Datu Michael Abas Kida vs. Senate of the Philippines, et al., G.R. No.

196271, October 18, 2011

THE FACTS
Several laws pertaining to the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) were enacted by Congress. Republic
Act (RA) No. 6734 is the organic act that established the ARMM and scheduled the first regular elections for the ARMM
regional officials. RA No. 9054 amended the ARMM Charter and reset the regular elections for the ARMM regional
officials to the second Monday of September 2001. RA No. 9140 further reset the first regular elections to November 26,
2001. RA No. 9333 reset for the third time the ARMM regional elections to the 2
nd
Monday of August 2005 and on the
same date every 3 years thereafter.
Pursuant to RA No. 9333, the next ARMM regional elections should have been held on August 8, 2011. COMELEC had
begun preparations for these elections and had accepted certificates of candidacies for the various regional offices to be
elected. But on June 30, 2011, RA No. 10153 was enacted, resetting the next ARMM regular elections to May 2013 to
coincide with the regular national and local elections of the country.
In these consolidated petitions filed directly with the Supreme Court, the petitioners assailed the constitutionality of RA
No. 10153.
THE ISSUES:
1) Does the 1987 Constitution mandate the synchronization of elections [including the ARMM elections]?
2) Does the passage of RA No. 10153 violate the three-readings-on-separate-days rule under Section 26(2), Article VI
of the 1987 Constitution?
3) Is the grant [to the President] of the power to appoint OICs constitutional?
THE RULING
[The Supreme Court] DISMISSED the petitions and UPHELD the constitutionality of RA No. 10153 in toto.]
1) YES, the 1987 Constitution mandates the synchronization of elections.
While the Constitution does not expressly state that Congress has to synchronize national and local elections, the clear
intent towards this objective can be gleaned from the Transitory Provisions (Article XVIII) of the Constitution, which show
the extent to which the Constitutional Commission, by deliberately making adjustments to the terms of the incumbent
officials, sought to attain synchronization of elections. The Constitutional Commission exchanges, read with the
provisions of the Transitory Provisions of the Constitution, all serve as patent indicators of the constitutional mandate to
hold synchronized national and local elections, starting the second Monday of May 1992 and for all the following
elections.
In this case, the ARMM elections, although called regional elections, should be included among the elections to be
synchronized as it is a local election based on the wording and structure of the Constitution.
Thus, it is clear from the foregoing that the 1987 Constitution mandates the synchronization of elections, including the
ARMM elections.
2) NO, the passage of RA No. 10153 DOES NOT violate the three-readings-on-separate-days requirement in
Section 26(2), Article VI of the 1987 Constitution.
The general rule that before bills passed by either the House or the Senate can become laws they must pass through
three readings on separate days, is subject to the EXCEPTION when the President certifies to the necessity of the bills
immediate enactment. The Court, in Tolentino v. Secretary of Finance, explained the effect of the Presidents
certification of necessity in the following manner:
The presidential certification dispensed with the requirement not only of printing but also that of reading the bill on
separate days. The phrase "except when the President certifies to the necessity of its immediate enactment, etc." in Art.
VI, Section 26[2] qualifies the two stated conditions before a bill can become a law: [i] the bill has passed three readings
on separate days and [ii] it has been printed in its final form and distributed three days before it is finally approved.
In the present case, the records show that the President wrote to the Speaker of the House of Representatives to certify
the necessity of the immediate enactment of a law synchronizing the ARMM elections with the national and local
elections. Following our Tolentino ruling, the Presidents certification exempted both the House and the Senate from
having to comply with the three separate readings requirement.
3) YES, the grant [to the President] of the power to appoint OICs in the ARMM is constitutional
[During the oral arguments, the Court identified the three options open to Congress in order to resolve the problem on
who should sit as ARMM officials in the interim [in order to achieve synchronization in the 2013 elections]: (1) allow the
[incumbent] elective officials in the ARMM to remain in office in a hold over capacity until those elected in the
synchronized elections assume office; (2) hold special elections in the ARMM, with the terms of those elected to expire
when those elected in the [2013] synchronized elections assume office; or (3) authorize the President to appoint OICs,
[their respective terms to last also until those elected in the 2013 synchronized elections assume office.]
3.1. 1
st
option: Holdover is unconstitutional since it would extend the terms of office of the incumbent ARMM
officials
We rule out the [hold over] option since it violates Section 8, Article X of the Constitution. This provision states:
Section 8. The term of office of elective local officials, except barangay officials, which shall be determined by law, shall
be three years and no such official shall serve for more than three consecutive terms. [emphases ours]
Since elective ARMM officials are local officials, they are covered and bound by the three-year term limit prescribed by
the Constitution; they cannot extend their term through a holdover. xxx.
