MANILA, MARCH 11, 2011 (STAR) By Edu Punay - City mayors asked the Supreme Court (SC) for the fourth time yesterday to reconsider its decision upholding the constitutionality of laws converting 16 municipalities into cities.
Some 40 mayors belonging to the League of Cities of the Philippines (LCP) marched to the SC to protest the flip-flopping on the case.
Speaking to reporters, LCP president San Fernando City, Pampanga Mayor Oscar Rodriguez asked to SC to revert to its supposedly final decision in November 2008 declaring the cityhood laws unconstitutional.
"Unfortunately, it creates a perception that our Supreme Court justices are not studying the cases carefully and meticulously," he said.
At the House of Representatives, lawmakers warned LCP officials yesterday against misleading the public in opposing the SC ruling upholding the constitutionality of the 16 new cities.
Speaking to reporters, Assistant Majority Leader Eduardo Gullas and Reps. Ben Evardone of Eastern Samar and Jose Carlos Cari of Leyte said the LCP was trying to pressure the SC into reversing its decision upholding the cityhood status of the 16 former municipalities.
Evardone, House committee on public information chairman, said the LCP's propaganda tactics are an affront to Congress.
Cari said the LCP allegation that the SC has flip-flopped on the issue was misleading since there have been 23 changes in the SC's composition in the past three years.
"We understand the disappointment on their side but it would be irresponsible for them to make a threat against the SC justices who voted against them," he said.
"They are giving false information because they know that they have no new arguments to convince the court to reverse itself."
Gullas debunked the claims of Rodriguez that Estelito Mendoza, counsel for the new cities, had sent a "secret letter" to the SC justices to prompt them to reverse their decision.
Copies of the letter were also sent to LCP members, he added.
The LCP said the conversion into cities of the 16 municipalities violates the Constitution.
"No province, city, municipality or barangay shall be created, divided, merged, abolished or its boundary substantially altered, except in accordance with the criteria established in the Local Government Code and subject to approval by a majority of the votes cast in a plebiscite in the political units directly affected," the LCP said, quoting the Constitution.
The mayors said the cityhood laws violated Republic Act 9009 that amended the Local Government Code six years before the cityhood laws and increased the annual income requirement for conversion of a
municipality into a city from P20 million to P100 million.
"The compliance with the criteria in the Local Government Code and the approval of the measure in a plebiscite are mandatory and indispensable requirements imposed by no less than the Constitution, the mayors said.
The city laws violated the equal protection clause of the Constitution and right of local governments to a just share in the national taxes, the LCP said.
The city mayors said the earlier ruling already had entry of judgment and was already being implemented by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) and the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).
The decision which dismissed with finality the appeal of municipal mayors stated that "no further pleadings shall be entertained" in the case, the city mayors added.
The LCP said the reversal of a final decision is setting "a bad precedent and will disturb the well-established legal principles on finality of judgment."
"It is beyond doubt that the decision of 18 November 2008 had already become final and this case had already been terminated," the city mayors said.
"The settled rule is that a final and executory judgment is immutable and unalterable, is no longer subject to attack, and cannot be modified directly or indirectly, and the court which rendered it, including the Supreme Court, had lost jurisdiction to modify it."
The LCP also said the finality of the SC decision prompted the Comelec and DBM to issue a circular on June 30, 2009 for the final internal revenue allocation (IRA) for 2009.
The SC violated Article VIII Section 1 of the Constitution in rendering the new ruling, the LCP added.
In its latest ruling last month, the SC said RA 9389, 9390, 9391, 9392, 9393, 9394, 9398, 9404, 9405, 9407, 9408, 9409, 9434, 9435, 9436, and 9491 (Cityhood laws) were all legal.
The new reversal was a result of the change in vote cast by Associate Justice Jose Mendoza, which led to a 7-6 voting.
In a ruling in December last year, seven justices voted to declare unconstitutional the cityhood laws.
Mendoza was one of them. The six others were: Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio and Associate Justices Conchita Carpio-Morales, Arturo Brion, Diosdado Peralta, Martin Villarama Jr. and Maria Lourdes Sereno.
However, Mendoza changed his opinion and now voted with the other six justices who declared the legality of the cityhood laws: Chief Justice Renato Corona and Associate Justices Presbitero Velasco Jr., Teresita Leonardo-de Castro, Lucas Bersamin, Roberto Abad and Jose Portugal Perez.
SC spokesman Midas Marquez said the changes in the SC rulings were "not very surprising because the voting on this case has always been tight."
Nothing is wrong with the new reversal since it was not a ruling on a second motion for reconsideration, he added. The SC reinstated its ruling that the 16 new cities were qualified cityhood applicants before the enactment of RA 9009.
"Thus, the imperatives of fairness dictate that they should be given a legal remedy by which they should be allowed to prove that they have all the necessary qualifications for city status using the criteria set forth under the LGC of 1991 prior to its amendment by RA 9009," read the SC decision.
"Truly, the peculiar conditions of respondent LGUs, which are actual and real, provide sufficient grounds for legislative classification."
Silent protest
In Pampanga, employees of the City of San Fernando wore black armbands as silent protest against the SC decision converting 16 towns into cities. The armbands contained the message "Stop the illegal conversion of municipalities – League of Cities of the Philippines (LCP)."
Mayor Rodriguez said city hall employees will wear the black armbands until the SC reverses its decision.
The city government will be losing up to P20-million share from the IRA every year due to the conversion of the 16 municipalities into cities, he added.
Rodriguez said in the Local Government Code, a town should at least have P100-million income per year and about 150,000 residents, among others, to become a city.
"Not all of these municipalities comply with these requirements," he said.
The 16 new cities are Lamitan, Basilan; Tabuk, Kalinga; Bayugan, Agusan del Sur; Batac, Ilocos Norte; Mati, Davao Oriental; Guihulngan, Negros Oriental; Cabadbaran, Agusan del Norte; Carcar, Cebu; El Salvador, Misamis Oriental; Naga, Cebu; Baybay, Leyte; Bogo, Cebu; Catbalogan, Western Samar; Tandag, Surigao del Sur; Borongan, Eastern Samar and Tayabas, Quezon.
El Salvador has an annual income of P17 million and about 17,000 residents, Rodriguez said.- With Paolo Romero, Ric Sapnu
Chief News Editor: Sol Jose Vanzi
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