Abdula vs. Guiani G.R. No.: 118821, February 18, 2000, 326 SCRA 1 FACTS: The case involves a petition for certiorari and prohibition to set aside the warrant of arrest issued by Judge Japal M. Guiani of Branch 14 of the Regional Trial Court of Cotabato City. The petitioners, Mayor Bai Unggie D. Abdula and Odin Abdula, were charged with murder in Criminal Case No. 2376. The murder complaint alleged that the petitioners paid six other individuals for the death of a certain Abdul Dimalen, the former COMELEC Registrar of Kabuntalan, Maguindanao. Initially, the Provincial Prosecutor of Maguindanao dismissed the murder charges against the petitioners and five other respondents due to lack of prima facie evidence. However, a separate information for murder was filed against one of the respondents, Kasan Mama. Subsequently, the case was ordered to be returned to the Provincial Prosecutor for further investigation. After additional evidence was presented, the Provincial Prosecutor found a prima
REPUBLIC VS. COURT OF APPEALS
G.R. No. 79732, November 8 ,1993
FACTS:
The Republic of the Philippines has sought the expropriation of certain portions of land owned by the private respondents for the widening and concreting of the Nabua-Bato-Agos Section, Philippine-Japan Highway Loan (PJHL) road. While the right of the Republic is not now disputed, the private respondents, however, demand that the just compensation for the property should be based on fair market value and not that set by Presidential Decree No. 76, as amended, which fixes payment on the basis of the assessment by the assessor or the declared valuation by the owner, whichever is lower. The Regional Trial Court ruled in favor to the private respondents and subsequently affirmed by the Court of Appeals.
In Export Processing Zone Authority ("EPZA") vs. Dulay, etc. et al., this Court held the determination of just compensation in eminent domain to be a judicial function and it thereby declared Presidential Decree No. 76, as well as related decrees, including Presidential Decree No. 1533, to the contrary extent, as unconstitutional and as an impermissible encroachment of judicial prerogatives. The ruling, now conceded by the Republic was reiterated in subsequent cases.
ISSUE:
Whether or not the declaration of nullity of the law in question should have prospective, not retroactive, application.
HELD:
The strict view considers a legislative enactment which is declared unconstitutional as being, for all legal intents and purposes, a total nullity, and it is deemed as if had never existed. Here, of course, we refer to the law itself being per se repugnant to the Constitution. It is not always the case, however, that a law is constitutionally faulty per se. Thus, it may well be valid in its general import. but invalid in its application to certain factual situations. To exemplify, an otherwise valid law may be held unconstitutional only insofar as it is allowed to operate retrospectively such as, in pertinent cases, when it vitiates contractually vested rights. To that extent, its retroactive application may be so declared invalid as impairing the obligations of contracts.
A judicial declaration of invalidity, it is also true, may not necessarily obliterate all the effects and consequences of a void act occurring prior to such a declaration. Thus, in our decisions on the moratorium laws, we have been constrained to recognize the interim effects of said laws prior to their declaration of unconstitutionality, but there we have likewise been unable to simply ignore strong considerations of equity and fair play. So also, even as a practical matter, a situation that may aptly be described as fait accompli may no longer be open for further inquiry, let alone to be unsettled by a subsequent declaration of nullity of a governing statute.
Doctrine of Operative Fact - as an exception to the general rule (an unconstitutional law is void), only applies as a matter of equity and fair play.
FACTS:
The Republic of the Philippines has sought the expropriation of certain portions of land owned by the private respondents for the widening and concreting of the Nabua-Bato-Agos Section, Philippine-Japan Highway Loan (PJHL) road. While the right of the Republic is not now disputed, the private respondents, however, demand that the just compensation for the property should be based on fair market value and not that set by Presidential Decree No. 76, as amended, which fixes payment on the basis of the assessment by the assessor or the declared valuation by the owner, whichever is lower. The Regional Trial Court ruled in favor to the private respondents and subsequently affirmed by the Court of Appeals.
In Export Processing Zone Authority ("EPZA") vs. Dulay, etc. et al., this Court held the determination of just compensation in eminent domain to be a judicial function and it thereby declared Presidential Decree No. 76, as well as related decrees, including Presidential Decree No. 1533, to the contrary extent, as unconstitutional and as an impermissible encroachment of judicial prerogatives. The ruling, now conceded by the Republic was reiterated in subsequent cases.
ISSUE:
Whether or not the declaration of nullity of the law in question should have prospective, not retroactive, application.
HELD:
The strict view considers a legislative enactment which is declared unconstitutional as being, for all legal intents and purposes, a total nullity, and it is deemed as if had never existed. Here, of course, we refer to the law itself being per se repugnant to the Constitution. It is not always the case, however, that a law is constitutionally faulty per se. Thus, it may well be valid in its general import. but invalid in its application to certain factual situations. To exemplify, an otherwise valid law may be held unconstitutional only insofar as it is allowed to operate retrospectively such as, in pertinent cases, when it vitiates contractually vested rights. To that extent, its retroactive application may be so declared invalid as impairing the obligations of contracts.
A judicial declaration of invalidity, it is also true, may not necessarily obliterate all the effects and consequences of a void act occurring prior to such a declaration. Thus, in our decisions on the moratorium laws, we have been constrained to recognize the interim effects of said laws prior to their declaration of unconstitutionality, but there we have likewise been unable to simply ignore strong considerations of equity and fair play. So also, even as a practical matter, a situation that may aptly be described as fait accompli may no longer be open for further inquiry, let alone to be unsettled by a subsequent declaration of nullity of a governing statute.
Doctrine of Operative Fact - as an exception to the general rule (an unconstitutional law is void), only applies as a matter of equity and fair play.