EN BANC
G.R. No. L-32675 November 3, 1970
ESTANISLAO A. FERNANDEZ, petitioner,
vs.
VICENTE B. FERNANDEZ and THE COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS, respondents.
Estanislao A. Fernandez in his own behalf.
Luis A. L. Javellana for respondent.
Separate Opinon
BARREDO, J., concurring:
I fully concur in the opinion ably written for the Court by Mr. Justice Castro. The only purpose of this brief separate opinion is to express in my own way my view on the very important question of jurisdiction raised by respondent Vicente Fernandez. He insists that the matter of his qualifying residence in Mabitac, Laguna may not be inquired into whether by the Comelec or by this Court in passing upon the question of whether or not his certificate of candidacy should be given due course. I hold that respondent's posture in this respect is untenable.
To begin with, it is not only overwhelmingly borne by the evidence on record but also candidly admitted by respondent that up to November 11, 1969, he was a resident of San Juan, Rizal and that the earliest he could have changed his residence to Mabitac was on November 12, 1969. Incidentally, it is alleged in the supplemental petition and not denied by respondent that his application for registration as a voter in Mabitac for the purpose of the coming constitutional convention election has been denied by the local registration board and, on appeal, by the Court of First Instance of Laguna, whose decision on such matters is final,1 and considering that for such registration only six months prior residence in the municipality is required by law, it may be said that it is beyond all dispute that even assuming that respondent did in fact transfer his residence to Mabitac on November 12, 1969, an assumption more liberal to him than the decision of the registration board and the Court of First Instance of Laguna above referred to, he would still have less than one year residence in Mabitac by November 10, 1970, the date of the election in which he wants to be candidate for delegate to the constitutional convention. If, as respondent claims in his propaganda, he is a member of the Bar, it is to be presumed that when he filed his certificate of candidacy he knew that his own pretended residence in Mabitac is short of the one year which the Constitutional Convention Law requires of candidates for Delegate.
Under Section 37 of the Revised Election Code, even the certificates of candidacy of candidates who undisputably have all the legal qualifications for the positions they are running for may be denied due course by the Comelec upon proof that the same has been "presented and filed to cause confusion among electors by the similarity of the names of the registered candidates or by other means which demonstrate that the candidate has no bona fide intention to run for the office for which the certificate has been filed and thus prevent a faithful determination of the true will of the electorate." This provision does require that a candidate be legally disqualified in order that the Comelec may refuse to give due course to his certificate of candidacy, but surely, if in addition to other relevant evidence tending to establish a case of "nuisance" candidacy, as the situation contemplated in the statute is ordinarily referred to, it appears that the candidate concerned knows or ought to know that he lacks one or more of the legal qualifications of the office indicated in his certificate of candidacy, the Comelec or this Court, on appeal, may take such circumstance into account in ruling whether or not the above-mentioned Section 37 of the Revised Election Code may be applied. In doing so, the Comelec or this Court does not encroach at all into the exclusive jurisdiction of the Constitutional Convention to decide on the qualifications of its members.
The case of respondent is not one wherein his certificate of candidacy is being denied due course because he does not possess all the legal qualifications of Delegate.ℒαwρhi৷ It is being denied because there are enough circumstances in the record indicating that his candidacy is not bona fide, principally, as far as I am concerned, the fact that according to the finding of the Comelec in its resolution under review, respondent would not start his campaign until after the "cloud" on his candidacy has been removed. Generally, this Court has consistently held that consciousness of the existence of a cloud over one's right or title is inconsistent with good faith in claiming the same. I am inclined to believe that respondent's expectation that the Comelec would decline to pass upon the controversy as to the period of his legal residence in Mabitac was what emboldened him to sally forth notwithstanding his own knowledge of its inadequacy. It is my considered view that Section 37 of the Revised Election Code, which is one of the devises conceived by Congress to purify the exercise of suffrage would be rendered nugatory in the most appropriate cases if respondent's theory is upheld. Precisely, the candidate who knows he is not qualified is the one who would more likely agree to be a "nuisance" candidate because he would have nothing to lose anyway. If respondent were being denied the right to run solely because of a finding of the Comelec or this Court that he lacks one or some of the legal qualifications of Delegate, I would have voted to deny the present petition. I am voting to grant it, not because I hold he is disqualified, but because I have to presume that he well knows he has less than one year residence in Mabitac and I hold that that knowledge, taken together, but not otherwise, with other undeniable facts in the record, indicative, to my mind, of the less than full-hearted resolution on the part of the respondent to run for the office of Delegate, leads to no other conclusion than that his case comes within the letter and spirit of Section 37 of the Revised Election Code.
In conclusion, I vote to grant the petition but I believe it is necessary for this Court to spell out that respondent's certificate is being denied due course not because We hold that he is not legally qualified but simply because the circumstances surrounding the filing thereof, among them the fact that it was not spontaneous on his part but only accepted by him after petitioner had filed his own certificate, sufficiently convinces Us that this is one of the instances wherein the power to deny due course to a certificate of candidacy should be exercised, without primary regard to whether or not said respondent is legally qualified.
Teehankee, J., concur.
Footnotes
1 The only remedy against such a decision is a certiorari in the Supreme Court and none such appears to have been filed by respondent.
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