsman of her jurisdiction which she has
already acquired. Private respondent’s claim of
condonation doctrine is equally a matter of
defense which, like any other defense, could be
raised in the proper pleading, could be
rebutted, and could be waived.
As a defense, condonation should be passed
upon after a decision on the administrative
proceedings, not this early in the proceeding.
7. The condonation doctrine, however,
cannot abate the issuance of a preventive
suspension order, precisely because an order of
preventive suspension does not render a
respondent administratively liable. A
respondent may be preventively suspended, yet
may be exonerated in the end.
8. At all events, there is no condonation
because private respondent committed the acts
subject of the complaint after his reelection in
2013, as was argued by petition in public
respondent Court of Appeals.
9. As mentioned earlier, there is no
condonation. The assailed act (i.e., payment), by
private respondent’s own admission during the
proceedings before public respondent Court of
Appeals, took place during the period of June
 and July 2013, which was after his reelection in
May 2013.1
 
The Ombudsman again discussed the doctrine of
condonation at some length in her Memorandum as
the fourth and last argument presented on the issue
of the propriety of the temporary restraining order
and the writ of preliminary injunction.2 She
reiterated, however, that the doctrine was only a
matter of defense that was relevant only in imposing
an administrative penalty on the respondent public
elective official, to wit:

_______________

1  Supplemental Petition for Certiorari, p. 4.

2  Memorandum, pp. 646-734.

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

165. Thus, in deciding that the evidence of

respondent Binay’s guilt is strong, petitioner
did not take into consideration the so-called
“condonation doctrine” the way respondent
Court of Appeals did in its Third Resolution.
The condonation doctrine is applicable and
relevant only to the imposition of an
administrative penalty, not to the issuance of a
preventive suspension, the latter being merely
a preliminary step in an administrative
investigation.
166. Since a preventive suspension does
not hold a public officer liable, it will not be
 affected by any “condonation” that the
electorate may extend to the public officer.
Verily, for purposes of aiding an investigation,
a public officer may be preventively suspended
even as, ultimately, he or she will be
exonerated from administrative liability due to
the condonation doctrine. CONDONATION IS
A MATTER OF DEFENSE — to be positively
alleged and to be weighed according to the
evidence — during the administrative
proceedings, and not at the very preliminary
stage thereof.3
 
I agree with the Ombudsman. The question of
grave abuse of discretion on the part of the CA could
be settled not by reexamining and overturning the
doctrine of condonation but by reference to Section
24 of the Republic Act No. 6770. It would be plain
error for us to determine whether the Court of
Appeals (CA) gravely abused its discretion or not on
the basis of the doctrine of condonation.
The general investigatory power of the
Ombudsman is decreed by Section 13(1), Article XI of
the 1987 Constitution,4

_______________

3  Id., at pp. 703-704.

4  Sec. 13. The Office of the Ombudsman shall have the
following powers, functions, and duties:
(1) Investigate on its own, or on complaint by any person, any
act or omission of any public official, employee, office or agency,
when such act or omission appears to be illegal, unjust, improper,
or inefficient. x x x

 
 
562
562 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED
Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

while her statutory mandate to act on

administrative complaints is founded on Section 19
of Republic Act No. 6770, viz.:
 
Section 19. Administrative complaints.—
The Ombudsman shall act on all complaints
relating, but not limited, to acts or omissions
which:
1. Are contrary to law or regulation;
2. Are unreasonable, unfair, oppressive or
discriminatory;
3. Are inconsistent with the general course
of an agency’s functions, though in accordance
with law;
4. Proceed from a mistake of law or an
arbitrary ascertainment of facts;
5. Are in the exercise of discretionary
powers but for an improper purpose; or
6. Are otherwise irregular, immoral or
devoid of justification.
 