If it will be claimed that the holdover period is effectively another term mandated by Congress, the net result is for
Congress to create a new term and to appoint the occupant for the new term. This view like the extension of the
elective term is constitutionally infirm because Congress cannot do indirectly what it cannot do directly, i.e., to act in a
way that would effectively extend the term of the incumbents. Indeed, if acts that cannot be legally done directly can be
done indirectly, then all laws would be illusory. Congress cannot also create a new term and effectively appoint the
occupant of the position for the new term. This is effectively an act of appointment by Congress and an unconstitutional
intrusion into the constitutional appointment power of the President. Hence, holdover whichever way it is viewed is a
constitutionally infirm option that Congress could not have undertaken.
Even assuming that holdover is constitutionally permissible, and there had been statutory basis for it (namely Section 7,
Article VII of RA No. 9054) in the past, we have to remember that the rule of holdover can only apply as an available
option where no express or implied legislative intent to the contrary exists; it cannot apply where such contrary intent is
evident.
Congress, in passing RA No. 10153, made it explicitly clear that it had the intention of suppressing the holdover rule that
prevailed under RA No. 9054 by completely removing this provision. The deletion is a policy decision that is wholly
within the discretion of Congress to make in the exercise of its plenary legislative powers; this Court cannot pass
upon questions of wisdom, justice or expediency of legislation, except where an attendant unconstitutionality or grave
abuse of discretion results.
3.2. 2
nd
option: Calling special elections is unconstitutional since COMELEC, on its own, has no authority to
order special elections.
The power to fix the date of elections is essentially legislative in nature. [N]o elections may be held on any other date for
the positions of President, Vice President, Members of Congress and local officials, except when so provided by another
Act of Congress, or upon orders of a body or officer to whom Congress may have delegated either the power or the
authority to ascertain or fill in the details in the execution of that power.
Notably, Congress has acted on the ARMM elections by postponing the scheduled August 2011 elections and setting
another date May 13, 2011 for regional elections synchronized with the presidential, congressional and other local
elections. By so doing, Congress itself has made a policy decision in the exercise of its legislative wisdom that it shall
not call special elections as an adjustment measure in synchronizing the ARMM elections with the other elections.
After Congress has so acted, neither the Executive nor the Judiciary can act to the contrary by ordering special elections
instead at the call of the COMELEC. This Court, particularly, cannot make this call without thereby supplanting the
legislative decision and effectively legislating. To be sure, the Court is not without the power to declare an act of
Congress null and void for being unconstitutional or for having been exercised in grave abuse of discretion. But our
power rests on very narrow ground and is merely to annul a contravening act of Congress; it is not to supplant the
decision of Congress nor to mandate what Congress itself should have done in the exercise of its legislative powers.
Thus, in the same way that the term of elective ARMM officials cannot be extended through a holdover, the term cannot
be shortened by putting an expiration date earlier than the three (3) years that the Constitution itself commands. This is
what will happen a term of less than two years if a call for special elections shall prevail. In sum, while
synchronization is achieved, the result is at the cost of a violation of an express provision of the Constitution.
3.3. 3
rd
option: Grant to the President of the power to appoint ARMM OICs in the interim is valid.
The above considerations leave only Congress chosen interim measure RA No. 10153 and the appointment by the
President of OICs to govern the ARMM during the pre-synchronization period pursuant to Sections 3, 4 and 5 of this
law as the only measure that Congress can make. This choice itself, however, should be examined for any attendant
constitutional infirmity.
At the outset, the power to appoint is essentially executive in nature, and the limitations on or qualifications to the
exercise of this power should be strictly construed; these limitations or qualifications must be clearly stated in order to be
recognized. The appointing power is embodied in Section 16, Article VII of the Constitution, which states:
Section 16. The President shall nominate and, with the consent of the Commission on Appointments, appoint the heads
of the executive departments, ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls or officers of the armed forces from the
rank of colonel or naval captain, and other officers whose appointments are vested in him in this Constitution. He shall
also appoint all other officers of the Government whose appointments are not otherwise provided for by law, and those
whom he may be authorized by law to appoint. The Congress may, by law, vest the appointment of other officers lower
in rank in the President alone, in the courts, or in the heads of departments, agencies, commissions, or boards.
[emphasis ours]
This provision classifies into four groups the officers that the President can appoint. These are:
First, the heads of the executive departments; ambassadors; other public ministers and consuls; officers of the Armed
Forces of the Philippines, from the rank of colonel or naval captain; and other officers whose appointments are vested in
the President in this Constitution;
Second, all other officers of the government whose appointments are not otherwise provided for by law;
Third, those whom the President may be authorized by law to appoint; and
Fourth, officers lower in rank whose appointments the Congress may by law vest in the President alone.
