THE Supreme Court has lifted the temporary restraining order it issued in 2016 that stopped the Commission on Elections (Comelec) from implementing a resolution allowing detainees to vote in national and local polls.
Lawyer Victor Aguinaldo had filed the petition for certiorari and prohibition with prayers for the issuance of an injunction and asked the high court to declare as unconstitutional Comelec Resolution No.9371 which was promulgated on March 6, 2016.
Covered by the assailed Comelec resolution are detainees who are confined in jail, formally charged for any crime/s and awaiting/undergoing trial; serving a sentence of imprisonment for less than one year; and those whose conviction of a crime involving disloyalty to duly constituted government such as rebellion, sedition, violation of the firearms laws or any crime against national security or for any other crime is on appeal.
Aguinaldo had argued that the poll body’s resolution failed to provide its own implementing rules and regulations and did not undergo prior public consultations.
He also said the resolution violates the equal protection of laws by favoring PDLs over other classes of voters, while also failing to address certain operational and logistical blind spots.
The Office of the Solicitor General which represented the Comelec, New Bilibid Prison, Bureau of Corrections, Department of Justice, Bureau of Jail Management and Penology and the different municipal, city and provincial jails rebutted Aguinaldo’s argument and told the SC that he filed a procedurally flawed petition and that he failed to present evidence to challenge the resolution’s constitutionality.
In a nine-page resolution posted on its website on August 26, the SC ruled that Aguinaldo lacked the legal standing to file the petition, and that he also failed to present an actual case or controversy that would warrant judicial review.
“After a judicious review of the allegations, issues and arguments adduced by the parties, the Court dismisses the instant petition for failing to establish the judicial requisites of judicial review. Fatally absent in the instant petition are the requisites of an actual case or controversy, and petitioner’s locus standi,” the resolution penned by Associate Justice Jhosep Lopez said.
“Wherefore, the instant petition is dismissed. The temporary restraining order issued on April 9, 2016 is lifted thereby allowing the Commission on Elections to fully implement Resolution No. 9371 in the upcoming and succeeding elections,” the resolution added.
The SC said Aguinaldo merely stated his standing as a citizen, taxpayer and lawyer, without elaborating why he would suffer injury if the assailed resolution allowing detainees to vote is implemented.
“As a general rule, the challenger must have a personal and substantial interest in the case such that he has sustained, or will sustain, direct injury as a result of its enforcement. Petitioner’s material averments fail to show how he stands to be affected by the implementation of Resolution No. 9371,” the SC said, adding that the petitioner is not a PDL that would be affected by the assailed resolution.
Finally, the SC said Aguinaldo cannot just invoke that he is a lawyer out to preserve the rule law as he had argued as it does not suffice “to clothe members of the Bar with standing.”
“Even more so must petitioner’s claim of lawyers’ standing fail, considering that he did not substantiate his allegations,” the SC added.
