G.R. No.

L-25291 January 30, 1971

THE INSULAR LIFE ASSURANCE CO., LTD., EMPLOYEES ASSOCIATION-NATU, FGU INSURANCE
GROUP WORKERS and EMPLOYEES ASSOCIATION-NATU, and INSULAR LIFE BUILDING
EMPLOYEES
ASSOCIATION-NATU, petitioners,
vs.
THE INSULAR LIFE ASSURANCE CO., LTD., FGU INSURANCE GROUP, JOSE M. OLBES and
COURT OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, respondents.
Lacsina, Lontok and Perez and Luis F. Aquino for petitioners.
Francisco de los Reyes for respondent Court of Industrial Relations.
Araneta, Mendoza and Papa for other respondents.

CASTRO, J.:
Appeal, by certiorari to review a decision and a resolution en banc of the Court of Industrial Relations dated August
17, 1965 and October 20, 1965, respectively, in Case 1698-ULP.
The Insular Life Assurance Co., Ltd., Employees Association-NATU, FGU Insurance Group Workers & Employees
Association-NATU, and Insular Life Building Employees Association-NATU (hereinafter referred to as the
Unions), while still members of the Federation of Free Workers (FFW), entered into separate collective bargaining
agreements with the Insular Life Assurance Co., Ltd. and the FGU Insurance Group (hereinafter referred to as the
Companies).
Two of the lawyers of the Unions then were Felipe Enaje and Ramon Garcia; the latter was formerly the secretarytreasurer of the FFW and acting president of the Insular Life/FGU unions and the Insular Life Building Employees
Association. Garcia, as such acting president, in a circular issued in his name and signed by him, tried to dissuade
the members of the Unions from disaffiliating with the FFW and joining the National Association of Trade Unions
(NATU), to no avail.
Enaje and Garcia soon left the FFW and secured employment with the Anti-Dummy Board of the Department of
Justice. Thereafter, the Companies hired Garcia in the latter part of 1956 as assistant corporate secretary and legal
assistant in their Legal Department, and he was soon receiving P900 a month, or P600 more than he was receiving
from the FFW. Enaje was hired on or about February 19, 1957 as personnel manager of the Companies, and was
likewise made chairman of the negotiating panel for the Companies in the collective bargaining with the Unions.
In a letter dated September 16, 1957, the Unions jointly submitted proposals to the Companies for a modified
renewal of their respective collective bargaining contracts which were then due to expire on September 30, 1957.
The parties mutually agreed and to make whatever benefits could be agreed upon retroactively effective October 1,
1957.
Thereafter, in the months of September and October 1957 negotiations were conducted on the Union's proposals, but
these were snagged by a deadlock on the issue of union shop, as a result of which the Unions filed on January 27,
1958 a notice of strike for "deadlock on collective bargaining." Several conciliation conferences were held under the
auspices of the Department of Labor wherein the conciliators urged the Companies to make reply to the Unions'
proposals en toto so that the said Unions might consider the feasibility of dropping their demand for union security
in exchange for other benefits. However, the Companies did not make any counter-proposals but, instead, insisted
that the Unions first drop their demand for union security, promising money benefits if this was done. Thereupon,
and prior to April 15, 1958, the petitioner Insular Life Building Employees Association-NATU dropped this

particular demand, and requested the Companies to answer its demands, point by point, en toto. But the respondent
Insular Life Assurance Co. still refused to make any counter-proposals. In a letter addressed to the two other Unions
by the joint management of the Companies, the former were also asked to drop their union security demand,
otherwise the Companies "would no longer consider themselves bound by the commitment to make money benefits
retroactive to October 1, 1957." By a letter dated April 17, 1958, the remaining two petitioner unions likewise
dropped their demand for union shop. April 25, 1958 then was set by the parties to meet and discuss the remaining
demands.
From April 25 to May 6, 1958, the parties negotiated on the labor demands but with no satisfactory result due to a
stalemate on the matter of salary increases. On May 13, 1958 the Unions demanded from the Companies final
counter-proposals on their economic demands, particularly on salary increases. Instead of giving counter-proposals,
the Companies on May 15, 1958 presented facts and figures and requested the Unions to submit a workable formula
which would justify their own proposals, taking into account the financial position of the former. Forthwith the
Unions voted to declare a strike in protest against what they considered the Companies' unfair labor practices.
Meanwhile, eighty-seven (87) unionists were reclassified as supervisors without increase in salary nor in
responsibility while negotiations were going on in the Department of Labor after the notice to strike was served on
the Companies. These employees resigned from the Unions.
On May 20, 1958 the Unions went on strike and picketed the offices of the Insular Life Building at Plaza Moraga.
On May 21, 1958 the Companies through their acting manager and president, the respondent Jose M. Olbes
(hereinafter referred to as the respondent Olbes), sent to each of the strikers a letter (exhibit A) quoted verbatim as
follows:
We recognize it is your privilege both to strike and to conduct picketing.
However, if any of you would like to come back to work voluntarily, you may:
1. Advise the nearest police officer or security guard of your intention to do so.
2. Take your meals within the office.
3. Make a choice whether to go home at the end of the day or to sleep nights at the office where
comfortable cots have been prepared.
4. Enjoy free coffee and occasional movies.
5. Be paid overtime for work performed in excess of eight hours.
6. Be sure arrangements will be made for your families.
The decision to make is yours whether you still believe in the motives of the strike or in the
fairness of the Management.
The Unions, however, continued on strike, with the exception of a few unionists who were convinced to desist by
the aforesaid letter of May 21, 1958.
From the date the strike was called on May 21, 1958, until it was called off on May 31, 1958, some management
men tried to break thru the Unions' picket lines. Thus, on May 21, 1958 Garcia, assistant corporate secretary, and
Vicente Abella, chief of the personnel records section, respectively of the Companies, tried to penetrate the picket
lines in front of the Insular Life Building. Garcia, upon approaching the picket line, tossed aside the placard of a
picketer, one Paulino Bugay; a fight ensued between them, in which both suffered injuries. The Companies

