Ramualdez vs COMELEC (48-51)

Caption:

G.R. No. 119976 September 18, 1995

IMELDA ROMUALDEZ-MARCOS, petitioner, 

vs.

COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS and CIRILO ROY MONTEJO, respondents.

Facts:

The petitioner, Imelda Romualdez-Marcos, applied as a candidate to contest elections to the House of Representatives in the district of Leyte. The incumbent representative of the constituency of Leyte, Cirilo Roy Montejo (a candidate for the same position) applied

to Commission on Elections “COMELEC” to have Imelda Romualdez-Marcos’s application rejected on the grounds that it did not meet the constitutional requirement for residency. The constitutional requirement for residency for election purposes stated that in order to contest a position, the candidate must have resided in the location for which they are standing for a period of one year or more. The purpose of the provision was to prevent the possibility of strangers or newcomers who were unacquainted with the needs of a community standing for office. In her original application form, Imelda Romualdez-Marcos had stated that she had resided in Leyte for seven months. In response to the complaint fled by Cirilo Roy Montejo she amended the time of residency in her application from seven months to “since childhood”. She claimed that the entry of the word “seven” in her original Certifcate of Candidacy was the result of an “honest misinterpretation”, which she now sought to rectify. She further stated that she had always maintained Tacloban (in the district of Leyte) as her domicile or residence. COMELEC, after considering the petition of Cirilo Roy Montejo to have the candidacy of Imelda Romualdez-Marcos rejected, found the claim meritorious and refused the petitioner’s original application for candidacy and her amended version. COMELEC rejected the petitioner’s application for candidacy on the basis that her conduct revealed that she did not intend to make Tacloban her domicile, that she had registered as a voter in different places, and on several occasions had declared that she was a resident of Manila. COMELEC stated that although she spent her school days in Tacloban she had abandoned residency when she chose to stay and reside in other places. Imelda Romualdez-Marcos subsequently appealed to the Supreme Court requesting a declaration that she had been a resident, for election purposes, of the First District of Leyte for a period of one year at the time she applied to contest the 1995 elections.

She argued that the meaning of residency in the Constitution, which designated the requirements for candidacy for election purposes, was that of domicile. She argued that she had domicile in Leyte because that was her place of original domicile and she had not acted to replace that domicile with another. She also argued that her marriage and changes of residency alongside her husband when he changed residency did not result in a change in her place of domicile. In support of that argument she claimed that section 69 of the Family Code 1988, which gives a husband and wife the right to jointly fix the family domicile, illustrates the intent of the Philippines Parliament to recognize the rights of women. She claimed therefore that since she had domicile in Leyte she automatically fulfilled the requirements for a one-year residency for election purposes.

The respondents argued the meaning of residency in Article 110 of the Civil Code 1950 was the meaning that should be applied to the constitutional requirement for a one-year residency prior to qualifying for candidacy for the elections. Imelda Romualdez-Marcos, they argued, had changed her residency to that of her husband upon her marriage and at the same time automatically gained her husband’s domicile. After returning to Leyte she had resided there for only seven months and she therefore did not satisfy the one year requirement for candidacy.

Issues:

Was Imelda a resident, for election purposes, of the First District of Leyte for a period of one year at the time of the May 9, 1995 elections. 

Does the Comelec lose jurisdiction to hear and decide a pending disqualification case after the elections? 

Does the House of Representatives Electoral Tribunal assumed exclusive jurisdiction over the question of Imelda's qualifications after the May 8, 1995 elections? 

Held:

The majority of the Supreme Court (eight judges in favor, four against) held that Imelda Romualdez-Marcos was a resident of the First District of Leyte for election purposes, and therefore possessed the necessary residence qualifications to run in Leyte as a candidate for a seat in the House of Representatives. The Court held that the term “residence” in the context of qualifying for certain elected positions is synonymous with the term domicile. Domicile denotes a fixed permanent residence to which one intends to return after an absence. A person can only have a single domicile, although they can abandon one domicile in favor of another. To successfully change domicile, one must demonstrate three (3) requirements:

1.   an actual removal or an actual change of domicile;

2.   a bona fide intention of abandoning the former place of residence and establishing a new one;

3.    and one must act in accordance with that intent.

Only with clear and positive evidence that all three requirements have been met will the residence of origin be lost, otherwise residency will be deemed to continue.

The Court held that the meaning of “residence” in Article 110 of the Civil Code, which states that “the husband shall fix the residence of the family”, is different therefore to the meaning of residence in the Constitution. The term residence may have one meaning in civil law (as under the Civil Code) and another different meaning in political law as represented in the election requirements identified in the Constitution. Residency is satisfied under the Civil Code if a person establishes that they intend to leave a place when the purpose for which they have taken up their abode ends. The purpose of residency might be for pleasure, business, or health and a person may have different residences in various places. However, residency in the Constitution as opposed to the Civil Code means domicile and therefore the key issue is to determine the domicile of the petitioner, Imelda Romualdez-Marcos. The Court held that Article 110 does not create a presumption that a wife automatically gains a husband’s domicile upon marriage. When the petitioner was married to then Congressman Marcos in 1954, she was obliged by virtue of Article 110 of the Civil Code to follow her husband’s actual place of residence as fixed by him. The right of the husband to fix the residence was in harmony with the intention of the law to strengthen and unify the family. It recognised the fact that the husband and wife bring into the marriage different domiciles and if the husband has to stay in or transfer to any one of their residences, the wife should necessarily be with him in order that they may “live together.” However, the term “residence” in Article 110 of the Civil Code does not mean domicile and therefore it cannot be correctly argued that petitioner lost her domicile as a result of her marriage to the late President Ferdinand E. Marcos in 1952. The Court also held that it would be illogical for the Court to assume that a wife cannot regain her original domicile upon the death of her husband, if she has not positively selected a new one during the subsistence of the marriage itself.

The Court held that the new Family Code, which was introduced to replace the Civil Code, confirmed the petitioner’s argument that marriage does not automatically change a wife’s domicile to that of her husband. The Family Code replaced the term “residence” (used in the Civil Code) with the term “domicile”. Article 69 of the Family Code gives a husband and wife the right to jointly fix the family domicile. The provision recognised revolutionary changes in the concept of women’s rights in the intervening years by making the choice of domicile a product of mutual agreement between the spouses. The provision recognised the right of women to choose their own domicile and removed the automatic transfer of a husband’s domicile to his wife.

House of Representative's "HRET" jurisdiction as the sole judge of all contests relating to the elections, returns and qualifications of members of Congress begins only after a candidate has become a member of the House of Representatives. Imelda, not being a member of the House of Representatives, it is obvious that the HRET at this point has no jurisdiction over the question.