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Commissioners Luzviminda G. Tancangco and Ralph C. Lantion, together with Consultant Resurreccion Z. Borra (now Commissioner) attended the public hearing called by the Senate Committee headed by Senator Roco, held at the Senate, New GSIS Headquarters Bldg., Pasay City.
On January 29, 2001, Commissioners Tancangco and Lantion submitted Memorandum No. 2001-027 on the Report on the Request for a Two-day Additional Registration of New Voters Only, excerpts of which are hereto quoted:
“3. The applicants shall
present valid
identification documents, like school records.
“2. The Comelec field officers will be given the opportunity to verify the voters enumerator’s list or conduct ocular inspection;
“3. Availability of funds for the purpose; and
“4. Meetings with student groups to ensure orderly and honest conduct of the registration and drum up interest to register among the new voters.
“The presence of REDs on January 30 can be used partly for consultation on the practical side and logistical requirements of such additional registration days. The meeting will be set at 1:30 p.m. at the Office of ED.”[4]
On March 09, 2001, herein petitioner Michelle Betito, a student of the University of the Philippines, likewise filed a Petition for Mandamus, docketed as G.R. No. 147179, praying that this Court direct the COMELEC to provide for another special registration day under the continuing registration provision under the Election Code.
On March 13, 2001, this Court resolved to consolidate the two petitions and further required respondents to file their Comment thereon within a non-extendible period expiring at 10:00 A.M. of March 16, 2001. Moreover, this Court resolved to set the consolidated cases for oral arguments on March 16, 2001.[6]
On March 16, 2001, the Solicitor General, in its Manifestation and Motion in lieu of Comment, recommended that an additional continuing registration of voters be conducted at the soonest possible time “in order to accommodate that disenfranchised voters for purposes of the May 14, 2001 elections.”
In effect, the Court in passing upon the merits of the present petitions, is tasked to resolve a two-pronged issue focusing on respondent COMELEC’s issuance of the assailed Resolution dated February 8, 2001, which Resolution, petitioners, by and large, argue to have undermined their constitutional right to vote on the May 14, 2001 general elections and caused the disenfranchisement of around four (4) million Filipinos of voting age who failed to register before the registration deadline set by the COMELEC.
To be sure, the right of suffrage ardently invoked by herein petitioners, is not at all absolute. Needless to say, the exercise of the right of suffrage, as in the enjoyment of all other rights, is subject to existing substantive and procedural requirements embodied in our Constitution, statute books and other repositories of law. Thus, as to the substantive aspect, Section 1, Article V of the Constitution provides:
Viewed broadly, existing legal proscription and pragmatic operational considerations bear great weight in the adjudication of the issues raised in the instant petitions.
On the legal score, Section 8, of the R.A. 8189, which provides a system of continuing registration, is explicit, to wit:
“x x x It must be remembered that the period serves a vital role in protecting the integrity of the registration process. Without the prohibitive periods, the COMELEC would be deprived of any time to evaluate the evidence on the application. We would be obliged to simply take them at face value. If we compromise on these safety nets, we may very well end up with a voter’s list full of flying voters, overflowing with unqualified registrants, populated with shadows and ghosts x x x.
“x x x The short cuts that will have to be adopted in order to fit the entire process of registration within the last 60 days will give rise to haphazard list of voters, some of whom might not even be qualified to vote. x x x The very possibility that we shall be conducting elections on the basis of an inaccurate list is enough to cast a cloud of doubt over the results of the polls. If that happens, the unforgiving public will disown the results of the elections, regardless of who wins, and regardless of how many courts validate our own results. x x x”
Similarly, every new statute should be construed in connection with those already existing in relation to the same subject matter and all should be made to harmonize and stand together, if they can be done by any fair and reasonable interpretation.[10] Interpretare et concordare legibus est optimus interpretandi, which means that the best method of interpretation is that which makes laws consistent with other laws. Accordingly, courts of justice, when confronted with apparently conflicting statutes, should endeavor to reconcile them instead of declaring outright the invalidity of one against the other. Courts should harmonize them, if this is possible, because they are equally the handiwork of the same legislature.[11]
In light of the foregoing doctrine, we hold that Section 8 of R.A. 8189 applies in the present case, for the purpose of upholding the assailed COMELEC Resolution and denying the instant petitions, considering that the aforesaid law explicitly provides that no registration shall be conducted during the period starting one hundred twenty (120) days before a regular election.
Corollarily, it is specious for herein petitioners to argue that respondent COMELEC may validly and legally conduct a two-day special registration, through the expedient of the letter of Section 28 of R.A. 8436. To this end, the provisions of Section 28, R.A. 8436 would come into play in cases where the pre-election acts are susceptible of performance within the available period prior to election day. In more categorical language, Section 28 of R.A. 8436 is, to our mind, anchored on the sound premise that these certain “pre-election acts” are still capable of being reasonably performed vis-a-vis the remaining period before the date of election and the conduct of other related pre-election activities required under the law.
