Speculations on forced resignations

The Philippine labor law and jurisprudence allows an employer-employee relationship to be created between a company and a worker and also allows them to terminate their relationship at any appropriate time and for legal causes. In the same manner that the employer has the prerogative to terminate employment, for just or authorized causes, enumerated under Articles 282 and 283 of the Labor Code, an employee may also terminate his employment under Article 285. The causes include serious insult by the employer, inhuman and unbearable treatment, commission of a crime by the employer against the employee and analogous cases. Once an employee resigns, he cannot claim, as a matter of right, that he was illegally dismissed, unless he can make a case of constructive dismissal.

Many persistent questions have been raised, these days after that shocking Papal announcement, on why a well-entrenched leader of 1.3 billion Roman Catholic all over the world would tender his resignation and just like that, leave a very powerful post that is his for a lifetime. Every priest would silently aspire to become a bishop, an archbishop and ultimately a cardinal. To become a pope is, as they say, a gift of God, not to be aspired for but only prayed for  “en pectore”, or in the silence of one's heart and God will take care of the rest. John Paul II was shot, wounded and almost died. He was weaker and perhaps more exhausted. But he never gave up. Why would Pope Benedict XVI? Could there be a more serious cause?  Different people have different views on the matters but we all do not know what actually took place in the sanctum sanctorum of the Vatican.

Well, it is not for us to speculate and to theorize, nor argue and bicker on such an issue. Rather, it is useful to analyze and discuss labor cases involving resignations that turn out to be imposed and not voluntary, and how do labor tribunals, and ultimately, the Supreme Court, consider and pass upon them. As a general rule, any employee has the freedom to resign, provided that his consent is freely given and not vitiated by force, intimidation, threats, undue influence, nor hoodwinked, misled or pressured by a glowing promise of a substantial separation package. However, resignations are presumed to be valid and voluntarily made. He who seeks to impugn its validity bears the burden of proof. And whenever resignations are held valid, the resigned employee cannot demand any separation pay, except only if there is an agreement, collective or individual, stipulation for resignation pay.

In the case of Bilbao vs. Saudi Arabian Airlines (GR 183915, 14 Dec 2011), the Supreme Court upheld the validity of an employee's resignation and thwarted her attempt to obtain reinstatement and backwages. The Court held: Bare and self-serving allegations of coercion and intimidation, unsubstantiated by evidence, do not constitute proof to sufficiently support a finding of forced resignation. For intimidation to vitiate consent, the following elements must be present: 1. that intimidation caused the consent to be given; 2. that the threatened act be unjust and unlawful; 3. that the threat be real and serious; 4. that there is evident disproportion between the evil poised by the threat and the resistance, and 5. that it produces a well-grounded fear on an impending injury to person or property (citing Guatson vs. NLRC, 230 SCRA 815, 09 Mar 1994).

In the same case, the High Court held: An employee who resigns and executes a quitclaim in favor of the employer is generally stopped from filing any further claim against the employer for any entitlement arising from the terminated relationship

(citing Alfaro vs. CA, 416 Phil 316, 321, 2001). In the case of Vicente vs. CA (GR 175988, 24 August 2007), the Court declared: A resignation letter containing words of gratitude can hardly come from an employee who is forced to resign (citing St. Michael Academy vs. NLRC, 354 Phil 491 1998).

However, to be fair to all concerned, we hasten a caveat, that there are really some employers who would subject their workers to undue pressure in order to ease them out for some whimsical causes. In Penaflor vs. OCMC (GR 17711, 13 April 2010), the Supreme Court declared that there was no valid resignation. Applying the basic labor law principles of affording full protection to labor, the Court declared that the company was guilty of constructive dismissal.

Therefore, all these speculations and guess work about the pope's resignation are useless without the facts. And these facts are sealed in the inner chambers of the Vatican. Thus, it will be good for us to limit our discussion on resignations, in the context of Philippine laws and let the pope's case be decided above. Let us just focus on the here and the now.