organized three bus-loads of employees, including a photographer, who with the said respondent Olbes, succeeded
in penetrating the picket lines in front of the Insular Life Building, thus causing injuries to the picketers and also to
the strike-breakers due to the resistance offered by some picketers.
Alleging that some non-strikers were injured and with the use of photographs as evidence, the Companies then filed
criminal charges against the strikers with the City Fiscal's Office of Manila. During the pendency of the said cases in
the fiscal's office, the Companies likewise filed a petition for injunction with damages with the Court of First
Instance of Manila which, on the basis of the pendency of the various criminal cases against striking members of the
Unions, issued on May 31, 1958 an order restraining the strikers, until further orders of the said court, from
stopping, impeding, obstructing, etc. the free and peaceful use of the Companies' gates, entrance and driveway and
the free movement of persons and vehicles to and from, out and in, of the Companies' building.
On the same date, the Companies, again through the respondent Olbes, sent individually to the strikers a letter
(exhibit B), quoted hereunder in its entirety:
The first day of the strike was last 21 May 1958.
Our position remains unchanged and the strike has made us even more convinced of our decision.
We do not know how long you intend to stay out, but we cannot hold your positions open for long.
We have continued to operate and will continue to do so with or without you.
If you are still interested in continuing in the employ of the Group Companies, and if there are no
criminal charges pending against you, we are giving you until 2 June 1958 to report for work at
the home office. If by this date you have not yet reported, we may be forced to obtain your
replacement.
Before, the decisions was yours to make.
So it is now.
Incidentally, all of the more than 120 criminal charges filed against the members of the Unions, except three (3),
were dismissed by the fiscal's office and by the courts. These three cases involved "slight physical injuries" against
one striker and "light coercion" against two others.
At any rate, because of the issuance of the writ of preliminary injunction against them as well as the ultimatum of
the Companies giving them until June 2, 1958 to return to their jobs or else be replaced, the striking employees
decided to call off their strike and to report back to work on June 2, 1958.
However, before readmitting the strikers, the Companies required them not only to secure clearances from the City
Fiscal's Office of Manila but also to be screened by a management committee among the members of which were
Enage and Garcia. The screening committee initially rejected 83 strikers with pending criminal charges. However,
all non-strikers with pending criminal charges which arose from the breakthrough incident were readmitted
immediately by the Companies without being required to secure clearances from the fiscal's office. Subsequently,
when practically all the strikers had secured clearances from the fiscal's office, the Companies readmitted only some
but adamantly refused readmission to 34 officials and members of the Unions who were most active in the strike, on
the ground that they committed "acts inimical to the interest of the respondents," without however stating the
specific acts allegedly committed. Among those who were refused readmission are Emiliano Tabasondra, vice
president of the Insular Life Building Employees' Association-NATU; Florencio Ibarra, president of the FGU
Insurance Group Workers & Employees Association-NATU; and Isagani Du Timbol, acting president of the Insular
Life Assurance Co., Ltd. Employees Association-NATU. Some 24 of the above number were ultimately notified
months later that they were being dismissed retroactively as of June 2, 1958 and given separation pay checks

computed under Rep. Act 1787, while others (ten in number) up to now have not been readmitted although there
have been no formal dismissal notices given to them.
On July 29, 1958 the CIR prosecutor filed a complaint for unfair labor practice against the Companies under
Republic Act 875. The complaint specifically charged the Companies with (1) interfering with the members of the
Unions in the exercise of their right to concerted action, by sending out individual letters to them urging them to
abandon their strike and return to work, with a promise of comfortable cots, free coffee and movies, and paid
overtime, and, subsequently, by warning them that if they did not return to work on or before June 2, 1958, they
might be replaced; and (2) discriminating against the members of the Unions as regards readmission to work after
the strike on the basis of their union membership and degree of participation in the strike.
On August 4, 1958 the Companies filed their answer denying all the material allegations of the complaint, stating
special defenses therein, and asking for the dismissal of the complaint.
After trial on the merits, the Court of Industrial Relations, through Presiding Judge Arsenio Martinez, rendered on
August 17, 1965 a decision dismissing the Unions' complaint for lack of merit. On August 31, 1965 the Unions
seasonably filed their motion for reconsideration of the said decision, and their supporting memorandum on
September 10, 1965. This was denied by the Court of Industrial Relations en banc in a resolution promulgated on
October 20, 1965.
Hence, this petition for review, the Unions contending that the lower court erred:
1. In not finding the Companies guilty of unfair labor practice in sending out individually to the
strikers the letters marked Exhibits A and B;
2. In not finding the Companies guilty of unfair labor practice for discriminating against the
striking members of the Unions in the matter of readmission of employees after the strike;
3. In not finding the Companies guilty of unfair labor practice for dismissing officials and
members of the Unions without giving them the benefit of investigation and the opportunity to
present their side in regard to activities undertaken by them in the legitimate exercise of their right
to strike; and
4. In not ordering the reinstatement of officials and members of the Unions, with full back wages,
from June 2, 1958 to the date of their actual reinstatement to their usual employment.
I. The respondents contend that the sending of the letters, exhibits A and B, constituted a legitimate exercise of their
freedom of speech. We do not agree. The said letters were directed to the striking employees individually by
registered special delivery mail at that without being coursed through the Unions which were representing the
employees in the collective bargaining.
The act of an employer in notifying absent employees individually during a strike following
unproductive efforts at collective bargaining that the plant would be operated the next day and that
their jobs were open for them should they want to come in has been held to be an unfair labor
practice, as an active interference with the right of collective bargaining through dealing with the
employees individually instead of through their collective bargaining representatives. (31 Am. Jur.
563, citing NLRB v. Montgomery Ward & Co. [CA 9th] 133 F2d 676, 146 ALR 1045)
Indeed, it is an unfair labor practice for an employer operating under a collective bargaining agreement to negotiate
or to attempt to negotiate with his employees individually in connection with changes in the agreement. And the
basis of the prohibition regarding individual bargaining with the strikers is that although the union is on strike, the
employer is still under obligation to bargain with the union as the employees' bargaining representative (Melo Photo
Supply Corporation vs. National Labor Relations Board, 321 U.S. 332).