In line with the power to investigate
administrative cases, the Ombudsman is vested with
the authority to preventively suspend respondent
public officials and employees pursuant to Section 24
of Republic Act No. 6770, which provides:
 
Section 24. Preventive Suspension.—The
Ombudsman or his Deputy may preventively
suspend any officer or employee under his
authority pending an investigation, if in his
judgment the evidence of guilt is strong, and (a)
the charge against such officer or employee
involves dishonesty, oppression or grave
misconduct or neglect in the performance of
duty; (b) the charges would warrant removal
 from the service; or (c) the respondent’s
continued stay in office may prejudice the case
filed against him.
The preventive suspension shall continue
until the case is terminated by the Office of the
Ombudsman but not more than six (6) months,
without pay, except when the delay in the
disposition of the case by the Office of the
Ombudsman is due to the fault, negligence or
petition of the respondent, in which case the
period of such
 
 

563

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

delay shall not be counted in computing the

period of suspension herein provided.
 
It is important to note, however, that the
Ombudsman has no authority to issue the preventive
suspension order in connection with criminal
investigations of government officials or employees
because such authority rests in the courts in which
the criminal cases are filed.5
Under Section 24, supra, two requisites must
concur to render the preventive suspension order
valid. The first requisite is unique because it can be
satisfied in only one way, which is that the evidence
of guilt is strong in the judgment of the Ombudsman
or the Deputy Ombudsman.  But the second requisite
may be satisfied in three different ways, namely: (1)
that the offense charged involves dishonesty,
oppression or grave misconduct or neglect in the
performance of duty; or (2) the charge would warrant
removal from the service; or (3) the respondent’s
continued stay in office may prejudice the case filed
against him or her.6
Respondent Jejomar Erwin S. Binay, Jr., along
with other officers and employees of the City of
Makati, were administratively charged in the Office
of the Ombudsman with grave misconduct, serious
dishonesty, and conduct prejudicial to the best
interest of the service.7 In her joint order dated
March 10, 2015, the Ombudsman stated that the
requisites for the issuance of the preventive
suspension order against Binay, Jr. and his
corespondents were satisfied, specifically:

The first requisite is present in these cases,

as shown by the supporting evidence attached
as Annexes to the Complaint. These Annexes
include, among other

_______________

5  See Luciano v. Provincial Governor, No. L-30306, June 20,

1969, 28 SCRA 517.
6  Office of the Ombudsman v. Evangelista, G.R. No. 177211,
March 13, 2009, 581 SCRA 350.
7  Docketed as OMB-C-A-15-0058, OMB-C-A-15-0059, OMB-C-
A-15-0060, OMB-C-A-15-0061, OMB-C-A-15-0062, OMB-C-A-15-
0063.

 
 
564

564 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

things, sworn statements of alleged losing

bidders and of some members of the Makati
City BAC attesting to the irregularities in the
 subject procurement; documents negating the
purported publication of bids; and
disbursement vouchers, checks, and official
receipts showing disbursement of public funds
by the city government.
As regard the second requisite, all the
circumstances enumerated therein are likewise
present. The Complaint charges respondents
with Grave Misconduct, Serious Dishonesty
and Conduct Prejudicial to the Best Interest of
the Service. If proven true, they constitute
grounds for removal from public service under
the Revised Rules on Administrative Cases in
the Civil Service. Moreover, since the
respondents’ respective positions give them
access to public records and influence on
possible witnesses, respondents’ continued stay
in office may prejudice the cases filed against
them. Thus, their preventive suspension without
pay for a period of six (6) months is in order.
 
When he assailed the preventive suspension order
by petition for certiorari in the CA, Binay, Jr. alleged
that the preventive suspension order was illegal and
issued with grave abuse of discretion because: (1) it
contravened well-settled jurisprudence applying the
doctrine of condonation; and (2) evidence of his guilt
was not strong. He prayed that a temporary
restraining order or writ of preliminary injunction be
issued to enjoin the implementation of the preventive
suspension order.
The CA heeded Binay, Jr.’s prayer for injunctive
reliefs chiefly on the basis of the doctrine of
condonation. In the resolution promulgated on
March 16, 2015, the CA, citing the pronouncement in
Garcia, Jr. v. Court of Appeals,8 granted Binay, Jr.’s
application for the temporary restraining order,
holding as follows:
_______________

8  G.R. No. 185132, April 24, 2009, 586 SCRA 799.

 
 
565

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

In Garcia v. Court of Appeals (G.R. No.

