SC to DAP sponsors: Prove good faith patron
By Tarra Quismundo |Philippine Daily Inquirer
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Unless it can prove “good faith” before the proper tribunal, Malacañang may be held liable for violating the Constitution by implementing the Disbursement Acceleration Program, the Supreme Court said in striking down the presidential stimulus fund on Tuesday. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines–Unless it can prove “good faith” before the proper tribunal, Malacañang may be held liable for violating the Constitution by implementing the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP), the Supreme Court said in striking down the presidential stimulus fund on Tuesday.
In a 92-page decision written by Associate Justice Lucas Bersamin, the Supreme Court tackled the question of whether its ruling, which declared the DAP unconstitutional, could be interpreted as retroactive or prospective, essentially saying that the fund’s originators had some explaining to do.
Citing the position of Associate Justice Arturo Brion, the court noted how the doctrine of operative fact could be invoked but only apply on programs, activities and projects (PAPs) implemented in good faith prior to the court ruling invalidating the DAP, as a matter of equity.
Effects sustained
The doctrine is a legal principle that upholds the effects of an unconstitutional law, that is, activities conducted under that law prior to its being declared illegal. As the court stated: “…it nullifies the void law or executive act but sustains its effects.”
The court said applying the principle must “be subjected to great scrutiny and circumspection, and it cannot be invoked to validate an unconstitutional law or executive act, but is resorted to only as a matter of equity and fair play.”
This same doctrine, the court said, could not apply on “authors, proponents and implementors of the DAP.”
Doctrine of operative fact
“In that context, as Justice Brion has clarified, the doctrine of operative fact can apply only to the PAPs that can no longer be undone, and whose beneficiaries relied in good faith on the validity of the DAP, but cannot apply to the authors, proponents and implementers of the DAP, unless there are concrete findings of good faith in their favor by the proper tribunals determining their criminal, civil, administrative and other liabilities,” the court said.
The full text of the decision was released Wednesday night.
Impractical, unfair
The court said setting aside the DAP’s prior implementation, where such was done in good faith, would be “impractical and unfair.”
“To declare the implementation of the DAP unconstitutional without recognizing that its prior implementation constituted an operative fact that produced consequences in the real as well as juristic worlds of the government and the nation is to be impractical and unfair,” the court said.
Enormously burdensome
“Unless the doctrine is held to apply, the executive as the disburser and the offices under it and elsewhere as the recipients could be required to undo everything that they had implemented in good faith under the DAP. That scenario would be enormously burdensome for the government. Equity alleviates such burden,” it said.
The court acknowledged that the DAP “yielded undeniably positive results that enhanced the economic welfare of the country.”
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