Posted by: Zennia Marie V. Deleonio on 3 August 2018
FACTS:
Promat participated in the bidding for government construction project including those under the FMED, and private respondent. In the course of their amorous relationship, private respondents gifted PROMAT with public works contracts and interceded for it in problems concerning the same in his office. Later, petitioner tried to terminate their relationship, private respondent refused and resisted her attempts to do so to the extent of employing acts of harassment, intimidation and threats. An administrative case was filed against Agustin which eventually led an appeal to the Ombudsman. It was ruled in favor of Agustin and he said the decision is final and executory.
FACTS:
Promat participated in the bidding for government construction project including those under the FMED, and private respondent. In the course of their amorous relationship, private respondents gifted PROMAT with public works contracts and interceded for it in problems concerning the same in his office. Later, petitioner tried to terminate their relationship, private respondent refused and resisted her attempts to do so to the extent of employing acts of harassment, intimidation and threats. An administrative case was filed against Agustin which eventually led an appeal to the Ombudsman. It was ruled in favor of Agustin and he said the decision is final and executory.
Fabian appealed the case to the Supreme Court. She averred that Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6770 (Ombudsman Act of 1989) is unconstitutional. She points out that under Section 7, Rule III of Administrative Order No. 07 (Rules of Procedure of the office of the Ombudsman),[2] when a respondent is absolved of the charges in an administrative proceeding decision of the ombudsman is final and unappealable.
She accordingly submits that the office of the ombudsman has no authority under the law to restrict, in the manner provided in its aforesaid Rules, the right of appeal allowed by Republic Act No. 6770, nor to limit the power of review of this Court. Because of the aforecited provision in those Rules of Procedure, she claims that she found it "necessary to take an alternative recourse under Rule 65 of the Rules of Court, because of the doubt it creates on the availability of appeals under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court.
ISSUE:
Whether or not administrative disciplinary cases, orders, directives or decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman may be appealed to the Supreme Court.
RULING:
No. Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6770 (Ombudsman Act of 1989) pertinently provides that:
In all administrative diciplinary cases, orders, directives or decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman may be appealed to the Supreme Court by filing a petition for certiorari within ten (10) days from receipt of the written notice of the order, directive or decision or denial of the motion for reconsideration in accordance with Rule 45 of the Rules of Court.
ISSUE:
Whether or not administrative disciplinary cases, orders, directives or decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman may be appealed to the Supreme Court.
RULING:
No. Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6770 (Ombudsman Act of 1989) pertinently provides that:
In all administrative diciplinary cases, orders, directives or decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman may be appealed to the Supreme Court by filing a petition for certiorari within ten (10) days from receipt of the written notice of the order, directive or decision or denial of the motion for reconsideration in accordance with Rule 45 of the Rules of Court.
It cannot validly authorize an appeal to this Court from decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman in administrative disciplinary cases. It consequently violates the proscription in Section 30, Article VI of the Constitution against a law which increases the Appellate jurisdiction of this Court. No countervailing argument has been cogently presented to justify such disregard of the constitutional prohibition which, as correctly explained in First Leparto Ceramics, Inc. vs. The Court of Appeals, et al. was intended to give this Court a measure of control over cases placed under its appellate Jurisdiction. Otherwise, the indiscriminate enactment of legislation enlarging its appellate jurisdiction would unnecessarily burden the Court.
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As a consequence of our ratiocination that Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6770 should be struck down as unconstitutional, and in line with the regulatory philosophy adopted in appeals from quasi-judicial agencies in the 1997 Revised Rules of Civil Procedure, appeals from decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman in administrative disciplinary cases should be taken to the Court of Appeals under the provisions of Rule 43.
There is an intimation in the pleadings, however, that said Section 27 refers to appellate jurisdiction which, being substantive in nature, cannot be disregarded by this Court under its rule-making power, especially if it results in a diminution, increase or modification of substantive rights. Obviously, however, where the law is procedural in essence and purpose, the foregoing consideration would not pose a proscriptive issue against the exercise of the rule-making power of this Court. This brings to fore the question of whether Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6770 is substantive or procedural.
It will be noted that no definitive line can be drawn between those rules or statutes which are procedural, hence within the scope of this Court's rule-making power, and those which are substantive. In fact, a particular rule may be procedural in one context and substantive in another.[29] It is admitted that what is procedural and what is substantive is frequently a question of great difficulty.[30] It is not, however, an insurmountable problem if a rational and pragmatic approach is taken within the context of our own procedural and jurisdictional system.
In determining whether a rule prescribed by the Supreme Court, for the practice and procedure of the lower courts, abridges, enlarges, or modifies any substantive right, the test is whether the rule really regulates procedure, that is, the judicial process for enforcing rights and duties recognized by substantive law and for justly administering remedy and redress for a disregard or infraction of them.[31] If the rule takes away a vested right, it is not procedural. If the rule creates a right such as the right to appeal, it may be classified as a substantive matter; but if it operates as a means o implementing an existing right then the rule deals merely with procedure.[32]
In the situation under consideration, a transfer by the Supreme Court, in the exercise of its rule-making power, of pending cases involving a review of decisions of the Office of the Ombudsman in administrative disciplinary actions to the Court of Appeals which shall now be vested with exclusive appellate jurisdiction thereover, relates to procedure only.[33] This is so because it is not the right to appeal of an aggrieved party which is affected by the law. That right has been preserved. Only the procedure by which the appeal is to be made or decided has been changed. The rationale for this is that litigant has a vested right in a particular remedy, which may be changed by substitution without impairing vested rights, hence he can have none in rules of procedure which relate to the remedy.[34]
Furthermore, it cannot be said that transfer of appellate jurisdiction to the Court of Appeals in this case is an act of creating a new right of appeal because such power of the Supreme Court to transfer appeals to subordinate appellate courts is purely a procedural and not a substantive power. Neither can we consider such transfer as impairing a vested right because the parties have still a remedy and still a competent tribunal to administer that remedy.[35]
Thus, it has been generally held that rules or statutes involving a transfer of cases from one court to another, are procedural and remedial merely and that, as such, they are applicable to actions pending at the time the statute went into effect[36] or, in the case at bar, when its invalidity was declared. Accordingly, even from the standpoint of jurisdiction ex hypothesi the validity of the transfer of appeals in said cases to the Court of Appeals can be sustained.
