Case Digest (G.R. No. 94010)
Facts:
Felipe Evardone v. Commission on Elections, Alexander Apelado, Victorino Aclan and Noel Nival, G.R. No. 94010, and Alexander R. Apelado, Victorino E. Aclan and Noel A. Nival v. Commission on Elections and Mayor Felipe Evardone, G.R. No. 95063, December 02, 1991, the Supreme Court En Banc, Padilla, J., writing for the Court.On 14 February 1990, petitioners Alexander R. Apelado, Victorino E. Aclan and Noel A. Nival filed a petition for the recall of incumbent Mayor Felipe P. Evardone with the Local Election Registrar of Sulat, Eastern Samar. The Election Registrar recommended that the signing of the recall petition be held on 14 July 1990; the Commission on Elections (COMELEC), in en banc Resolution No. 90-0557 dated 20 June 1990, approved that recommendation.
Mayor Evardone filed a petition for prohibition with an urgent prayer for injunctive relief on 10 July 1990 (docketed as G.R. No. 94010). On 12 July 1990 this Court issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) enjoining the respondents from holding the scheduled signing. The TRO was received by the COMELEC Central Office on 12 July but the field agent in Sulat received telegraphic notice only on 15 July—after the signing had occurred on 14 July 1990.
Despite the TRO, the signing proceeded on 14 July 1990; the Election Registrar later attested that about 2,050 of the 6,090 registered voters of Sulat signed the petition. In en banc Resolution No. 90-0660 dated 26 July 1990 the COMELEC nullified the signing for being in violation of this Court's TRO; a motion for reconsideration was denied in Resolution No. 90-0777. The recall proponents then filed G.R. No. 95063, a petition for review on certiorari seeking to annul COMELEC's nullification.
Among Evardone's claims in G.R. No. 94010 was that COMELEC committed grave abuse of discretion in approving the signing without due process and that COMELEC Resolution No. 2272 (23 May 1990), which set out rules on recall, was unconstitutional because, Evardone argued, Article X, Section 3 of the 1987 Constitution required Congress to enact a new Local Government Code. COMELEC answered that the existi...(Pro-only)
Issues:
- Are the petitions moot and academic such that judicial relief should be denied?
- Did the Commission on Elections have authority to promulgate Resolution No. 2272 and is that resolution constitutional?
- Did the temporary restraining order issued by this Court on 12 July 1990 render nugatory or void the signing of the recall pet...(Pro-only)
Ruling:
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Ratio:
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Doctrine:
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