Indeed, some such similar actions are illegal as constituting unwarranted acts of interference. Thus, the act of a
company president in writing letters to the strikers, urging their return to work on terms inconsistent with their union
membership, was adjudged as constituting interference with the exercise of his employees' right to collective
bargaining (Lighter Publishing, CCA 7th, 133 F2d 621). It is likewise an act of interference for the employer to send
a letter to all employees notifying them to return to work at a time specified therein, otherwise new employees
would be engaged to perform their jobs. Individual solicitation of the employees or visiting their homes, with the
employer or his representative urging the employees to cease union activity or cease striking, constitutes unfair labor
practice. All the above-detailed activities are unfair labor practices because they tend to undermine the concerted
activity of the employees, an activity to which they are entitled free from the employer's molestation. 1
Moreover, since exhibit A is a letter containing promises of benefits to the employees in order to entice them to
return to work, it is not protected by the free speech provisions of the Constitution (NLRB v. Clearfield Cheese Co.,
Inc., 213 F2d 70). The same is true with exhibit B since it contained threats to obtain replacements for the striking
employees in the event they did not report for work on June 2, 1958. The free speech protection under the
Constitution is inapplicable where the expression of opinion by the employer or his agent contains a promise of
benefit, or threats, or reprisal (31 Am. Jur. 544; NLRB vs. Clearfield Cheese Co., Inc., 213 F2d 70; NLRB vs. Goigy
Co., 211 F2d 533, 35 ALR 2d 422).
Indeed, when the respondents offered reinstatement and attempted to "bribe" the strikers with "comfortable cots,"
"free coffee and occasional movies," "overtime" pay for "work performed in excess of eight hours," and
"arrangements" for their families, so they would abandon the strike and return to work, they were guilty of strikebreaking and/or union-busting and, consequently, of unfair labor practice. It is equivalent to an attempt to break a
strike for an employer to offer reinstatement to striking employees individually, when they are represented by a
union, since the employees thus offered reinstatement are unable to determine what the consequences of returning to
work would be.
Likewise violative of the right to organize, form and join labor organizations are the following acts: the offer of a
Christmas bonus to all "loyal" employees of a company shortly after the making of a request by the union to
bargain; wage increases given for the purpose of mollifying employees after the employer has refused to bargain
with the union, or for the purpose of inducing striking employees to return to work; the employer's promises of
benefits in return for the strikers' abandonment of their strike in support of their union; and the employer's statement,
made about 6 weeks after the strike started, to a group of strikers in a restaurant to the effect that if the strikers
returned to work, they would receive new benefits in the form of hospitalization, accident insurance, profit-sharing,
and a new building to work in. 2
Citing paragraph 5 of the complaint filed by the acting prosecutor of the lower court which states that "the officers
and members of the complainant unions decided to call off the strike and return to work on June 2, 1958 by reason
of the injunction issued by the Manila Court of First Instance," the respondents contend that this was the main cause
why the strikers returned to work and not the letters, exhibits A and B. This assertion is without merit. The
circumstance that the strikers later decided to return to work ostensibly on account of the injunctive writ issued by
the Court of First Instance of Manila cannot alter the intrinsic quality of the letters, which were calculated, or which
tended, to interfere with the employees' right to engage in lawful concerted activity in the form of a strike.
Interference constituting unfair labor practice will not cease to be such simply because it was susceptible of being
thwarted or resisted, or that it did not proximately cause the result intended. For success of purpose is not, and
should not, be the criterion in determining whether or not a prohibited act constitutes unfair labor practice.
The test of whether an employer has interfered with and coerced employees within the meaning of
subsection (a) (1) is whether the employer has engaged in conduct which it may reasonably be said
tends to interfere with the free exercise of employees' rights under section 3 of the Act, and it is
not necessary that there be direct evidence that any employee was in fact intimidated or coerced by
statements of threats of the employer if there is a reasonable inference that anti-union conduct of
the employer does have an adverse effect on self-organization and collective bargaining.
(Francisco, Labor Laws 1956, Vol. II, p. 323, citing NLRB v. Ford, C.A., 1948, 170 F2d 735).