185132, April 24, 2009), the Supreme Court
held that suspension from office of an elective
official, whether as a preventive measure or as
a penalty will undeservedly deprive the
electorate of the services of the person they
have conscientiously chosen and voted into
office.
The Supreme Court in said case likewise
found serious and urgent the question, among
other matters, of whether the alleged acts were
committed in the previous term of office of
petitioner therein. This is because if it were
established that the acts subject of the
administrative complaint were indeed
committed during petitioner’s prior term, then
following settled jurisprudence, he can no
longer be administratively charged. It further
declared imperative on the part of the appellate
court, as soon as it was apprised of the said
considerable grounds, to issue an injunctive
writ so as not to render moot, nugatory and
ineffectual the resolution of the issues in the
certiorari petition. (Garcia, supra)
The Supreme Court also declared that it
would have been more prudent on the part of
the CA, on account of the extreme urgency of
 the matter and the seriousness of the issues
raised in the certiorari petition, to issue a TRO
while it awaits the respective comments of the
respondents and while it judiciously
contemplates on whether or not to issue a writ
of preliminary injunction.   It pointed out that
the basic purpose of a restraining order is to
preserve the status quo until the hearing of the
application for preliminary injunction. That, it
is a preservative remedy for the protection of
substantive rights and interests. (Garcia,
supra)
In view of the seriousness of the issues
raised in the Petition for Certiorari and the
possible repercussions on the electorate who
will unquestionably be affected by suspension
of their elective official, the Court resolves to
grant petitioner’s prayer for a Temporary
Restraining Order for a period of sixty
(60) days from notice hereof, conditioned
upon the posting by pe-
 
 

566

566 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

titioner of a bond in the amount of

FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND PESOS
(P500,000.00).9
 
In ultimately granting the writ of preliminary
injunction through its April 6, 2015 resolution, the
CA, relying on the doctrine of condonation adopted in
Garcia, Jr.; Joson III v. Court of Appeals;10
Aguinaldo v. Santos;11 and Salalima v. Guingona,
Jr.,12 explained:
 Garcia was simply an echo of teachings in
Joson v. Court of Appeals (G.R. No. 160652,
February 13, 2006) where the High Court
declared that suspension from office of an
elective official would deprive the electorate of
the services of the person they have voted into
office.
Along this line, the concept of condonation,
as advocated by petitioner and opposed by
public respondent Ombudsman, will assume
resonance.
Premised on Aguinaldo, Salalima and
Garcia, petitioner asserted that the public
respondent Ombudsman can hardly impose
preventive suspension of petitioner, given his
election in 2010 and reelection in 2013 as
Makati City Mayor, relative to his perceived
illegal participation in anomalous activities for
the Makati City Hall Building II project from
2007 to 2013.
x x x x
To reiterate, there was no disagreement that
petitioner was elected in 2010 and reelected as
City Mayor of Makati in 2013. The acts
constitutive of the charges in the Complaint
pertained to events from November 8, 2007,
when City Ordinance No. 2007-A-015
appropriated P1,240,000,000.00 as
supplemental budget for 2007. From this
budget, P400,000,000.00 was allocated for the
parking building. It was allegedly during this
time that a

_______________

9   CA Resolution dated March 16, 2015, pp. 4-5.

10  G.R. No. 160652, February 13, 2006, 482 SCRA 360.
11  G.R. No. 94115, August 21, 1992, 212 SCRA 768.
 12  G.R. No. 117589-92, May 22, 1996, 257 SCRA 55.

