The so-called Aguinaldo doctrine is being debated nowadays after the camp of beleaguered Makati City Mayor Junjun Binay secured a temporary restraining order (TRO) from the Court of Appeals, effectively stopping the Ombudsman from investigating him on graft charges arising from the alleged overpricing of Makati City Hall Building II.
Mayor Junjun Binay first signed the contract on the purportedly anomalous transaction during his first term as mayor from 2010 to 2013. In his arguments before the CA, Mayor Binay maintained he signed the contracts for the questionable bidding during his first stint as mayor from 2010 to 2013. Since he was reelected to the same position in 2013, based on the Aguinaldo doctrine “he should have been condoned for his alleged commission of the offense”.
As we know, Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales did not take the CA issuance sitting down. In asking the Supreme Court to nullify the TRO, the Ombudsman also asked for the SC to “revisit” the Aguinaldo doctrine.
As a layperson I can be forgiven for not knowing that the condonation doctrine has been around for 55 years except that it was only baptized as Aguinaldo doctrine in 1992, referring to the case of then Cagayan province governor Rodolfo Aguinaldo.
In Aguinaldo vs. Santos, the Court made clear the rule that a public official cannot be removed for administrative misconduct committed during a prior term, since his reelection to office operates as a condoning of the officer’s previous misconduct, thereby cutting off the right to remove him.
Having said that, I think the SC should call the condonation doctrine by its proper name – the re-election doctrine.
* * *
Now that this issue is being hotly debated, I opt to revisit past articles as it applied to the administrative and criminal cases faced by a number of local chief executives.
From 2005 to 2007, the overpriced lamppost controversy hounded then Lapulapu City mayor Arturo Radaza and 13 other local officials, a case which prompted then acting deputy ombudsman for the Visayas Virginia Palanca-Santiago to investigate and subsequently recommend to then ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez to place the mayor under preventive suspension.
Gutierrez heeded the recommendation in March 2007 but events were overtaken by the general elections of that same year, which won for Radaza another term as mayor. Radaza’s re-election quieted critics because under the Aguinaldo doctrine, the administrative cases filed against him had been extinguished by virtue of his fresh mandate.
Finally in January 2013 or 6 years after the scandal erupted, Radaza who was then serving as 6th district congressman scored another victory after the Sandiganbayan dismissed criminal cases filed against him and 13 other officials implicated in the lamp posts scandal for lack of evidence.
In the article “Criminal Liability” which I wrote in July 2007, I cited jurisprudence on another case involving former mayor Alvin Garcia:
In Garcia vs. Mojica (GR No. 139043 September 10, 1999), the Supreme Court held that while petitioner, then Cebu City Mayor Alvin Garcia, can no longer be held administratively liable for signing the contract with F. E. Zuellig, this should not prejudice the filing of any case outside of the administrative suit previously filed against Garcia. The Court used the Aguinaldo Doctrine which states: “a re-elected local official may not be held administratively accountable for misconduct committed during his prior term of office. The rationale being that when the electorate put him back into office, it is presumed that it did so with full knowledge of his life and character, including his past misconduct. If, armed with such knowledge, it still reelects him, then such reelection is considered a condonation of his past misdeeds.” There is no specific law that provides for condonation by re-election, which is why the Aguinaldo doctrine has been criticized as a form of judicial legislation.
Congress should be in the frontline of calling for such a review but this is a scenario which may be likened to the distance between the earth and the moon.
On the other hand, will the Supreme Court reverse itself on its own judicial interpretation?