ANTONIO J. VILLEGAS, IN HIS CAPACITY AS MAYOR OF THE CITY OF MANILA, GREGORIO A. EJERCITO, RIZAL DAGA, DIONISIO BARING, DIOSDADO ROQUE, ARTURO T. DE GUIA, AUGUSTO CASIBANG, JOSE…

Manila Ordinance No. 6485, effective January 1, 1968, created the position of City Legal
Officer and the positions of his staff,
and appropriated the ne­cessary amount for their salaries.  This Ordinance was passed pursuant to Section
19 of Republic Act No. 5185, otherwise known as the Decentralization Act of 1967, which authorizes a city to create said
positions to enable the city to avail itself of “full time and trusted
services.” For this purpose, con­tinues the law, “the functions hitherto
performed by the * * * city fiscals in serving as legal adviser and legal
officer for civil cases of the * * * city shall be transferred to the * * *
city legal officer * * *.”

On January 23, 1968,
Mayor Antonio J. Villegas ap­pointed Gregorio A. Ejercito
as City Legal Officer effective January 1, 1968. On the same day Mayor Villegas
designated Ejercito City Legal Officer “[i]/n the interest of the public service and in order to
enable the Office of the City Legal Officer, which was created effective
January 1, 1968, to immediately start functioning.” The Mayor also made
appointments to the staff of the City Legal Officer, as follows:

The
appointments were sent to the Civil Service Commission shortly after the
respective dates of said appointments.

On March
13, 1968, Mayor
Villegas sent Civil Service Commissioner Abelardo Subido a letter of justification of the appointment of Ejercito as City Legal Officer.  The letter, in part, reads:

“Atty. Gregorio A. Ejercito has been
the As­sistant Secretary for legal and Administrative Services up to his
appointment as City Legal Officer of Manila
on January 23, 1968.  He has under his direct charge and
supervision three (3) divi­sions, namely, the Legal Division, Administrative
Division, and the Accounting & Property Division.

“The Legal Division under this organization set-up has been
entrusted with the functions or duties, among others, of:  (1) making researches on legal issues
affecting the interests of the City; (2) processing contracts to be entered by
the City; (3) drafting or preparing executive orders, proclamations, or
proposed ordinances and resolutions for submission to the Municipal Board; (4)
conducting formal administrative investigations against erring officials and em­ployees;
(5) preparing decisions on said administrative cases for the consideration of
the undersigned; and (6) otherwise, performing such other functions which only
lawyers or members of the bar are qualified to perform.

“Indeed, there have been numerous cases which Atty. Gregorio A.
Ejercito and his as­sistants had to handle in court
especially those affecting the rights and interests of the City of Manila
because as has happened not infre­quently, the City Fiscal of Manila (the then
legal adviser and legal officer of the City) took positions or held views in
said cases contrary or adverse to the position taken by the Office of the Mayor
or the undersigned.

“There have also been many instances when Atty. Ejercito and his assistants represented the undersigned in
court or in the fiscal’s office in cases where the
undersigned either sued or was sued in his official capacity as Mayor of
Manila.  In all of these cases where
Atty. Ejercito appeared as counsel either of the City
of Manila or of the undersigned in the latter’s official capacity and upon my
direction, no prior permission was secured from the Commission for him to
appear as such counsel inasmuch as it was part of his duties to handle legal matters affecting the City or
the Mayor of Manila, and to make court appearances when the circumstances
warrant * * *.

“Inasmuch as Atty. Ejercito has been
rendering service in the Office of the Mayor for the last 22 years, performing
legal and administrative work, I believe I am in a good position to assess his
capabilities and qualifications for the position, as well as his dedication to
the service.  Indeed, in recognition of
his outstanding services to the City government in the legal and admi­nistrative
fields, he was voted in the year 1961 by
the City Hall Press Club as the “Most Outstanding Assistant Department
Head” in the City government. 
Considering his long and va­ried experience in the service of the City
government and his familiarity with its administrative practices, procedures
and policies which will serve him in good stead in the new position, I
sincerely believe that his proposed appointment is fully justified.”

No action having been
taken by the Civil Service Commissioner on the appointments despite the lapse
of about 6 months, on July 29, 1968, Mayor Villegas sent Commissioner Subido a follow-up letter concluding:

“From the foregoing it may be seen that early action on the
proposed appointments submitted to your office is urgently necessary to enable the
City Legal Office to dis­charge its duties under the law with a full
complement, particularly considering the volume of work which it has been
attending to since its creation.”