 
 

567

VOL. 774, NOVEMBER 10, 2015 567

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

Negotiated Contract for the architectural

and engineering services were negotiated and
approved. Disbursements allegedly favored
Hilmarc and MANA amidst irregularities in the
bidding process during the term of petitioner as
City Mayor of Makati.
Yet, to subscribe to public respondent
Ombudsman’s submission that condonation can
only be appreciated by the investigating body
after it is ventilated as an exculpation by
petitioner and considered solely by public
respondent, following the exercise of its
investigatory power, will ignore the Court’s
constitutional power and duty to evaluate the
factual and legal foundations for, nay,
impediments to, a preventive suspension in an
administrative case.13
 
In my view, however, the CA erroneously banked
on the pronouncements in Garcia, Jr., Joson III,
Aguinaldo, and Salalima to espouse the doctrine of
condonation as the basis to issue the injunctive writs
under its resolutions promulgated on March 16, 2015
and April 6, 2015. In both Aguinaldo and Salalima,
the Court applied the doctrine of condonation to
avoid the imposition of administrative liability upon
reelected public officials. Specifically, the Court held
in Aguinaldo that:
 
 Petitioner’s reelection to the position of
Governor of Cagayan has rendered the
administrative case pending before Us moot
and academic. It appears that after the
canvassing of votes, petitioner garnered the
most number of votes among the candidates for
governor of Cagayan province. x x x
x x x x
Clearly then, the rule is that a public official
cannot be removed for administrative
misconduct committed during a prior term,
since his reelection to office operates as a
condonation of the officer’s previous misconduct
to

_______________

13  CA Resolution dated April 6, 2015, pp. 6-10.

 
 
568

568 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the extent of cutting off the right to remove

him therefor. The foregoing rule, however, finds
no application to criminal cases pending
against petitioner for acts he may have
committed during the failed coup.14
 
while in Salalima, the Court maintained that:
 
x  x  x [A]ny administrative liability which
petitioner Salalima might have incurred in the
execution of the retainer contract in O.P. Case
No. 5469 and the incidents related therewith
 and in the execution on 6 March 1992 of a
contract for additional repair and rehabilitation
works for the Tabaco Public Market in O.P.
Case No. 5450 are deemed extinguished by his
reelection in the 11 May 1992 synchronized
elections.   So are the liabilities, if any, of
petitioner members of the Sangguniang
Panlalawigan ng Albay, who signed Resolution
No. 129 authorizing petitioner Salalima to
enter into the retainer contract in question and
who were reelected in the 1992 elections. This
is, however, without prejudice to the institution
of appropriate civil and criminal cases as may
be warranted by the attendant circumstances.
x x x15
 
It is clear to me that, based on the language and
the factual milieu of Aguinaldo and Salalima, which
both cited Pascual v. Provincial Board of Nueva
Ecija,16 and of other akin rulings,17 condonation
shall apply only in case of the reelection of a public
officer who is sought to be permanently removed
from office as a result of his misconduct, not while
such public

_______________

14  Aguinaldo v. Santos, G.R. No. 94115, August 21, 1992, 212
SCRA 768.
15  Salalima v. Guingona, Jr., G.R. No. 117589-92, May 22,
1996, 257 SCRA 55, 116.
16  106 Phil. 467 (October 31, 1959).
17  Lizares v. Hechanova, No. L-22059, May 17, 1966, 17 SCRA
58; Office of the Ombudsman v. Torres, G.R. No. 168309, January
29, 2008, 543 SCRA 46; Garcia v. Mojica, G.R. No. 139043,
September 10, 1999, 314 SCRA 207.