Since the Presidents authority to appoint OICs emanates from RA No. 10153, it falls under the third group of officials
that the President can appoint pursuant to Section 16, Article VII of the Constitution. Thus, the assailed law facially rests
on clear constitutional basis.
If at all, the gravest challenge posed by the petitions to the authority to appoint OICs under Section 3 of RA No. 10153 is
the assertion that the Constitution requires that the ARMM executive and legislative officials to be elective and
representative of the constituent political units. This requirement indeed is an express limitation whose non-observance
in the assailed law leaves the appointment of OICs constitutionally defective.
After fully examining the issue, we hold that this alleged constitutional problem is more apparent than real and becomes
very real only if RA No. 10153 were to be mistakenly read as a law that changes the elective and representative
character of ARMM positions. RA No. 10153, however, does not in any way amend what the organic law of the
ARMM (RA No. 9054) sets outs in terms of structure of governance. What RA No. 10153 in fact only does is to appoint
officers-in-charge for the Office of the Regional Governor, Regional Vice Governor and Members of the Regional
Legislative Assembly who shall perform the functions pertaining to the said offices until the officials duly elected in the
May 2013 elections shall have qualified and assumed office. This power is far different from appointing elective ARMM
officials for the abbreviated term ending on the assumption to office of the officials elected in the May 2013 elections.
The legal reality is that RA No. 10153 did not amend RA No. 9054. RA No. 10153, in fact, provides only for
synchronization of elections and for the interim measures that must in the meanwhile prevail. And this is how RA No.
10153 should be read in the manner it was written and based on its unambiguous facial terms. Aside from its order for
synchronization, it is purely and simply an interim measure responding to the adjustments that the synchronization
requires.
digest of the case of Datu Michael Abas Kida vs. Senate of the Philippines (G.R. No. 196271 and the other cases
consolidated therewith) promulgated by the Supreme Court on October 18, 2011. In this hairline 8-7 decision, the
Supreme Court DISMISSED the consolidated petitions assailing the validity of R.A. No. 10153 for lack of merit
and UPHELD the constitutionality of the said law in toto.
Justice Brion, with whom Justices Diosdado Peralta, Lucas Bersamin, Martin Villarama Jr., Martin del Castillo, Jose
Catral Mendoza, Bienvenido Reyes Jr. and Estela Perlas Bernabe concurred, wrote the majority decision. The majority
held that the Constitution mandates the synchronization of all elections, including the ARMM regional elections, which
is really a local election. On the other hand, the passage of RA No. 10153 does not violate the requirement of having
three readings on separate days of proposed legislations since the President certified on the urgency thereof. The
petitioners fail to provide any justification for the judicial review of the factual basis of the presidential certification of
urgency. The passage of RA No. 10153 does not require a supermajority vote and a plebiscite as provided in RA No.
9054 since the former is not an amendment to the latter. RA No. 9054 only provides for the schedule of the first ARMM
elections and does not fix the date of the subsequent regular elections, which is what RA No. 10153 does.
On the more contentious issue of the case, the majority ruled that the grant to the President of the power to appoint
OICs, who will serve as ARMM officials in the interim, is valid. The first alternative, which calls for the holding over of the
incumbent ARMM officials, is unconstitutional since elective ARMM officials are local officials bound by the three-year
term limit prescribed by the Constitution. The second alternative [favored by the minority], which is to conduct special
elections for the ARMM electorate to choose the officials who, instead of OICs, will govern in the interim, is also held
unconstitutional. The COMELEC has no authority to order the proposed special elections as the power to fix the date of
elections is legislative in nature. In this case, Congress has postponed the scheduled August 2011 ARMM elections and
set another date therefor May 13, 2011. By so doing, Congress has made a policy decision in the exercise of its
legislative wisdom that it shall not call special elections as an adjustment measure in synchronizing the ARMM elections
with the other elections.
Justice Antonio Carpio, with whom Justices Jose Catral Perez and Maria Lourdes Sereno concurred, wrote
a dissenting opinion declaring R.A. No. 10153 partly unconstitutional. He argued that Sections 3, 4 and 5 of RA
10153, which authorize the President to appoint OICs in place of elective ARMM officials, are unconstitutional. His thesis:
while the synchronization of elections is a constitutional mandate, Congress cannot validly authorize the President to
appoint OICs in place of elective officials. He would therefore order the COMELEC to conduct special elections to elect
ARMM officials, who shall serve until the ones elected in the synchronized May 2013 elections shall have assumed their
respective offices. He reasoned however that the holding over of the incumbent ARMM officials cannot be validly done
since this would extend their respective terms of office. Thus, pending the assumption to office of the ARMM officials
elected in the special elections, the President, exercising his power of general supervision over local governments, may
appoint an OIC-ARMM Governor. This appointment is absolutely necessary and unavoidable to keep the functioning of
essential government services in the ARMM.