On September 20, 1968,
Mayor Villegas sent the Commissioner another follow-up letter stating that the
appointees who had been working since their appointments without having
received their salaries were suffering privations, and that as more than 180
days had already elapsed since their appointments had been received by the Civil
Service Commission said appointments should be deemed to have been properly
made under Section 20 of Republic Act No. 2260, otherwise known as the Civil
Service Act of 1959, and that said appointments should immediately be released.

On September 30, 1968,
Commissioner Subido sent Mayor Villegas a letter
returning the appointments without action, of all the appointees (except Ejercito) on the ground that Ejercito
had no legal capacity to re­commend said appointments considering that his own
ap­pointment had not yet been approved. 
The letter also said that as the appointments had been sent direct to
the Commissioner, Section 20 of Republic Act No. 2260 was not applicable and
that “this Office is not limited by the law to a period of 180 days within
which to act on appointments.”

On October
1, 1968,
Commissioner Subido disapproved the appointment of Ejercito in an indorsement which
in part states:

“For appointment to the position of City Legal Officer, the
following qualification standards must be met:

Education:  Bachelor of Laws

Experience:  Three years
experience in general legal work and four years experience in trial work in the
Court of First Instance and/or superior courts.

Eligibility:  RA 1080 (BAR)

“Mr. Ejercito is presently holding
the po­sition of Assistant Secretary for Legal and Ad­ministrative
Services.  A certification of the duties
of the said position as certified by that Office has been submitted to this
Office.  A perusal of Mr. Ejercito’s information sheet and the statement of his
duties would show that while he meets the education and civil service
eligibility requirements, he does not meet the four years’ experience in trial
work in the CFI and/or superior courts. 
Suffice it to state that Sec. 23
enjoins that ‘Employees shall be selected on the basis of their fitness to
perform the duties and as­sume the responsibilities of the positions whether in
the competitive or classified or in the non-competitive or unclassified
service.’

“Premises considered, the appointment
of Mr. Ejercito has been disapproved.  * * *.”

The first question
presented before us is, whether Section 20 of Republic Act No. 2260 is applicable to the appointments of Ejercito and his staff which were sub­mitted direct to the
Commissioner of Civil Service.  The
answer is in the negative.  The statute
cited contemplates a situation where an appointment is attested by the city treasurer in his
capacity
as deputy of the Commissioner of Civil Service. 
Such attested appointment takes effect immediately and the appointee is entitled
to receive the salary of the position.  Section 20 then provides
that:

“All appointments
made by * * * city ma­yors shall, after being attested to by the respective * *
* city treasurer, be forwarded within ten days to the Commissioner of Civil Service for review pursuant
to Civil Service law and
rules.  If, within one hundred eighty
days after receipt of said appointments, the Commissioner of Civil Service
shall not have made any correction
or revision, then such appointments shall be deemed to have been properly made
* * *.”

This law, clearly, does not cover the appointments
of Ejercito and his staff.  The law cannot be applied to their
appointments by analogy, because theirs is a dif­ferent situation and there is
no act therein analogous to the attestation mentioned in the law.  It is true that in 1959 there was an
arrangement made by City Treasurer Sarmiento and
Mayor Lacson with Civil Service Commissioner del
Rosario whereby appointments made by the City Mayor were to be sent directly to the Commis­sioner
of Civil Service for
practical reasons, among them the lack of personnel in the Office of the City
Treasurer to process the appointments for purposes of attesting them and the
proximity of the City Hall of Manila to the office of the Civil Service
Commission.  This arrangement however did
not, and could not, mean that said appointments were
to be considered as having been attested by the City Treasurer.

The
second question for resolution is, whether the Commissioner of Civil Service has
the power to impose for the office of City Legal Officer the qualification
standard of “[t]hree years experience
in general legal work and four years experience in trial work in the Court of
First Instance and/or superior courts.” The petitioners contend that it is only the law
that may prescribe qualifications for an office and that the Civil Service
Commis­sioner may not do so, since he has no legislative power.  The Solicitor General, unable to point out
the legal source of respondent Civil Service Commissioner’s alleged power to
prescribe the qualification standard abovementioned, argues that at any rate
said qualification standard is reasonable. 
Section 23 of the Civil Service Act of 1959 which provides in part that “[e]mployees shall be selected on the basis of their fitness to
perform the duties and assume the responsibilities of the positions whether in the competitive or
classified or in the non-competitive or unclassified service,” relied upon
by respondent Civil Service
Commissioner as the source of his alleged power, is not clear or definite on the point. 
However we find it unnecessary to rule on the question presented in view
of our finding below that Ejercito has met said
qualifi­cation standard.