Besides, the letters, exhibits A and B, should not be considered by themselves alone but should be read in the light
of the preceding and subsequent circumstances surrounding them. The letters should be interpreted according to the
"totality of conduct doctrine,"
... whereby the culpability of an employer's remarks were to be evaluated not only on the basis of
their implicit implications, but were to be appraised against the background of and in conjunction
with collateral circumstances. Under this "doctrine" expressions of opinion by an employer which,
though innocent in themselves, frequently were held to be culpable because of the circumstances
under which they were uttered, the history of the particular employer's labor relations or anti-union
bias or because of their connection with an established collateral plan of coercion or interference.
(Rothenberg on Relations, p. 374, and cases cited therein.)
It must be recalled that previous to the petitioners' submission of proposals for an amended renewal of their
respective collective bargaining agreements to the respondents, the latter hired Felipe Enage and Ramon Garcia,
former legal counsels of the petitioners, as personnel manager and assistant corporate secretary, respectively, with
attractive compensations. After the notice to strike was served on the Companies and negotiations were in progress
in the Department of Labor, the respondents reclassified 87 employees as supervisors without increase in salary or in
responsibility, in effect compelling these employees to resign from their unions. And during the negotiations in the
Department of Labor, despite the fact that the petitioners granted the respondents' demand that the former drop their
demand for union shop and in spite of urgings by the conciliators of the Department of Labor, the respondents
adamantly refused to answer the Unions' demands en toto. Incidentally, Enage was the chairman of the negotiating
panel for the Companies in the collective bargaining between the former and the Unions. After the petitioners went
to strike, the strikers were individually sent copies of exhibit A, enticing them to abandon their strike by inducing
them to return to work upon promise of special privileges. Two days later, the respondents, thru their president and
manager, respondent Jose M. Olbes, brought three truckloads of non-strikers and others, escorted by armed men,
who, despite the presence of eight entrances to the three buildings occupied by the Companies, entered thru only one
gate less than two meters wide and in the process, crashed thru the picket line posted in front of the premises of the
Insular Life Building. This resulted in injuries on the part of the picketers and the strike-breakers.lwph1.t Then
the respondents brought against the picketers criminal charges, only three of which were not dismissed, and these
three only for slight misdemeanors. As a result of these criminal actions, the respondents were able to obtain an
injunction from the court of first instance restraining the strikers from stopping, impeding, obstructing, etc. the free
and peaceful use of the Companies' gates, entrance and driveway and the free movement of persons and vehicles to
and from, out and in, of the Companies' buildings. On the same day that the injunction was issued, the letter, Exhibit
B, was sent again individually and by registered special delivery mail to the strikers, threatening them with
dismissal if they did not report for work on or before June 2, 1958. But when most of the petitioners reported for
work, the respondents thru a screening committee of which Ramon Garcia was a member refused to admit 63
members of the Unions on the ground of "pending criminal charges." However, when almost all were cleared of
criminal charges by the fiscal's office, the respondents adamantly refused admission to 34 officials and union
members. It is not, however, disputed that all-non-strikers with pending criminal charges which arose from the
breakthrough incident of May 23, 1958 were readmitted immediately by the respondents. Among the non-strikers
with pending criminal charges who were readmitted were Generoso Abella, Enrique Guidote, Emilio Carreon,
Antonio Castillo, Federico Barretto, Manuel Chuidian and Nestor Cipriano. And despite the fact that the fiscal's
office found no probable cause against the petitioning strikers, the Companies adamantly refused admission to them
on the pretext that they committed "acts inimical to the interest of the respondents," without stating specifically the
inimical acts allegedly committed. They were soon to admit, however, that these alleged inimical acts were the same
criminal charges which were dismissed by the fiscal and by the courts..
Verily, the above actuations of the respondents before and after the issuance of the letters, exhibit A and B, yield the
clear inference that the said letters formed of the respondents scheme to preclude if not destroy unionism within
them.
To justify the respondents' threat to dismiss the strikers and secure replacements for them in order to protect and
continue their business, the CIR held the petitioners' strike to be an economic strike on the basis of exhibit 4 (Notice
of Strike) which states that there was a "deadlock in collective bargaining" and on the strength of the supposed

testimonies of some union men who did not actually know the very reason for the strike. It should be noted that
exhibit 4, which was filed on January 27, 1958, states, inter alia:
TO:
BUREAU
DEPARTMENT
MANILA

OF

LABOR
OF

RELATIONS
LABOR

Thirty (30) days from receipt of this notice by the Office, this [sic] unions intends to go on strike
against
THE
INSULAR
Plaza Moraga, Manila
THE
FGU
Plaza Moraga, Manila
INSULAR
LIFE
Plaza Moraga, Manila .

LIFE

ASSURANCE

INSURANCE

BUILDING

CO.,

LTD.

GROUP

ADMINISTRATION

for the following reason: DEADLOCK IN COLLECTIVE BARGAINING...

