The Supreme Court (SC) has amended the rules of procedure that would pave the way for the “expeditious, inexpensive and just disposition” of election protests in the Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections (BSKE) on Oct. 30.
The amended rules are contained in AM No. 07-4-15-SC which was approved during the SC’s full court session last Aug. 29. The amended rules have not been released by the SC.
In a statement, the SC’s public information office (PIO) said “the 2023 Amended Rules shall take effect fifteen (15) days after publication once in a newspaper of general circulation or in the Supreme Court Official Website but its effectivity shall in no case be later than Oct. 15, 2023.”
“The 2023 Amended Rules, which shall apply prospectively to all Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan election contests, provide for expeditious, inexpensive and just determination and disposition of such election contests,” the PIO said.
It also said:
“The 2023 Amended Rules incorporates some of the provisions of the 2019 Amendments to the Rules of Civil Procedure which include, among others, the provisions on the service and filing of pleadings and the judicial affidavit rule, as well as provisions applicable to automated elections in view of the Commission on Elections’ adoption of pilot automated election system in the three (3) barangays -- (one [1] in Quezon City and two [2] in Cavite) in the upcoming elections.”
“Like in the 2022 Interim Amendments to the 2010 Rules of Procedure for Municipal Election Contests (A.M. No. 10-4-1-SC), the 2023 Amended Rules also provides for an initial recount of ballots of the pilot protested clustered precincts or mono precincts, as the case may be. This initial recount is intended to determine whether the protest is meritorious upon showing by the protestant of at least 20 percent substantial recovery from the overall vote lead of the protestee.”
Earlier, the SC had declared unconstitutional the law that postponed the Dec. 5, 2022 BSKE as it affirmed the legal practicality and necessity of proceeding with the BSKE on Oct. 30, 2023.
The SC had said the term of office of the sitting BSK officials is deemed to have ended on Dec. 31, 2022. In the interim, it said that the sitting BSK “shall continue to hold office until their successors shall have been elected and qualified.”
It clarified that the continued discharge of functions by the sitting BSK officials in a “hold-over” capacity “shall in no way constitute as an unconstitutional “legislative appointment.”
It also ruled that the succeeding BSKE “shall be held on the first Monday of December 2025 and every three years thereafter…, and that the Congress is not precluded from further amending RA 9164 (as amended), the law which provides for synchronized BSKE.”
Declared unconstitutional was Republic Act No. 11935, an Act Postponing the December 2022 Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections, which amended RA 9164, the law on Synchronized Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan Elections.
The SC, in a decision written by Justice Antonio T. Kho Jr., had granted the petitions filed by Atty. Romulo B. Macalintal, and Attys. Alberto N. Hidalgo, Aluino O. Ala, Agerico A. Avila, Ted Cassey B. Castello, Joyce Ivy C. Macasa, and Frances May C. Realino.