Perpetual disqualification from holding public office

The constitutional provision on impeachment, specifically Section 3, paragraph 7 of the 1987 Constitution, provides that in case of conviction in the impeachment case, the official convicted shall be removed from public office and perpetually disqualified from holding any public office. He may also be prosecuted, tried and if convicted, sentenced to imprisonment.

Perpetual disqualification from public office is a legal and administrative penalty which bars any official who has been impeached and convicted by the impeachment court from being appointed or elected to any government position, employment or office. It also entails forfeiture of all retirement benefits and cancellation of all civil service eligibility. Moreover, as a member of the Philippine Bar, any lawyer who is convicted by impeachment court, I submit that disbarment may also be pursued for grave violation of the Lawyers' Code of Professional Responsibility.

Under the Revised Penal Code, perpetual disqualification from holding public office is an accessory penalty on top of imprisonment and payment of civil indemnity under proper circumstances. The same penalty is also routinely imposed by the Ombudsman in administrative cases where public officials are either dismissed from office or meted grave suspension in proper cases. The Supreme Court has decided a number of cases where perpetual disqualification has been imposed.

In the case of Romeo Jalosjos vs Comelec, GR no 205033, decided by the High Court En Banc, written by the brilliant jurist, Associate Justice Estela Perlas-Bernabe and promulgated on June 13, 2013, this accessory penalty was imposed by the 15 members of the highest court. In the Decision, Justice Bernabe cited a precedent in the case of Lacuna vs Abes, whereby the Supreme Court explained the meaning and full consequences of perpetual disqualification.

In Jalosjos, citing Lacuna precedent, it was clarified that the accessory penalty of perpetual special disqualification takes effect immediately once the judgment becomes final. The effective date of the penalty does not depend on the duration of the principal penalty because it is perpetual. And it continues to disqualify the convicted official whether or not he or she serves the sentence. The last sentence of Article 32 of the Penal Code provides that the offender shall not be permitted to hold any public office during the period of perpetual disqualification.

It is also provided in the Code that once the judgment of conviction becomes final, it is immediately executory. Any public office that the convict may be holding becomes vacant upon finality of the decision of conviction. Thus, as a necessary consequence, the convict becomes ineligible from holding any public office perpetually. And that includes disqualification from election and appointment. That convicted public official cannot even be appointed barangay tanod, much less run for barangay chairman or any other position in government.

In another En Banc Decision, written by former Associate Justice, later Chief Justice Lucas P Bersamin, in the case of Joel T. Maturan vs Comelec, GR no 227155, promulgated on March 28, 2017, the Supreme Court postulated the doctrine that the penalty of perpetual disqualification to hold public office may be imposed on public officials who violate the SALN law, Republic Act 7166, specifically Section 14. In the said decision, the highest court of the land declared that the penalty of perpetual disqualification does not amount to cruel, degrading and inhuman punishment.

It is generally accepted by the legal community that a judgment of conviction by the Senate impeachment court is not appealable to the Supreme Court precisely because impeachment is not purely a legal or judicial proceedings. It is principally a political process. If and when a convicted public official goes to the Supreme Court to seek judicial review of a judgment of conviction, the said recourse would expectedly be dismissed because it would be involving a political controversy rather than a justiciable issue.

Such being the case, once a public official is impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate, the Supreme Court should exercise judicial restraint by respecting a co-equal branch of the government, pursuant to the cardinal principle of separation of powers. For these reasons, once the vice president is convicted by the Senate sitting as impeachment court, she can no longer appeal to the Supreme Court. And the accessory penalty of perpetual disqualification from holding office would mean that she cannot run for any office in 2028.

But then again, the vice president may not be convicted at all. Not because she is not guilty but because she has the number. And that's justice for you and me. Should we just grin and bear it? The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind. The answer is blowing in the wind.