However, the employees did not stage the strike after the thirty-day period, reckoned from January 27, 1958. This
simply proves that the reason for the strike was not the deadlock on collective bargaining nor any lack of economic
concessions. By letter dated April 15, 1958, the respondents categorically stated what they thought was the cause of
the "Notice of Strike," which so far as material, reads:
3. Because you did not see fit to agree with our position on the union shop, you filed a notice of
strike with the Bureau of Labor Relations on 27 January 1958, citing `deadlock in collective
bargaining' which could have been for no other issue than the union shop." (exhibit 8, letter dated
April 15, 1958.)
The strike took place nearly four months from the date the said notice of strike was filed. And the actual and main
reason for the strike was, "When it became crystal clear the management double crossed or will not negotiate in
good faith, it is tantamount to refusal collectively and considering the unfair labor practice in the meantime being
committed by the management such as the sudden resignation of some unionists and [who] became supervisors
without increase in salary or change in responsibility, such as the coercion of employees, decided to declare the
strike." (tsn., Oct. 14, 1958, p. 14.) The truth of this assertion is amply proved by the following circumstances: (1) it
took the respondents six (6) months to consider the petitioners' proposals, their only excuse being that they could not
go on with the negotiations if the petitioners did not drop the demand for union shop (exh. 7, respondents' letter
dated April 7, 1958); (2) when the petitioners dropped the demand for union shop, the respondents did not have a
counter-offer to the petitioners' demands. Sec. 14 of Rep. Act 875 required the respondents to make a reply to the
petitioners' demands within ten days from receipt thereof, but instead they asked the petitioners to give a "well
reasoned, workable formula which takes into account the financial position of the group companies." (tsn., Sept. 8,
1958, p. 62; tsn., Feb. 26, 1969, p. 49.)
II. Exhibit H imposed three conditions for readmission of the strikers, namely: (1) the employee must be interested
in continuing his work with the group companies; (2) there must be no criminal charges against him; and (3) he must
report for work on June 2, 1958, otherwise he would be replaced. Since the evidence shows that all the employees
reported back to work at the respondents' head office on June 2, 1953, they must be considered as having complied
with the first and third conditions.
Our point of inquiry should therefore be directed at whether they also complied with the second condition. It is not
denied that when the strikers reported for work on June 2, 1958, 63 members of the Unions were refused

readmission because they had pending criminal charges. However, despite the fact that they were able to secure their
respective clearances 34 officials and union members were still refused readmission on the alleged ground that they
committed acts inimical to the Companies. It is beyond dispute, however, that non-strikers who also had criminal
charges pending against them in the fiscal's office, arising from the same incidents whence the criminal charges
against the strikers evolved, were readily readmitted and were not required to secure clearances. This is a clear act of
discrimination practiced by the Companies in the process of rehiring and is therefore a violation of sec. 4(a) (4) of
the Industrial Peace Act.
The respondents did not merely discriminate against all the strikers in general. They separated the active from the
less active unionists on the basis of their militancy, or lack of it, on the picket lines. Unionists belonging to the first
category were refused readmission even after they were able to secure clearances from the competent authorities
with respect to the criminal charges filed against them. It is significant to note in this connection that except for one
union official who deserted his union on the second day of the strike and who later participated in crashing through
the picket lines, not a single union officer was taken back to work. Discrimination undoubtedly exists where the
record shows that the union activity of the rehired strikers has been less prominent than that of the strikers who were
denied reinstatement.
So is there an unfair labor practice where the employer, although authorized by the Court of
Industrial Relations to dismiss the employees who participated in an illegal strike, dismissed only
the leaders of the strikers, such dismissal being evidence of discrimination against those dismissed
and constituting a waiver of the employer's right to dismiss the striking employees and a
condonation of the fault committed by them." (Carlos and Fernando, Labor and Social Legislation,
p. 62, citing Phil. Air Lines, Inc. v. Phil. Air Lines Emloyees Association, L-8197, Oct. 31, 1958.)
It is noteworthy that perhaps in an anticipatory effort to exculpate themselves from charges of discrimination in
the readmission of strikers returning to work the respondents delegated the power to readmit to a committee. But
the respondent Olbes had chosen Vicente Abella, chief of the personnel records section, and Ramon Garcia, assistant
corporate secretary, to screen the unionists reporting back to work. It is not difficult to imagine that these two
employees having been involved in unpleasant incidents with the picketers during the strike were hostile to
the strikers. Needless to say, the mere act of placing in the hands of employees hostile to the strikers the power of
reinstatement, is a form of discrimination in rehiring.
Delayed reinstatement is a form of discrimination in rehiring, as is having the machinery of
reinstatement in the hands of employees hostile to the strikers, and reinstating a union official who
formerly worked in a unionized plant, to a job in another mill, which was imperfectly organized.
(Morabe, The Law on Strikes, p. 473, citing Sunshine Mining Co., 7 NLRB 1252; Cleveland
Worsted Mills, 43 NLRB 545; emphasis supplied.)
Equally significant is the fact that while the management and the members of the screening committee admitted the
discrimination committed against the strikers, they tossed back and around to each other the responsibility for the
discrimination. Thus, Garcia admitted that in exercising for the management the authority to screen the returning
employees, the committee admitted the non-strikers but refused readmission to the strikers (tsn., Feb. 6, 1962, pp.
15-19, 23-29). Vicente Abella, chairman of the management's screening committee, while admitting the
discrimination, placed the blame therefor squarely on the management (tsn., Sept. 20, 1960, pp. 7-8, 14-18). But the
management, speaking through the respondent Olbes, head of the Companies, disclaimed responsibility for the
discrimination. He testified that "The decision whether to accept or not an employee was left in the hands of that
committee that had been empowered to look into all cases of the strikers." (tsn., Sept. 6, 1962, p. 19.)
Of course, the respondents through Ramon Garcia tried to explain the basis for such discrimination by
testifying that strikers whose participation in any alleged misconduct during the picketing was not serious in nature
were readmissible, while those whose participation was serious were not. (tsn., Aug. 4, 1961, pp. 48-49, 56). But
even this distinction between acts of slight misconduct and acts of serious misconduct which the respondents
contend was the basis for either reinstatement or discharge, is completely shattered upon a cursory examination of
the evidence on record. For with the exception of Pascual Esquillo whose dismissal sent to the other strikers cited
the alleged commission by them of simple "acts of misconduct."

