BY WILLIAM B. DEPASUPIL Reporter

The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed with finality a petition to disqualify former President Joseph Estrada from again seeking the presidency in the May 2010 elections.

“The court denied the petition with finality. There are no substantial arguments in the petition,” said lawyer Midas Marquez, High Tribunal spokesman and concurrently deputy court administrator.

The petition to disqualify Estrada filed by the group Vanguard of the Philippine Constitution Inc., or simply Vanguard, was first junked by the Supreme Court on December 8, 2009. But the group filed a motion for reconsideration.

Marquez explained that Vanguard’s petition was premature as there was a similar petition pending before the Commission on Elections (Comelec). He added that Vanguard has to first wait for the resolution of the Comelec—a Constitutional body—before going to the Supreme Court.

Vanguard’s petition
In its petition, Vanguard, led by a certain Elio Mallari, cited the 1987 Philippine Constitution that prohibits former presidents from seeking any reelection for the same post.

Raul Gonzalez, the former justice secretary and now chief presidential legal counsel, supported Vanguard’s position, saying that Estrada and all other past presidents cannot run for the same position as it is prohibited by the Constitution.

Acting Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera, for her part, said that Estrada was not allowed to run because the pardon granted to him by the Arroyo government was conditional on him not seeking the presidency again.

Estrada was ousted from the Palace in 2001 amid allegations of corruption and mismanagement. His then-Vice President Gloria Arroyo succeeded him, and she later pardoned Estrada after he was convicted of massive graft and corruption.

Qualified to run
Lawyer Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel 3rd, however, does not agree with Gonzalez and Devanadera, saying that the Constitutional prohibition against “the President” seeking reelection literally applies to an incumbent president who has already served more than four years as chief executive.

Pimentel pointed out that the prohibition does not apply to Estrada since he was not the incumbent President and that he had only served two and a half years of his six-year presidential term, which he won in the 1998 elections.

Pimentel added that Devanadera was also wrong in saying that the pardon granted to Estrada was conditional, pointing out that the “whereas clause” of the amnesty she had cited could not be used in watering down the pardon. The pardon fully restored the political rights of Estrada to vote and to be voted for to a public office, the lawyer explained.

Dean Amado Valdez of the University of the East College of Law supported Pimentel’s argument, explaining that the Constitutional prohibition against the president seeking reelection applies only to the incumbent who had completed at least four years in office.

Valdez said that this intent of the framers of the 1987 Constitution was evident when the chairman of the Constitutional Commission (ConCom), Justice Cecilia Muñoz-Palma, made it known that the delegates were voting to bar the reelection of a president who had completed a six-year term.

Gonzalez, however, explained that even if Estrada did not finish his term, his interrupted service was still considered a full term under the Constitution.

“The Constitution says that if you have serve for more than two years, you are considered having served your full term,” he added.

“He cannot run,” Gonzalez insisted. “That’s my position. The pivotal term in the Constitution is any reelection.”