MANILA, Philippines?The Supreme Court Tuesday declared as valid and constitutional 16 republic acts that converted 16 municipalities into cities while exempting them from a law that requires towns to have an income of P100 million yearly to vie for cityhood.

In an en banc session, the high tribunal voted 6-4 to grant the second motion for reconsideration filed by the towns that lost their city status because of the court?s decision on Nov. 18, 2008, that found their ?cityhood laws? unconstitutional.

The Supreme Court, with a deadlocked vote of six apiece, upheld on April 28, 2009, the nullification of the 16 laws because of a common provision exempting them from the annual-income requirement as it supposedly violated the equal-protection clause.

The tribunal said in its April ruling that all issues in the motion for reconsideration had already been resolved when it rendered its November 2008 decision.

In a decision penned by Associate Justice Presbitero Velasco, the Supreme Court ruled that a deadlocked vote did not reflect the majority of the tribunal members and went on to decide that there was no violation of the equal protection clause in the cityhood laws.

The Supreme Court, thus, restored the validity of the cityhood laws that created the cities out of the 16 towns.

The 16 new cities are Baybay in Leyte; Bogo in Cebu; Catbalogan in Samar; Tandag in Surigao del Sur; Borongan in Eastern Samar; Tayabas in Quezon province; Lamitan in Basilan; Tabuk in Kalinga; Bayugan in Agusan del Sur; Batac in Ilocos Norte; Mati in Davao Oriental; Guihulngan in Negros Oriental; Cabadbaran in Agusan del Norte; Carcar in Cebu; El Salvador in Misamis Oriental and Naga in Cebu.

Seeking cityhood before 2001

The high court said all 16 municipalities had been seeking cityhood?along with 33 other towns that eventually became cities?even before the passage of Republic Act No. 9009 in June 2001.

RA 9009 amended the Local Government Code to raise the income requirement for towns to become cities from P20 million to P100 million.

The tribunal said the impeachment trial of then President Joseph Estrada in Congress in 2000 came in the way of the passage of the cityhood laws covering the respondent municipalities.

?Respondent municipalities and the 33 other cities, which had already been elevated to city status, were all found to be qualified under the old Section 450 of the Local Government Code of 1991 during the 11th Congress,? the Supreme Court said.

?As such, both respondent LGUs [local government units] and the 33 other former municipalities are under like circumstances and conditions. There is, thus, no rhyme or reason why an exemption from the P100-million requirement cannot be given to the respondent LGUs,? the tribunal added.

Qualified for exemption

The Supreme Court, however, clarified that only LGUs with pending cityhood applications before the passage of RA 9009 would qualify for exemption from the stringent income requirement.

?It is hard to imagine, however, if there are still municipalities out there belonging in context to the same class as the 16 respondent LGUs. Municipalities that cannot claim to belong to the same class as the 16 cannot seek refuge in the cityhood laws,? the tribunal said.

?The former have to comply with the P100-million income requirement imposed by RA 9009,? it said.

League of cities

The League of Cities of the Philippines (LCP), represented by its president, Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Treñas, questioned the cityhood laws.

He cited the violation of the equal-protection clause allegedly posed by the common provision of exempting the 16 towns from the higher-income requirement.

The league also expressed fear that the existing cities would suffer a reduced share in the internal revenue allotment (IRA) because of the creation of additional cities presumably with low income.

The IRA is a subsidy given by the national government to LGUs.

?In the proceedings at bar, petitioner LCP and the intervenors cannot plausibly invoke the equal-protection clause, precisely because no deprivation of property results by virtue of the enactment of the cityhood laws,? the Supreme Court said.

Cut in IRA allocation

The tribunal said the LCP claim that the IRA of its member cities would be substantially reduced because of the conversion into cities of the 16 towns would not suffice ?to bring it within the ambit of constitutional guarantee.?

?Indeed it is presumptuous on the part of the LCP member cities to already stake a claim on the IRA, as if it were their property, as the IRA is yet to be allocated,? the court said.

The number of cities in the country has more than doubled from 61 in 1977 to 136 in 2007.

This increase has significantly reduced the share of the internal revenue allotment (IRA) of existing cities.

The IRA is the share of provinces, cities, municipalities and barangays from national tax collections.

Budget Secretary Rolando Andaya said that the existing cities would lose an average of P2 million from their IRA share for every additional new city.

Some mayors have recommended the increase of the percentage share of the IRA for cities.

Before the recent Supreme Court decision, 120 cities and 81 provinces each had a 21-percent shared in the IRA, while 1,494 municipalities share 34 percent, and 41,900 barangays, 20 percent.

Citing results of his own studies, Naga City Jesse Mayor Robredo said that the provinces? share in the IRA had increased by 161 percent, the municipalities? share by 168 percent, but the cities? share by only 49 percent. With a report from Inquirer Research