G.R. No. 93252 August 5 1991
FACTS:
Ganzon, after having been issued three successive 60-day of
suspension order by Secretary of Local Government, filed a petition for
prohibition with the CA to bar Secretary Santos from implementing the said
orders. Ganzon was faced with 10 administrative complaints on various charges
on abuse of authority and grave misconduct.
ISSUE:
Whether or not the Secretary of Local Government (as the
alter ego of the President) has the authority to suspend and remove local
officials.
RULING:
The Constitution did nothing more, and insofar as existing legislation
authorizes the President (through the Secretary of Local Government) to proceed
against local officials administratively, the Constitution contains no
prohibition. The Chief Executive is not banned from exercising acts of
disciplinary authority because she did not exercise control powers, but because
no law allowed her to exercise disciplinary authority.
In those case that this Court denied the President the power
(to suspend/remove) it was not because that the President cannot exercise it on
account of his limited power, but because the law lodged the power elsewhere.
But in those cases in which the law gave him the power, the Court, as in Ganzon
v. Kayanan, found little difficulty in sustaining him.
We
reiterate that we are not precluding the President, through the Secretary of
Interior from exercising a legal power, yet we are of the opinion that the
Secretary of interior is exercising that power oppressively, and needless to
say, with a grave abuse of discretion.
As
we observed earlier, imposing 600 days of suspension which is not a remote
possibility Mayor Ganzon is to all intents and purposes, to make him spend the
rest of his term in inactivity. It is also to make, to all intents and
purposes, his suspension permanent.