III. Anent the third assignment of error, the record shows that not a single dismissed striker was given the
opportunity to defend himself against the supposed charges against him. As earlier mentioned, when the striking
employees reported back for work on June 2, 1958, the respondents refused to readmit them unless they first secured
the necessary clearances; but when all, except three, were able to secure and subsequently present the required
clearances, the respondents still refused to take them back. Instead, several of them later received letters from the
respondents in the following stereotyped tenor:
This will confirm the termination of your employment with the Insular Life-FGU Insurance Group
as of 2 June 1958.
The termination of your employment was due to the fact that you committed acts of misconduct
while picketing during the last strike. Because this may not constitute sufficient cause under the
law to terminate your employment without pay, we are giving you the amount of P1,930.32
corresponding to one-half month pay for every year of your service in the Group Company.
Kindly acknowledge receipt of the check we are sending herewith.
Very truly yours,
(Sgd.) JOSE M. OLBES
President, Insurance Life
Acting President, FGU.
The respondents, however, admitted that the alleged "acts of misconduct" attributed to the dismissed strikers were
the same acts with which the said strikers were charged before the fiscal's office and the courts. But all these charges
except three were dropped or dismissed.
Indeed, the individual cases of dismissed officers and members of the striking unions do not indicate sufficient basis
for dismissal.
Emiliano Tabasondra, vice-president of the petitioner FGU Insurance Group Workers & Employees AssociationNATU, was refused reinstatement allegedly because he did not report for duty on June 2, 1958 and, hence, had
abandoned his office. But the overwhelming evidence adduced at the trial and which the respondents failed to rebut,
negates the respondents' charge that he had abandoned his job. In his testimony, corroborated by many others,
Tabasondra particularly identified the management men to whom he and his group presented themselves on June 2,
1958. He mentioned the respondent Olbes' secretary, De Asis, as the one who received them and later directed them
when Olbes refused them an audience to Felipe Enage, the Companies' personnel manager. He likewise
categorically stated that he and his group went to see Enage as directed by Olbes' secretary. If Tabasondra were not
telling the truth, it would have been an easy matter for the respondents to produce De Asis and Enage who
testified anyway as witnesses for the respondents on several occasions to rebut his testimony. The respondents
did nothing of the kind. Moreover, Tabasondra called on June 21, 1958 the respondents' attention to his nonadmission and asked them to inform him of the reasons therefor, but instead of doing so, the respondents dismissed
him by their letter dated July 10, 1958. Elementary fairness required that before being dismissed for cause,
Tabasondra be given "his day in court."
At any rate, it has been held that mere failure to report for work after notice to return, does not constitute
abandonment nor bar reinstatement. In one case, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the taking back of six of eleven
men constituted discrimination although the five strikers who were not reinstated, all of whom were prominent in
the union and in the strike, reported for work at various times during the next three days, but were told that there
were no openings. Said the Court:
... The Board found, and we cannot say that its finding is unsupported, that, in taking back six
union men, the respondent's officials discriminated against the latter on account of their union
activities and that the excuse given that they did not apply until after the quota was full was an

afterthought and not the true reason for the discrimination against them. (NLRB v. Mackay Radio
& Telegraph Co., 304 U.S. 333, 58 Sup. Ct. 904, 82 L. Ed. 1381) (Mathews, Labor Relations and
the Law, p. 725, 728)
The respondents' allegation that Tabasondra should have returned after being refused readmission on June 2, 1958,
is not persuasive. When the employer puts off reinstatement when an employee reports for work at the time agreed,
we consider the employee relieved from the duty of returning further.
Sixto Tongos was dismissed allegedly because he revealed that despite the fact that the Companies spent more than
P80,000 for the vacation trips of officials, they refused to grant union demands; hence, he betrayed his trust as an
auditor of the Companies. We do not find this allegation convincing. First, this accusation was emphatically denied
by Tongos on the witness stand. Gonzales, president of one of the respondent Companies and one of the officials
referred to, took a trip abroad in 1958. Exchange controls were then in force, and an outgoing traveller on a
combined business and vacation trip was allowed by the Central Bank, per its Circular 52 (Notification to
Authorized Agent Banks) dated May 9, 1952, an allocation of $1,000 or only P2,000, at the official rate of two pesos
to the dollar, as pocket money; hence, this was the only amount that would appear on the books of the Companies. It
was only on January 21, 1962, per its Circular 133 (Notification to Authorized Agent Banks), that the Central Bank
lifted the exchange controls. Tongos could not therefore have revealed an amount bigger than the above sum. And
his competence in figures could not be doubted considering that he had passed the board examinations for certified
public accountants. But assuming arguendo that Tongos indeed revealed the true expenses of Gonzales' trip
which
the
respondents
never
denied
or
tried
to
disprove his statements clearly fall within the sphere of a unionist's right to discuss and advertise the facts
involved in a labor dispute, in accordance with section 9(a)(5) of Republic Act 875 which guarantees the
untramelled exercise by striking employees of the right to give "publicity to the existence of, or the fact involved in
any labor dispute, whether by advertising, speaking, patrolling or by any method not involving fraud or violence."
Indeed, it is not only the right, it is as well the duty, of every unionist to advertise the facts of a dispute for the
purpose of informing all those affected thereby. In labor disputes, the combatants are expected to expose the truth
before the public to justify their respective demands. Being a union man and one of the strikers, Tongos was
expected to reveal the whole truth on whether or not the respondent Companies were justified in refusing to accede
to union demands. After all, not being one of the supervisors, he was not a part of management. And his statement,
if indeed made, is but an expression of free speech protected by the Constitution.
Free speech on both sides and for every faction on any side of the labor relation is to me a
constitutional and useful right. Labor is free ... to turn its publicity on any labor oppression,
substandard wages, employer unfairness, or objectionable working conditions. The employer, too,
should be free to answer and to turn publicity on the records of the leaders of the unions which
seek the confidence of his men ... (Concurring opinion of Justice Jackson in Thomas v. Collins,
323 U.S. 516, 547, 65 Sup. Ct. 315, 89 L. Ed. 430.) (Mathews, Labor Relations and the Law, p.
591.)
The respondents also allege that in revealing certain confidential information, Tongos committed not only a betrayal
of trust but also a violation of the moral principles and ethics of accountancy. But nowhere in the Code of Ethics for
Certified Public Accountants under the Revised Rules and Regulations of the Board of Accountancy formulated in
1954, is this stated. Moreover, the relationship of the Companies with Tongos was that of an employer and not a
client. And with regard to the testimonies of Juan Raymundo and Antolin Carillo, both vice-presidents of the Trust
Insurance Agencies, Inc. about the alleged utterances made by Tongos, the lower court should not have given them
much weight. The firm of these witnesses was newly established at that time and was still a "general agency" of the
Companies. It is not therefore amiss to conclude that they were more inclined to favor the respondents rather than
Tongos.
Pacifico Ner, Paulino Bugay, Jose Garcia, Narciso Dao, Vicente Alsol and Hermenigildo Ramirez, opined the
lower court, were constructively dismissed by non-readmission allegedly because they not only prevented Ramon
Garcia, assistant corporate secretary, and Vicente Abella, chief of the personnel records section of the Companies,
from entering the Companies' premises on May 21, 1958, but they also caused bruises and abrasions on Garcia's
chest and forehead acts considered inimical to the interest of the respondents. The Unions, upon the other hand,