 
 
 569

VOL. 774, NOVEMBER 10, 2015 569

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

officer is undergoing investigation. Condonation

necessarily implies that the condoned act has
already been found to have been committed by the
public officer. Hence, condonation applies to the
penalty or punishment imposed after the conduct of
an administrative investigation. Under the
circumstances, the pronouncements in Aguinaldo,
Salalima and the others could not be applicable to
the preventive suspension order issued to Binay, Jr.
pending his administrative investigation because
preventive suspension pending the conduct of an
investigation was not yet a penalty in itself, but a
mere measure of precaution to enable the
disciplining authority to investigate the charges by
precluding the respondent from influencing the
witnesses against him.18
It is worth emphasis that preventive suspension is
distinct from the penalty of suspension. The former
is imposed on a public official during the
investigation while the latter, as a penalty, is served
after the final disposition of the case.19 The former is
not a punishment or penalty for misconduct in office,
but a merely preventive measure, or a preliminary
step in the administrative investigation.20
As I see it, the CA misconstrued the milieu in
Garcia, Jr. and Joson III as an application of the
doctrine of condonation.  The Court notably stated in
Garcia, Jr. and Joson III that “suspension from office
of an elective official would deprive the electorate of
the services of the person they voted into office” in
the context of determining the propriety of the
issuance of the preventive suspension order. In other
words, the statement only served to remind the
Ombudsman to issue the preventive suspension
orders with utmost caution in view of

_______________

18  Board of Trustees of the Government Service Insurance

System v. Velasco, G.R. No. 170463, February 2, 2011, 641 SCRA
372, 387.
19  Villaseñor v. Sandiganbayan, G.R. No. 180700, March 4,
2008, 547 SCRA 658, 667.
20  Section 24 of Rule XIV of the Omnibus Rules Implementing
Book V of the Administrative Code of 1987 (Executive Order No.
292).

 
 

570

570 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

the gravity of the effects of suspending an

incumbent elective local official. Hence, Garcia, Jr.
and Joson III did not apply the doctrine of
condonation.
I further underscore that the CA was then only
resolving Binay, Jr.’s application for injunctive
reliefs against the preventive suspension order
issued by the Ombudsman. At that point, the CA’s
application of the doctrine of condonation was
irrelevant and unnecessary.
A preliminary injunction is an order granted at
any stage of an action prior to the judgment or final
order requiring a party or a court, agency or a person
to refrain from a particular act or acts.21 The
requirements for the issuance of a writ of
preliminary injunction or temporary restraining
order are clearly set forth in Section 3, Rule 58 of the
Rules of Court.22  The sole objective of the writ of
preliminary injunction is to preserve the status quo
until the merits of the case can be heard fully. The
writ of preliminary injunction is generally based
solely on initial and incomplete evidence;23 hence, it

_______________

21  Section 1, Rule 58 of the Rules of Court.

22  Section 3. Grounds for issuance of preliminary injunction.
—A preliminary injunction may be granted when it is established:
(a) That the applicant is entitled to the relief demanded, and
the whole or part of such relief consists in restraining the
commission or continuance of the act or acts complained of, or in
requiring the performance of an act or acts, either for a limited
period or perpetually;
(b) That the commission, continuance or nonperformance of
the act or acts complained of during the litigation would probably
work injustice to the applicant; or
(c) That a party, court, agency or a person is doing,
threatening, or is attempting to do, or is procuring or suffering to
be done, some act or acts probably in violation of the rights of the
applicant respecting the subject of the action or proceeding, and
tending to render the judgment ineffectual.
23  Unilever Philippines (PRC), Inc. v. Court of Appeals, G.R.
No. 119280, August 10, 2006, 498 SCRA 334.