Justice Presbitero Velasco Jr., with whom Chief Justice Renato Corona and Justices Teresita Leonardo-De Castro and
Roberto Abad concurred, also wrote a dissenting opinion. He essentially agreed with the dissent of Justice
Carpio. But unlike Justice Carpios curious proposal that pending the holding of the special elections the President
may appoint an OIC-ARMM Governor, he voted for the holding over of the incumbent ARMM officials as provided in RA
No. 9054. He asserted that the President cannot fill the executive and legislative ARMM offices by appointment, even
temporarily and pending the holding of the special elections. Such action, he said, will not only be outside the scope of
the Presidents constitutional authority, but also further violates the principle of local autonomy, nullifies the will of the
electorate, and contravenes the only limitation set by the Constitution that the offices of the executive and legislative
ARMM officials be elective and representative.

Datu Kida v. Senate of the Philippines., GR 196271 (2012)
(Constitutionality of RA 10153)/CONSTITUTIONAL
Facts:
RA 6734 provided for the organic act mandated by the constitution for the formation of ARMM. Unfortunately
said organic act did not provide for the exact date for the regional elections in ARMM. Because of this, several Laws
were enacted to provide for the date of the election ; RA 9054- Second Monday of September 2001, RA 9140
November 26, 2001, RA 93332
nd
Monday of August 2005. And on the same date every three years thereafter.
Pursuant to RA 9333, COMELEC made preparations for August 8, 2001 Election but sometime in June, Congress
enacted RA 10153- An act providing for the synchronization of the elections in ARMM with the national and local
elections.
Several people, including herein plaintiff assailed the constitutionality of the said enactment.
Issue/s:
1) WON ARMM is a distinct from an ordinary local government unit and therefore should not be required to hold its
election during the local elections mandated in the constitution.
2) WON RA. 10153 is constitutional on the basis that it granted the president the power to appoint OIC for several
elective positions until such positions be filled during the May 2013 elections.
Held:
1) No ARMM is not a distinct government unit therefore not exempt from the synchronization of election. SC held
that the inclusion of autonomous regions in the enumeration of political subdivisions of the State under the heading
Local Government indicates quite clearly the constitutional intent to consider autonomous regions as one of the
forms of local governments.
That the Constitution mentions only the national government and the local governments, and does not make a
distinction between the local government and the regional government, is particularly revealing, betraying as it does
the intention of the framers of the Constitution to consider the autonomous regions not as separate forms of government,
but as political units which, while having more powers and attributes than other local government units, still remain under
the category of local governments. Since autonomous regions are classified as local governments, it follows that
elections held in autonomous regions are also considered as local elections.

2) Yes, The Supreme court upheld the constitutionality of RA 10153 stating thatthere is no incompatibility between the
Presidents power of supervision over local governments and autonomous regions, and the power granted to the
President, within the specific confines of RA No. 10153, to appoint OICs.
The power of supervision is defined as the power of a superior officer to see to it that lower officers perform their
functions in accordance with law. This is distinguished from the power of control or the power of an officer to alter or
modify or set aside what a subordinate officer had done in the performance of his duties and to substitute the judgment
of the former for the latter.
The petitioners apprehension regarding the Presidents alleged power of control over the OICs is rooted in their belief
that the Presidents appointment power includes the power to remove these officials at will. In this way, the petitioners
foresee that the appointed OICs will be beholden to the President, and act as representatives of the President and not of
the people.
Section 3 of RA No. 10153 expressly contradicts the petitioners supposition. The provision states:
Section 3. Appointment of Officers-in-Charge. The President shall appoint officers-in-charge for the Office of the
Regional Governor, Regional Vice Governor and Members of the Regional Legislative Assembly who shall perform the
functions pertaining to the said offices until the officials duly elected in the May 2013 elections shall have qualified and
assumed office.
The wording of the law is clear. Once the President has appointed the OICs for the offices of the Governor, Vice
Governor and members of the Regional Legislative Assembly, these same officials will remain in office until they are
replaced by the duly elected officials in the May 2013 elections. Nothing in this provision even hints that the President
has the power to recall the appointments he already made. Clearly, the petitioners fears in this regard are more
apparent than real.