insist that there is complete lack of evidence that Ner took part in pushing Garcia; that it was Garcia who elbowed
his way through the picket lines and therefore Ner shouted "Close up," which the picketers did; and that Garcia
tossed Paulino Bugay's placard and a fight ensued between them in which both suffered injuries. But despite these
conflicting versions of what actually happened on May 21, 1958, there are grounds to believe that the picketers are
not responsible for what happened.lwph1.t The picketing on May 21, 1958, as reported in the police blotter, was
peaceful (see Police blotter report, exh. 3 in CA-G.R. No. 25991-R of the Court of Appeals, where Ner was
acquitted). Moreover, although the Companies during the strike were holding offices at the Botica Boie building at
Escolta, Manila; Tuason Building at San Vicente Street, Manila; and Ayala, Inc. offices at Makati, Rizal, Garcia, the
assistant corporate secretary, and Abella, the chief of the personnel records section, reported for work at the Insular
Life Building. There is therefore a reasonable suggestion that they were sent to work at the latter building to create
such an incident and have a basis for filing criminal charges against the petitioners in the fiscal's office and applying
for injunction from the court of first instance. Besides, under the circumstances the picketers were not legally bound
to yield their grounds and withdraw from the picket lines. Being where the law expects them to be in the legitimate
exercise of their rights, they had every reason to defend themselves and their rights from any assault or unlawful
transgression. Yet the police blotter, about adverted to, attests that they did not resort to violence.
The heated altercations and occasional blows exchanged on the picket line do not affect or diminish the right to
strike. Persuasive on this point is the following commentary: .
We think it must be conceded that some disorder is unfortunately quite usual in any extensive or
long drawn out strike. A strike is essentially a battle waged with economic weapons. Engaged in it
are human beings whose feelings are stirred to the depths. Rising passions call forth hot words.
Hot words lead to blows on the picket line. The transformation from economic to physical combat
by those engaged in the contest is difficult to prevent even when cool heads direct the fight.
Violence of this nature, however much it is to be regretted, must have been in the contemplation of
the Congress when it provided in Sec. 13 of Act 29 USCA Sec. 163, that nothing therein should be
construed so as to interfere with or impede or diminish in any way the right to strike. If this were
not so, the rights afforded to employees by the Act would indeed be illusory. We accordingly
recently held that it was not intended by the Act that minor disorders of this nature would deprive
a striker of the possibility of reinstatement. (Republic Steel Corp. v. N. L. R. B., 107 F2d
472, cited in Mathews, Labor Relations and the Law, p. 378)
Hence the incident that occurred between Ner, et al. and Ramon Garcia was but a necessary incident of the strike
and should not be considered as a bar to reinstatement. Thus it has been held that:
Fist-fighting between union and non-union employees in the midst of a strike is no bar to reinstatement. (Teller,
Labor Disputes and Collective Bargaining, Vol. II, p. 855 citing Stackpole Carbon, Co. 6 NLRB 171, enforced 105
F2d 167.)
Furthermore, assuming that the acts committed by the strikers were transgressions of law, they amount only to mere
ordinary misdemeanors and are not a bar to reinstatement.
In cases involving misdemeanors the board has generally held that unlawful acts are not bar to reinstatement.
(Teller, Labor Disputes and Collective Bargaining, Id., p. 854, citing Ford Motor Company, 23 NLRB No. 28.)
Finally, it is not disputed that despite the pendency of criminal charges against non-striking employees before the
fiscal's office, they were readily admitted, but those strikers who had pending charges in the same office were
refused readmission. The reinstatement of the strikers is thus in order.
[W]here the misconduct, whether in reinstating persons equally guilty with those whose
reinstatement is opposed, or in other ways, gives rise to the inference that union activities rather
than misconduct is the basis of his [employer] objection, the Board has usually required
reinstatement." (Teller, supra, p. 853, citing the Third Annual Report of NLRB [1938], p. 211.)

