LUCENA CITY – Quezon Rep. Lorenzo “Erin” Tañada III (4th District) and his father, former Senator Wigberto Tañada, slammed the anti-Quezon split group for seeking a temporary restraining order from the Supreme Court to stop the upcoming plebiscite that would decide the division of the province into two separate political units.

Both called the legal action as a brazen act to grab power from the people.

“They are now trying to seize from the people their inherent supreme authority to decide their own fate through the plebiscite. The petitioners should have left the decision to the people whether to reject or approve the law,” the elder Tañada lamented in a phone interview Tuesday.

The younger Tañada said the anti-Quezon split group has the right to question the law before the Supreme Court but hoped the Supreme Court would resolve the case as soon as possible.

“The case will not deter our continuing campaign to inform Quezonians to vote Yes to Quezon del Sur,” he said.

On Monday, former Quezon Board Member Frumencio Pulgar and businessman Hobart Dator Jr., leaders of the so-called “Save Quezon Province Movement,” asked the Supreme Court to stop the conduct of a plebiscite on Dec. 13 that would ratify Republic Act 9405 creating Quezon del Sur, to be taken from the present province of Quezon and the renaming of the other half into Quezon del Norte.

The petitioners urged the high court to declare RA No. 9495 as unconstitutional, claiming that no sufficient standard was laid down for the powers that the interim appointees may exercise aside from failing to comply with the provisions of the implementing rules and regulations of the Local Government Code.

Named respondents in the suit were Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, the secretary of the Department of Budget and Management and the Commission on Election.

Rep. Tañada maintained that the controversial law had already passed scrutiny from the Committee on Local Government in the House of Representatives and the Senate.

“The concerned committees in both chambers saw nothing wrong with the measure every step of the way while it was being deliberated and reviewed during the entire lawmaking process. No legal questions or defects were raised. Everything was in order,” he argued.

The solon argued that there was no need to create another law that would rename the other half of the province into Quezon del Norte. He cited cases of several provinces that had already been divided which did not require a separate law to rename the other half.

Rep. Danilo Suarez (3rd District) called the court maneuver a desperate move motivated by “selfish political interest.”

Under RA 9495, the 17 towns in the first and second districts of the province will be known as Quezon del Norte and Lucena City will remain as capital. Quezon del Sur will be composed of 22 towns in the third and fourth districts with Gumaca town as the capital.

The measure was originally filed by the elder Tañada and Nantes during their stint in Congress in 1998.