Ex-SC chief justice: Let people decide on Poe’s bid for presidency

Senator Grace Poe. RYAN LEAGOGO/INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO

It should be left to Filipino voters to decide in next year’s presidential elections whether Sen. Grace Poe is a natural-born or naturalized Filipino citizen, a former chief justice thinks.

Despite questions about her citizenship, former Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban said Poe should be allowed to run in the May 2016 elections and that the people should pick the country’s next president.

Panganiban pointed out that election issues, not involving crimes or obvious violations of law, “should be settled by the voters, not by judges and lawyers.”

“I have always believed that doubts on legal issues involving elections and popular sovereignty should be resolved in favor of letting our people decide them freely through the ballot,” Panganiban said in his Philippine Daily Inquirer column.

To drive home his point, Panganiban cited the Supreme Court decision in Frivaldo vs Comelec, which he penned in 1996, a year after he (Panganiban) was appointed associate justice of the high court.

In its decision, the high tribunal upheld the election of Juan Frivaldo as governor of Sorsogon province in 1995 after he reacquired that year his Filipino citizenship, which he lost when he was naturalized as an American in 1983.  The court ruled that “decisions declaring the acquisition or denial of citizenship cannot govern a person’s future status with finality…because a person may subsequently reacquire, or for that matter lose, his citizenship under any of the modes recognized by law.”

Frivaldo was overwhelmingly voted governor of Sorsogon by a wide margin of 27,000 votes in 1988, and again by 57,000 in 1992. However, in both instances, he was ousted by the court for having lost his Philippine citizenship in 1983 when he was naturalized as an American.

Undaunted by his two defeats at the high court, Frivaldo ran and won again as governor also by 20,000 votes in 1995. His victory was challenged by his perennial opponent Raul Lee.

This time, Frivaldo claimed to have reacquired his Philippine citizenship under Republic Act No. 7160 by taking his oath of allegiance as a Filipino at 2 p.m. on June 30, 1995, the day he assumed office as governor.

Lee claimed that Frivaldo was already twice ruled to be an alien and that, at any rate, he should have possessed Philippine citizenship on the last day for filing certificates of candidacy, or at the latest, on the date of the election on May 8, 1995, not on the date he assumed office on June 30, 1995.

Moreover, Lee also attacked the haste in processing the repatriation because Frivaldo filed his application for it only on the day prior, on June 29, 1995.

The Supreme Court, however, noted that the law did not specify the date when a candidate must possess Philippine citizenship, thus it was sufficient to hold that Frivaldo became a citizen at the time he assumed his office, not necessarily at the time he filed his certificate of candidacy, or during the election campaign period.

Panganiban said the high tribunal’s “liberality in resolving Frivaldo’s citizenship is my basic legal philosophy upholding popular sovereignty on issues involving elections.”

“At balance, the question really boils down to a choice of philosophy and perception of how to interpret and apply laws relating to elections: literal or liberal; the letter or the spirit; the naked provision or its ultimate purpose; legal syllogism or substantial justice; in isolation or in the context of social conditions; harshly against or gently in favor of the voters’ obvious choice,” the court had ruled.

“In applying election laws, it would be far better to err in favor of popular sovereignty than to be right in complex but little understood legalisms,” the court added.

Panganiban also cited the concurring opinion then made by then associate justice and later Chief Justice Reynato Puno, which says: “I concur in the path-breaking ponencia of Mr. Justice Panganiban which is pro-people and pierces the myopia of legalism… In cases where the sovereign will of the people is at stake, we must not only be legally right, but also politically correct. We cannot fail by making the people succeed.”

Panganiban noted that Frivaldo’s case was even more complicated that that of Senator Poe whose citizenship, according to him, “has sparked nationwide debate among lawyers and nonlawyers alike.”

“Note that the issue in Frivaldo’s case was his total lack of citizenship, while in Senator Poe’s, it is merely her alleged lack of ‘natural-born’ status, given that most critics concede her ‘naturalized’ citizenship. With far more reasons, therefore, should the Constitution and the laws governing her case be more liberally construed by letting the 50 million Filipino voters decide the issue,” Panganiban said.

Poe, the topnotcher in the 2013 senatorial race and a frontrunner in various presidential preference surveys, recently declared her intention to run for president in next year’s elections. Under the 1987 Constitution, only natural-born Filipino citizens are qualified to run for president, vice-president, senator and congressman.

Poe is subject of a disqualification case filed by defeated senatorial candidate Rizalito David before the Senate Electoral Tribunal (SET).

During the Sept. 21 oral arguments on the disqualification case, the SET chair, Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio, opined that Poe, being a founding, is a naturalized citizen.

Election lawyer Romulo Macalintal, agreeing with Panganiban, also clarified on Sunday that customary international law (CIL), particularly the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, did not confer a specific nationality to foundlings.

“The nationality of the State where the foundling was found is not conferred to the foundling but to the parents of the foundling,” he explained in a statement.

Thus, in the case of Poe, Macalintal said her parents were the ones conferred by CIL of the nationality of the place, i.e., the Philippines, where the senator was found.

“And since Senator Poe was found in the Philippines, her parents, under CIL were conferred Philippine citizenship or presumed as Filipino citizens because Senator Poe was found in the Philippines. Therefore, since Senator Poe’s parents were, to repeat, conferred Filipino citizenship under the CIL, then Senator Poe is a natural-born Filipino citizen having been born of Filipino mother and father, as provided for under our Constitution,” Macalintal said.

Poe continued to get support from different influential political groups to boost her presidential bid in the 2016 elections.

The group of Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV, the 500,000-strong Samahang Magdalo, was the latest political organization to express their support to Poe’s bid for the presidency, over the weekend.

Speaking during the Magdalo convention last Saturday for the launching of Trillanes’ vice presidential candidacy, Magdalo party-list Rep. Gary Alejano said the group’s decision to support Poe was done after a series of consultations with their members over the past few months.

“She symbolizes hope and change, and we believe that she can carry out the ideals and aspirations of the group. She and Sen. Trillanes can make a good tandem in effecting change and development in the country since their advocacies and platforms are aligned,” he said.

Accepting the endorsement during the event was Poe’s son, Brian Poe Llamanzares, who attended in behalf of the senator.

Poe, in a video message, thanked the group for its support and applauded the members, headed by Trillanes, for their selfless service to the people. She sided with the group in its continuous fight against corruption, and in promoting the welfare of the people.

Brian said her mother was “honored” and “humbled” by the overflowing of support, adding, “This inspires her even more to work even harder to bring a better tomorrow to our people through real and inclusive change.”

Also last Wednesday, Poe’s presence during the launching of the senatorial bid of Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares seemed to indicate that she would be endorsed by the Makabayan umbrella group of progressive organizations. Poe was the only “presidentiable” invited by the group to the event.

Included in the Makabayan coalition are Bayan Muna, Anakpawis, Gabriela, Kabataan and Act Teachers party-list groups, Piston, Sulong Katribu, Migrante, among others.

Poe, together with her running mate Francis Escudero, also received warm welcome from the influential Bakud party in Cebu which is led by the Duranos. Cebu fifth district Rep. and Bakud vice president Ace Durano said while they had yet to make a decision on who to endorse as a presidential candidate, he was “attracted” to the Poe-Escudero tandem because of the “inclusiveness and open-mindedness of their politics.”