In its Comment, respondent COMELEC - which is the constitutional body tasked by no less than the fundamental charter (Sec. 2, par. 3, Article IX-C of the Constitution) to decide, except those involving the right to vote, all questions affecting elections, including registration of voters - painstakingly and thoroughly emphasized the “operational impossibility”[12] of conducting a special registration, which in its own language, “can no longer be accomplished within the time left to (us) the Commission.”[13]
Hence:
“(22) Second, the Board of Elections Inspectors must be constituted on or before the 4th of March. In addition, the list of the members of the BEI — including the precinct where they are assigned and the barangay where that precinct is located - must be furnished by the Election Officer to all the candidates and political candidates not later than the 26th of March.
“(23) Third, the Book of Voters which contains the approved Voter Registration Records of registered voters in particular precinct, must be inspected, verified, and sealed beginning March 30, until April 15.
“(24) Fourth, the Computerized Voters’ List must be finalized and printed out for use on election day; and finally
“(25) Fifth, the preparation, bidding, printing, and distribution of the Voters' Information Sheet must be completed on or before April 15.
“(26) With this rigorous schedule of pre-election activities, the Comelec will have roughly a month that will act as a buffer against any number of unforeseen occurrences that might delay the elections. This is the logic and the wisdom behind setting the 120-day prohibitive period. After all, preparing for an election is no easy task.
“(27) To hold special registrations now would, aside from being Illegal, whittle that approximately 30-day margin away to nothing.
“(28) When we say registration of voters, we do not - contrary to popular opinion - refer only to the act of going to the Election Officer and writing our names down. Registration is, in fact, a long process that takes about three weeks to complete not even counting how long it would take to prepare for the registration in the first place.
“(29) In order to concretize, the senior Staff of the Comelec, the other Commissioners, prepared a time-table in order to see exactly how the superimposition of special registration would affect the on-going preparation for the May 14 elections.
“(30) We assumed, for the sake of argument, that we were to hold the special registration on April 16 and 17. These are not arbitrary numbers, by the way it takes into account the fact that we only have about 800,000 Voters Registration Forms available, as against an estimated 4.5 million potential registrants, and it would take about 14 days — If we were to declare special registration today — to print up the difference and to verify these accountable forms. After printing and verification, the forms would have to be packed and shipped - roughly taking up a further two and a half weeks. Only then can we get on with registration.
“(31) The first step in registration is, of course, filling the application for registration with the Election Officer. The application, according to Section 17 of R.A. 8189, is then set for hearing, with notice of that hearing being posted in the city or municipal bulletin board for at least one week prior. Thus, if we held registrations on the 16th and the 17th, the posting requirement would be completed by the 24th. Considering that time must be allowed for the filling of oppositions, the earliest that the Election Registration Board can be convened for hearing would be the May 1st and 2nd.
“(32) Assuming - and this is a big assumption - that there are no challenges to the applicant’s right to register, the Election Registration Board can immediately rule on the applicant’s registration and post notices of its action by the 2nd until the 7th of May. By the 10th, copies of the notice of the action taken by the Board will have already been furnished to the applicants and the heads of registered political parties.
“(33) Only at this point can our Election Officers once again focus on the business of getting ready for the elections. Once the results of the special registration are finalized, they can be encoded and a new Computerized Voters’ List generated - at the earliest, by May 11, after which the new CVL would be posted. Incidentally, if we were to follow the letter of the law strictly, a May 11 posting date for the new CVL would be improper since R.A. 8189 provides that the CVL be posted at least 90 days before the election.
“(34) Assuming optimistically that we can then finish the inspection, verification, and sealing of the Book of Voters by May 15, we will already have overshot the May 14 election date, and still not have finished our election preparations.
“(35) After this point, we should have to prepare the allocation of Official Ballots, Election Returns, and other Non-accountable Forms and Supplies to be used for the new registrants. Once the allocation is ready, the contracts would be awarded, the various forms printed, delivered, verified, and finally shipped out to the different municipalities. All told, this process would take approximately 26 days, from the 15th of May until June 10.
“(36) Only then can we truly say that we are ready to hold the elections.
