Facts:
An administrative
complaint was filed with the Sangguniang Panlalawigan of Palawan against then
Mayor of San Vicente, Palawan Alejandro Villapando for abuse of authority and
culpable violation of the Constitution because he entered into a consultancy
agreement with Orlando Tiape, a defeated mayoralty candidate. Complainants argue that this amounted to
appointment to a government position within the prohibited one-year period
under Article IX-B, Sec. 6 of the 1987 Constitution.
In his answer,
respondent countered that he did not appoint Tiape, rather, he merely hired
him. He invoked Opinion No. 106, s.
1992, of the Department of Justice dated August 21, 1992, stating that the
appointment of a defeated candidate within one year from the election as a
consultant does not constitute an appointment to a government office or
position as prohibited by the Constitution.
The Sangguniang
Panlalawigan found respondent guilty and imposed on him the penalty of
dismissal from service, and was affirmed by the Office of the President. Vice-mayor Pablico took his oath as municipal
mayor in place of Villapando.
The Court of Appeals
declared the decisions of the SP and OP void, and ordered Pablico to vacate the
Office of the Mayor of San Vicente, Palawan.
ISSUE:
May local legislative bodies and/or the Office of the President,
on appeal, validly impose the penalty of dismissal from service on erring
elective local officials?
HELD:
Section 60. Grounds
for Disciplinary Actions. – An elective local official may be disciplined,
suspended, or removed from office on any of the following grounds:
x x x x x x
An elective local
official may be removed from office on the grounds enumerated above by order of
the proper court.
It is clear from the
last paragraph of the aforecited provision that the penalty of dismissal
from service upon an erring elective local official may be decreed only by a
court of law. Thus, in Salalima, et
al. v. Guingona, et al., we held that “[t]he Office of the President is without
any power to remove elected officials, since such power is exclusively vested
in the proper courts as expressly provided for in the last paragraph of the
aforequoted Section 60.”
Article 124 (b), Rule
XIX of the Rules and Regulations Implementing the Local Government Code,
however, adds that – “(b) An elective local official may be removed from office
on the grounds enumerated in paragraph (a) of this Article [The grounds
enumerated in Section 60, Local Government Code of 1991] by order of the proper
court or the disciplining authority whichever first acquires jurisdiction to
the exclusion of the other.” The
disciplining authority referred to pertains to the Sangguniang
Panlalawigan/Panlungsod/Bayan and the Office of the President.
As held in Salalima,
this grant to the “disciplining authority” of the power to remove elective
local officials is clearly beyond the authority of the Oversight Committee that
prepared the Rules and Regulations. No
rule or regulation may alter, amend, or contravene a provision of law, such as
the Local Government Code. Implementing
rules should conform, not clash, with the law that they implement, for a
regulation which operates to create a rule out of harmony with the statute is a
nullity. (
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