Romulo Macalintal. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—Officers in charge (OICs) appointed by President Benigno Aquino III to executive and legislative posts in the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) should be considered resigned upon filing of their certificates of candidacies (COCs) for next year’s polls, an election lawyer said on Friday.
Lawyer Romulo Macalintal made the statement after ARMM OIC Gov. Mujiv Hataman filed his COC for the position of ARMM governor at the Commission on Elections (Comelec) office in Cotabato City on Friday.
“Like an ordinary appointive official who files his COC in the 2013 polls, OICs are considered ‘designated’ or employed ‘upon designation to a government position,’” Macalintal said, citing a doctrine laid down by the Supreme Court in the case Balinang v. Lorenzana (Nov. 12, 1987).
Last Sept. 11, Comelec issued Resolution No. 9518, Section 4 of which states that upon filing a COC, “any person holding a public appointive office or position, including active members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and other officers and employees in government-owned or controlled corporations, shall be considered ipso facto resigned from his office and must vacate the same.”
The provision is similarly provided under Republic Act No. 9369 or the Automated Election System Act of 2007 and the Omnibus Election Code.
Macalintal said that in the Supreme Court case, the justices backed the constitutional provision that those who run and lost in the previous election may not be designated to a government office; otherwise, such officials will have better rights that the appointed ones.
“If OICs will not be considered ‘appointed’ or ‘appointive’ officials who are deemed resigned upon filing of COC, then it will set a dangerous precedent where the losers in the 2013 polls could just be designated as ‘OICs’ to circumvent the constitutional provision that poll losers cannot be appointed to government office within one year from the date of the election,” Macalintal said.
“The court warned that what cannot be done directly cannot be done indirectly,” he added.
Macalintal cited Article IX-B, Section 6 of the 1987 Constitution which states: “No candidate who has lost in any election, shall within one year after such election, be appointed to any office in the government or any government-owned or controlled corporations or in any of their subsidiaries.”