The
third question for decision is, whether Ejercito
is qualified for the position of City Legal
Officer.  The Civil Service
Commissioner’s indorsement of October 1, 1968, says that he has met two of the three
qualification standards therein set by the Commissioner; namely, education, Ejercito being a Bachelor of Laws (1946, U.P. College of
Law), and civil service eligibility, Ejercito having
passed the bar examinations (1946, with a rating of 86.9%). 
With respect to the third qualification standard set by the
Commissioner, to wit:  “[t]hree years expe­rience in general legal work and four years
experience in trial work in the Court of First Instance and/or su­perior courts,”
the indorsement impliedly concedes that Ejercito has met part thereof, namely, three years
experience in general legal work, but denies that he has had “four years
of trial work in the Court of First In­stance and/or superior courts.”
Hence, the issue of Ejercito’s qualification is narrowed down to whether he
has had “four years experience in trial work in the Court of First Instance
and/or superior court.” In resolving this particular question, we have in
view a certification from the office of the Clerk of Court of the Court of
First Instance of Manila dated October 15, 1968, annexed to the Reply, giving
the titles and numbers of 18 civil cases (1959-1967) in the Court of First
Instance of Manila wherein Gregorio A. Ejercito is
the counsel of record or one of the counsel of record for the City of Manila
and/or Mayor and other officials of the City. 
We find said certification together with Mayor Villegas’
letter of justification of Ejercito’s ap­pointment (supra, pp. 3 and 4) sufficient
to show that Ejercito has had more than four years of trial practice in the Court of First Instance of Manila and that
he has met the Commissioner’s third standard qualification of four years of
trial work in the Court of First Instance. 
Moreover, the declared purpose of the law (Section 19, Republic Act No.
5185) in authorizing the creation of the position of City Legal Officer is to
enable the city government to avail itself of the full time and trusted
services of the City Legal Officer.  This
purpose is achieved by the appointment of Ejercito as City Legal Officer because he had rendered the
City of Manila “full time
and trusted legal services” for a period of more than twenty years under
Mayors Lacson and Villegas.

The
fourth question before us is, whether mandamus lies to compel respondent Civil
Service Commissioner Su­bido forthwith to approve the
appointment of Gregorio A. Ejercito as City Legal
Officer of Manila and release the same.  Respondent Commissioner contends that
“this Office is not limited by the law to a period of 180 days within
which to act on appointments.” The contention is unten­able.  We find, and so hold, that there being no
period fixed for the Civil Service
Commissioner to act on ap­pointments directly submitted to him, public policy
and the public interest demand that he take action thereon within the
reasonable time of 180 days from date of
receipt of the appointments by the
Civil Service Commission. Ejercito being qualified
for the position of City Legal Officer to which he was appointed on January 23,
1968, and his appointment having been received by the Civil Service Commission
on January 26 of the same year, it is clear to us that mandamus should now
issue to compel respondent Civil Service Commissioner to forthwith approve said
appointment and release the same.  The indorsement of dis­approval of October 1, 1968, is declared of no value and without effect.

With
respect to the appointments of the staff of the City Legal Officer, considering
that the reason for their return, without action, no longer holds true,
mandamus lies to compel the respondent Civil Service Commissioner to act
thereon within 30 days from date of their re-sub­mission to the Civil Service
Commission.  In this connection attention
is called to the doctrine laid down in the case of Villanueva vs. Balallo, G.R. No. L-17745, October 31, 1963, as follows:

“When the appointee is qualified, as pe­titioner herein admittedly is, then the Commis­sioner of
Civil Service has no choice but to attest to the appointment.”

IN VIEW OF ALL THE FOREGOING, judgment is hereby rendered:  1. commanding respondent Civil Service
Commissioner forthwith to approve the appointment of Gregorio A. Ejercito as City Legal Officer of Manila and release the
same; and 2. commanding respondent Civil Service Commissioner to act on the 28
appointments of the staff of the City Legal Officer, mentioned on page 2 of this
decision, within 30 days from date of their re-submission to the Civil Service
Commission.  No special pronouncement as
to costs.

Concepcion, C.J., Reyes, J.B.L., Dizon, Makalintal, Zaldivar, Sanchez, Fernando, and
Teehankee, JJ., concur.

Castro and Barredo, JJ., did not take part.