Case Brief: Javier v 

COMELEC
NOVEMBER 17, 2013JEFF REY
G.R. Nos. L-68379-81  September 22, 1986
EVELIO B. JAVIER, petitioner,
vs.
THE COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, and ARTURO F. PACIFICADOR, respondents.
Raul S. Roco and Lorna Patajo-Kapunan for petitioner.

Facts:

The petitioner and the private respondent were candidates in Antique for the Batasang Pambansa in the May
1984 elections. On May 13, 1984, the eve of the elections, the bitter contest between the two came to a head
when several followers of the petitioner were ambushed and killed, allegedly by the latter’s men. Seven
suspects, including respondent Pacificador, are now facing trial for these murders.
It was in this atmosphere that the voting was held, and the post-election developments were to run true to form.
Owing to what he claimed were attempts to railroad the private respondent’s proclamation, the petitioner went
to the Commission on Elections to question the canvass of the election returns. His complaints were dismissed
and the private respondent was proclaimed winner by the Second Division of the said body. The petitioner
thereupon came to this Court, arguing that the proclamation was void because made only by a division and not
by the Commission on Elections en banc as required by the Constitution.

On May 18, 1984, the Second Division of the Commission on Elections directed the provincial board of
canvassers of Antique to proceed with the canvass but to suspend the proclamation of the winning candidate
until further orders. On June 7, 1984, the same Second Division ordered the board to immediately convene and
to proclaim the winner without prejudice to the outcome of the case before the Commission. On certiorari
before this Court, the proclamation made by the board of canvassers was set aside as premature, having been
made before the lapse of the 5-day period of appeal, which the petitioner had seasonably made. Finally, on July
23, 1984, the Second Division promulgated the decision now subject of this petition which inter alia
proclaimed Arturo F. Pacificador the elected assemblyman of the province of Antique. The petitioner then
came to this Court, asking to annul the said decision on the basis that it should have been decided by
COMELEC en banc.

The case was still being considered when on February 11, 1986, the petitioner was gunned down in cold blood
and in broad daylight. And a year later, Batasang Pambansa was abolished with the advent of the 1987
Constitution.

Respondents moved to dismiss the petition, contending it to be moot and academic.

Issues:
1. Whether it is correct for the court to dismiss the petition due to the petitioner being dead and the respondent
missing.
2. Whether the Second Division of the Commission on Elections was authorized to promulgate its decision of
July 23, 1984, proclaiming the private respondent the winner in the election?
Held:
1. No.
The abolition of the Batasang Pambansa and the disappearance of the office in dispute between the petitioner
and the private respondent-both of whom have gone their separate ways-could be a convenient justification for
dismissing this case. But there are larger issues involved that must be resolved now, once and for all, not only
to dispel the legal ambiguities here raised. The more important purpose is to manifest in the clearest possible
terms that this Court will not disregard and in effect condone wrong on the simplistic and tolerant pretext that
the case has become moot and academic.

The Supreme Court is not only the highest arbiter of legal questions but also the conscience of the government.
The citizen comes to us in quest of law but we must also give him justice. The two are not always the same.
There are times when we cannot grant the latter because the issue has been settled and decision is no longer
possible according to the law. But there are also times when although the dispute has disappeared, as in this
case, it nevertheless cries out to be resolved. Justice demands that we act then, not only for the vindication of
the outraged right, though gone, but also for the guidance of and as a restraint upon the future.

2. No.
The applicable provisions are found in Article XII-C, Sections 2 and 3, of the 1973 Constitution.
Section 2 confers on the Commission on Elections the power to:
(2) Be the sole judge of all contests relating to the election, returns and qualifications of all member of the
Batasang Pambansa and elective provincial and city officials.

Section 3 provides:
The Commission on Elections may sit en banc or in three divisions. All election cases may be heard and
decided by divisions except contests involving members of the Batasang Pambansa, which shall be heard and
decided en banc. Unless otherwise provided by law, all election cases shall be decided within ninety days from
the date of their submission for decision.

We believe that in making the Commission on Elections the sole judge of all contests involving the election,
returns and qualifications of the members of the Batasang Pambansa and elective provincial and city officials,
the Constitution intended to give it full authority to hear and decide these cases from beginning to end and on
all matters related thereto, including those arising before the proclamation of the winners.

As correctly observed by the petitioner, the purpose of Section 3 in requiring that cases involving members of
the Batasang Pambansa be heard and decided by the Commission en banc was to insure the most careful
consideration of such cases. Obviously, that objective could not be achieved if the Commission could act en
banc only after the proclamation had been made, for it might then be too late already. We are all-too-familiar
with the grab-the-proclamation-and-delay-the-protest strategy of many unscrupulous candidates, which has
resulted in the frustration of the popular will and the virtual defeat of the real winners in the election. The
respondent’s theory would make this gambit possible for the pre- proclamation proceedings, being summary in
nature, could be hastily decided by only three members in division, without the care and deliberation that
would have otherwise been observed by the Commission en banc.

WHEREFORE, let it be spread in the records of this case that were it not for the supervening events that have
legally rendered it moot and academic, this petition would have been granted and the decision of the
Commission on Elections dated July 23, 1984, set aside as violative of the Constitution.

Judicial Power

As the Court sees it, the effect of this interpretation would be to divide the jurisdiction of the Commission on Elections into two, viz.:
(1) over matters arising before the proclamation, which should be heard and decided by division in the exercise of its administrative
only en banc in the exercise
power; and (2) over matters arising after the proclamation, which could be heard and decided
of its judicial power. Stated otherwise, the Commission as a whole could not act as sole judge as long as one of its divisions
was hearing a pre-proclamation matter affecting the candidates for the Batasang Pambansa because there was as yet no contest;
or to put it still another way, the Commission en banc could not do what one of its divisions was competent to do, i.e., decide a pre-
proclamation controversy. Moreover, a mere division of the Commission on Elections could hear and decide, save only those
involving the election, returns and qualifications of the members of the Batasang Pambansa, all cases involving elective provincial
and city officials from start to finish, including pre-proclamation controversies and up to the election protest. In doing so, it would
exercise first administrative and then judicial powers. But in the case of the Commission en banc, its
jurisdiction would begin only after the proclamation was made and a contest was filed and not at any time and on any matter
before that, and always in the exercise only of judicial power.

It is worth observing that the special procedure for the settlement of what are now called "pre-proclamation controversies" is a
relatively recent innovation in our laws, having been introduced only in 1978, through P.D. No. 1296, otherwise known as the 1978
Election Code. Section 175 thereof provided:

Sec. 175. Suspension and annulment of proclamation.-The Commission shall be the sole judge of all pre-proclamation
controversies and any of its decisions, orders or rulings shall be final and executory. It may, motu proprio or upon written
 petition, and after due notice and hearing order the suspension of the proclamation of a candidate-elect or annul any
proclamation, if one has been made, on any of the grounds mentioned in Sections 172, 173 and 174 thereof.

Before that time all proceedings affecting the election, returns and qualifications of public officers came under the complete
jurisdiction of the competent court or tribunal from beginning to end and in the exercise of judicial power only. It therefore could not
have been the intention of the framers in 1935, when the Commonwealth Charter was adopted, and even in 1973, when the past
Constitution was imposed, to divide the electoral process into the pre-proclamation stage and the post-proclamation stage and to
provide for a separate jurisdiction for each stage, considering the first administrative and the second judicial.