Beating a dead horse

Did the Supreme Court (SC) conclusively settle the issue of whether FPJ is a natural-born Filipino or not?

To answer this question it is necessary to revisit the case of Fornier vs. Comelec et. al, G.R. 161824, decided on March 3, 2004. The said case principally assailed the Comelec resolution in SPA No. 04-003 dismissing for lack of merit Fornier’s petition to disqualify Poe, Jr. from running for the position of President in the last May 10, 2004 election on the ground that he made a material misrepresentation in his certificate of candidacy by claiming to be a natural-born Filipino when in truth his parents were foreigners, his mother being an American and his father, a Spanish national. Fornier contended that the Comelec committed a grave abuse of discretion in dismissing his petition.

In ascertaining whether Comelec committed grave abuse when it declared that FPJ did not commit any material misrepresentation in his certificate of candidacy, the SC had to resolve whether or not FPJ is a natural-born citizen. To find this out, it had to first determine whether his father Allan Poe would have himself been a Filipino and if in the affirmative, whether or not FPJ’s illegitimacy prevents him from taking after the Filipino citizenship of his father. After considering the evidence on record, the arguments of the parties and the views of the amici curiae, the SC found that FPJ’s father Allan Poe was a Filipino. This conclusion was drawn from the presumption that Allan’s father Lorenzo Pou (FPJ’s grandpa), albeit a Spanish subject, benefited from the "en masse Filipinization" that the Philippine Bill had effected in 1902 since he was not shown to have declared his allegiance to Spain. This benefit extended to Allan Poe according to the SC. And since Allan Poe, the father, was a Filipino, FPJ the son is a Filipino because "the 1935 Constitution during which regime FPJ had seen first light confers citizenship to all persons whose fathers are Filipino citizens regardless of whether such children are legitimate or illegitimate". These pronouncements are in the body of the decision and seem conclusive enough.

The problem, however, is in disposing the main issue of whether the Comelec committed grave abuse of discretion for declaring that FPJ did not commit a deliberate, willful and material misrepresentation in his certificate of candidacy, the SC further said that, "while the totality of the evidence may not establish conclusively that FPJ is a natural-born citizen of the Philippines, the evidence on hand would still preponderate in his favor enough to hold that he cannot be guilty of having made" such material misrepresentation. By such pronouncement, it can be validly argued, as some lawyers are doing now, that the SC has indeed not conclusively settled this issue.

But even if the SC has not conclusively settled this issue of FPJ’s being a natural-born Filipino, it cannot be revived now in the post-election protest filed by FPJ before the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET).This protest is one of the two distinct remedies comprising the "election contest" referred to in Section 4, paragraph 7, Article VII of the Constitution over which the PET is the sole judge in a post-proclamation scenario. The other remedy is a quo warranto proceeding. Protest is filed on the ground of fraud, terrorism and other illegal acts committed before, during and after the casting and counting of votes. Quo warranto is resorted to on the ground of ineligibility or lack of qualification of a person who intrudes into, or unlawfully holds or exercises a public office. Both remedies have one objective in view-to dislodge the winning candidate from office ( Tecson et al. vs. Comelec et al, G.R. 161434; Velez vs. Poe G.R. 161634, March 3, 2004). Obviously questioning FPJ’s citizenship assumes the nature of a quo warranto proceeding. And more obviously, it can only be filed against the winning candidate. FPJ is definitely not such person at this stage. In fact he is the one going after the proclaimed winner.

Besides, not just any citizen can contest the election of the president before the PET. Rule 14 of the PET Rules provides that "only the registered candidate for President who received the second or third highest number of votes" may do so. This rule is quite clear as to be understood even by non-lawyers. Thus the two lawyers who raised the same issue of FPJ’s citizenship prior to the elections cannot revive it now by intervening in the current protest and counter-protest pending in the PET. Neither could the proclaimed winner in the last presidential election do so in her counter protest. Her action in doing so might be construed as an implied admission that she doubts her victory and that she might have received only the second highest number of votes since it is only in such capacity could she question the citizenship qualification of FPJ under the aforesaid rules.

The natural-born citizenship issue of FPJ has therefore been rendered moot and academic by the outcome of the last presidential election when he was not proclaimed as the winner. At most it can be revived only after the PET has finally ruled on the pending protest and counter-protest; and only if FPJ is proclaimed as the eventual winner. Reviving it now is, at most, premature. It is like beating a dead or if not a dying horse. As Manong Max Soliven would say: "enough already"

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