Further, petitioners’ bare allegation that they were disenfranchised when respondent COMELEC pegged the registration deadline on December 27, 2000 instead of January 13, 2001 – the day before the period before the May 14, 2001 regular elections commences – is, to Our mind, not sufficient. On this matter, there is no allegation in the two consolidated petitions and the records are bereft of any showing that anyone of herein petitioners has filed an application to be registered as a voter which was denied by the COMELEC nor filed a complaint before the respondent COMELEC alleging that he or she proceeded to the Office of the Election Officer to register between the period starting from December 28, 2000 to January 13, 2001, and that he or she was disallowed or barred by respondent COMELEC from filing his application for registration. While it may be true that respondent COMELEC set the registration deadline on December 27, 2000, this Court is of the firm view that petitioners were not totally denied the opportunity to avail of the continuing registration under R.A. 8189. Stated in a different manner, the petitioners in the instant case are not without fault or blame. They admit in their petition[18] that they failed to register, for whatever reason, within the period of registration and came to this Court and invoked its protective mantle not realizing, so to speak, the speck in their eyes. Impuris minibus nemo accedat curiam. Let no one come to court with unclean hands.
In a similar vein, well-entrenched is the rule in our jurisdiction that the law aids the vigilant and not those who slumber on their rights. Vigilantis sed non dormientibus jura in re subveniunt.
Applying the foregoing, this Court is of the firm view that respondent COMELEC did not commit an abuse of discretion, much less be adjudged to have committed the same in some patent, whimsical and arbitrary manner, in issuing Resolution No. 3584 which, in respondent’s own terms, resolved “to deny the request to conduct a two-day additional registration of new voters on February 17 and 18, 2001.”
On this particular matter, grave abuse of discretion implies a capricious and whimsical exercise of judgment as is equivalent to lack of jurisdiction, or, when the power is exercised in an arbitrary or despotic manner by reason of passion or personal hostility, and it must be so patent and gross as to amount to an evasion of positive duty enjoined or to act at all in contemplation of laws.[19]
Under these circumstances, we rule that the COMELEC, in denying the request of petitioners to hold a special registration, acted within the bounds and confines of the applicable law on the matter - Section 8 of R.A. 8189. In issuing the assailed Resolution, respondent COMELEC simply performed its constitutional task to enforce and administer all laws and regulations relative to the conduct of an election,[20] inter alia, questions relating to the registration of voters; evidently, respondent COMELEC merely exercised a prerogative that chiefly pertains to it and one which squarely falls within the proper sphere of its constitutionally-mandated powers. Hence, whatever action respondent takes in the exercise of its wide latitude of discretion, specifically on matters involving voters’ registration, pertains to the wisdom rather than the legality of the act. Accordingly, in the absence of clear showing of grave abuse of power of discretion on the part of respondent COMELEC, this Court may not validly conduct an incursion and meddle with affairs exclusively within the province of respondent COMELEC - a body accorded by no less than the fundamental law with independence.
As to petitioners’ prayer for the issuance of the writ of mandamus, We hold that this Court cannot, in view of the very nature of such extraordinary writ, issue the same without transgressing the time-honored principles in this jurisdiction.
As an extraordinary writ, the remedy of mandamus lies only to compel an officer to perform a ministerial duty, not a discretionary one; mandamus will not issue to control the exercise of discretion of a public officer where the law imposes upon him the duty to exercise his judgment in reference to any manner in which he is required to act, because it is his judgment that is to be exercised and not that of the Court.[21]
Considering the circumstances where the writ of mandamus lies and the peculiarities of the present case, We are of the firm belief that petitioners failed to establish, to the satisfaction of this Court, that they are entitled to the issuance of this extraordinary writ so as to effectively compel respondent COMELEC to conduct a special registration of voters. For the determination of whether or not the conduct of a special registration of voters is feasible, possible or practical within the remaining period before the actual date of election, involves the exercise of discretion and thus, cannot be controlled by mandamus.
In Bayan vs. Executive Secretary Zamora and related cases,[22] wW enunciated that the Court’s function, as sanctioned by Article VIII, Section 1, is “merely (to) check whether or not the governmental branch or agency has gone beyond the constitutional limits of its jurisdiction, not that it erred or has a different view. In the absence of a showing (of) grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack of jurisdiction, there is no occasion for the Court to exercise its corrective power. It has no power to look into what it thinks is apparent error.”[23]
Finally, the Court likewise takes judicial notice of the fact that the President has issued Proclamation No. 15 calling Congress to a Special Session on March 19, 2001, to allow the conduct of Special Registration of new voters. House Bill No. 12930 has been filed before the Lower House, which bill seeks to amend R.A. 8189 as to the 120-day prohibitive period provided for under said law. Similarly, Senate Bill No. 2276[24] was filed before the Senate, with the same intention to amend the aforesaid law and, in effect, allow the conduct of special registration before the May 14, 2001 General Elections. This Court views the foregoing factual circumstances as a clear intimation on the part of both the executive and legislative departments that a legal obstacle indeed stands in the way of the conduct by the Commission on Elections of a special registration before the May 14, 2001 General Elections.
WHEREFORE, premises considered, the instant petitions for certiorari and mandamus are hereby DENIED.
SO ORDERED.
Ynares-Santiago, De Leon, and Sandoval-Gutierrez, JJ., concur.
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