 
 

571

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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

should not determine the merits of a case, or

decide controverted facts, for, being a preventive
remedy, it only seeks to prevent threatened wrong,
further injury, and irreparable harm or injustice
until the rights of the parties can be settled.24 As
held in Saulog v. Court of Appeals,25 it is sufficient
that:
 
x  x  x for the court to act, there must be an
existing basis of facts affording a present right
which is directly threatened by an act sought to
be enjoined. And while a clear showing of the
right claimed is necessary, its existence need
not be conclusively established. In fact, the
evidence to be submitted to justify preliminary
injunction at the hearing thereon need not be
conclusive or complete but need only be a
sampling intended merely to give the court an
idea of the justification for the preliminary
injunction pending the decision of the case on
the merits.   This should really be so since our
concern here involves only the proprietary of
the preliminary injunction and not the merits
of the case still pending with the trial court.
Thus, to be entitled to the writ of
preliminary injunction, the private
respondent needs only to show that it has
the ostensible right to the final relief
prayed for in its complaint x  x  x. (bold
emphasis supplied)
 
By relying on the doctrine of condonation,
therefore, the CA went beyond the parameters for
determining whether or not to issue the injunctive
writ. To recall, Binay, Jr. had filed his petition for
certiorari in the CA primarily to assail the validity of
the preventive suspension order. What was raised for
the CA to determine was whether or not the
Ombudsman satisfactorily complied with the
requisites imposed by Section 24 of Republic Act No.
6770 to establish that Binay, Jr. and

_______________
 24  Bank of the Philippine Islands v. Hontanosas, Jr., G.R. No.
157163, June 25, 2014.
25  G.R. No. 119769, September 18, 1996, 262 SCRA 51.

 
 
572

572 SUPREME COURT REPORTS ANNOTATED

Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

his corespondents had the ostensible right to the

final relief prayed for in their petition, which was the
nullification or lifting of the preventive suspension
order. In this regard, the CA plainly exceeded its
jurisdiction.
In the meanwhile, the Ombudsman found Binay,
Jr. administratively liable, and dismissed him from
the service. By such dismissal, the questions raised
against the CA’s issuance of the writ of preliminary
injunction against the Ombudsman were rendered
moot and academic. I join the Majority in saying that
the preventive suspension order, being an ancillary
issuance, was dissolved upon the Ombudsman’s
resolution of the administrative charges on the
merits. Thus, to dwell on the preventive suspension
of Binay, Jr. and his corespondents any further
would be superfluous, for, as the Court said in
Philippine Savings Bank v. Senate Impeachment
Court:26
 
It is a rule of universal application that
courts of justice constituted to pass upon
substantial rights will not consider questions in
which no actual interests are involved; they
decline jurisdiction of moot cases. And where
the issue has become moot and academic, there
is no justiciable controversy, so that a
 declaration thereon would be of no practical use
or value. There is no actual substantial
relief to which petitioners would be
entitled and which would be negated by
the dismissal of the petition.
 
In short, the Court should excuse itself from
exercising jurisdiction because the main case, the
administrative proceeding against the respondents,
has already been decided by the Ombudsman on the
merits.
IN VIEW OF THE FOREGOING, I VOTE to
PARTIALLY GRANT the petition for certiorari and
prohibition, and, accordingly, SET ASIDE the
Resolution promulgated on April 6, 2015 by the
Court of Appeals.

_______________

26  G.R. No. 200238, November 20, 2012, 686 SCRA 35.

 
 
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Carpio-Morales vs. Court of Appeals (Sixth Division)

I further VOTE to DISSOLVE the writ of

preliminary injunction issued on April 8, 2015 in
C.A.-G.R. S.P. No. 139453; and to AFFIRM the
Resolution promulgated on March 20, 2015 in C.A.-
G.R. S.P. No. 139504.

Petition partly granted.

Notes.—The long standing policy of the Supreme

Court is noninterference in the powers given by no
 less than the Constitution to the Office of the
Ombudsman. (Eijansantos vs. Special Presidential
Task Force 156, 724 SCRA 414 [2014])
The Supreme Court reiterates its policy of
noninterference with the rulings of the Office of the
Ombudsman, except in a clear case of grave abuse of
discretion. (Araullo vs. Office of the Ombudsman, 731
SCRA 346 [2014])
 
 
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