Lastly, the lower Court justified the constructive dismissal of Florencio Ibarra allegedly because he committed acts
inimical to the interest of the respondents when, as president of the FGU Workers and Employees AssociationNATU, he advised the strikers that they could use force and violence to have a successful picket and that picketing
was precisely intended to prevent the non-strikers and company clients and customers from entering the Companies'
buildings. Even if this were true, the record discloses that the picket line had been generally peaceful, and that
incidents happened only when management men made incursions into and tried to break the picket line. At any rate,
with or without the advice of Ibarra, picketing is inherently explosive. For, as pointed out by one author, "The picket
line is an explosive front, charged with the emotions and fierce loyalties of the union-management dispute. It may be
marked by colorful name-calling, intimidating threats or sporadic fights between the pickets and those who pass the
line." (Mathews, Labor Relations and the Law, p. 752). The picket line being the natural result of the respondents'
unfair labor practice, Ibarra's misconduct is at most a misdemeanor which is not a bar to reinstatement. Besides, the
only evidence presented by the Companies regarding Ibarra's participation in the strike was the testimony of one
Rodolfo Encarnacion, a former member of the board of directors of the petitioner FGU Insurance Group Workers
and Employees Union-NATU, who became a "turncoat" and who likewise testified as to the union activities of Atty.
Lacsina, Ricardo Villaruel and others (annex C, Decision, p. 27) another matter which emphasizes the
respondents' unfair labor practice. For under the circumstances, there is good ground to believe that Encarnacion
was made to spy on the actvities of the union members. This act of the respondents is considered unjustifiable
interference in the union activities of the petitioners and is unfair labor practice.
It has been held in a great number of decisions at espionage by an employer of union activities, or
surveillance thereof, are such instances of interference, restraint or coercion of employees in
connection with their right to organize, form and join unions as to constitute unfair labor practice.
... "Nothing is more calculated to interfere with, restrain and coerce employees in the exercise of
their right to self-organization than such activity even where no discharges result. The information
obtained by means of espionage is in valuable to the employer and can be used in a variety of
cases to break a union." The unfair labor practice is committed whether the espionage is carried on
by a professional labor spy or detective, by officials or supervisory employees of the employer, or
by fellow employees acting at the request or direction of the employer, or an ex-employee..."
(Teller, Labor Disputes and Collective Bargaining, Vol. II, pp. 765-766, and cases cited.) .
IV. The lower court should have ordered the reinstatement of the officials and members of the Unions, with full
back wages from June 2, 1958 to the date of their actual reinstatement to their usual employment. Because all too
clear from the factual and environmental milieu of this case, coupled with settled decisional law, is that the Unions
went on strike because of the unfair labor practices committed by the respondents, and that when the strikers
reported back for work upon the invitation of the respondents they were discriminatorily dismissed. The
members and officials of the Unions therefore are entitled to reinstatement with back pay.
[W]here the strike was induced and provoked by improper conduct on the part of an employer
amounting to an 'unfair labor practice,' the strikers are entitled to reinstatement with back pay.
(Rothenberg on Labor Relations, p. 418.)
[A]n employee who has been dismissed in violation of the provisions of the Act is entitled to
reinstatement with back pay upon an adjudication that the discharge was illegal."
(Id., citingWaterman S. S. Corp. v. N. L. R. B., 119 F2d 760; N. L. R. B. v. Richter's Bakery, 140
F2d 870; N. L. R. B. v. Southern Wood Preserving Co., 135 F. 2d 606; C. G. Conn, Ltd. v. N. L.
R. B., 108 F2d 390; N. L. R. B. v. American Mfg. Co., 106 F2d 61; N. L. R. B. v. Kentucky Fire
Brick Co., 99 F2d 99.)
And it is not a defense to reinstatement for the respondents to allege that the positions of these union members have
already been filled by replacements.
[W]here the employers' "unfair labor practice" caused or contributed to the strike or where the
'lock-out' by the employer constitutes an "unfair labor practice," the employer cannot successfully

urge as a defense that the striking or lock-out employees position has been filled by replacement.
Under such circumstances, if no job sufficiently and satisfactorily comparable to that previously
held by the aggrieved employee can be found, the employer must discharge the replacement
employee, if necessary, to restore the striking or locked-out worker to his old or comparable
position ... If the employer's improper conduct was an initial cause of the strike, all the strikers are
entitled to reinstatement and the dismissal of replacement employees wherever necessary; ... . (Id.,
p. 422 and cases cited.)
A corollary issue to which we now address ourselves is, from what date should the backpay payable to the unionists
be computed? It is now a settled doctrine that strikers who are entitled to reinstatement are not entitled to back pay
during the period of the strike, even though it is caused by an unfair labor practice. However, if they offer to return
to work under the same conditions just before the strike, the refusal to re-employ or the imposition of conditions
amounting to unfair labor practice is a violation of section 4(a) (4) of the Industrial Peace Act and the employer is
liable for backpay from the date of the offer (Cromwell Commercial Employees and Laborers Union vs. Court of
Industrial Relations, L-19778, Decision, Sept. 30, 1964, 12 SCRA 124; Id., Resolution on motion for
reconsideration, 13 SCRA 258; see also Mathews, Labor Relations and the Law, p. 730 and the cited cases). We
have likewise ruled that discriminatorily dismissed employees must receive backpay from the date of the act of
discrimination, that is, from the date of their discharge (Cromwell Commercial Employees and Laborers Union vs.
Court of Industrial Relations, supra).
The respondents notified the petitioner strikers to report back for work on June 2, 1958, which the latter did. A great
number of them, however, were refused readmission because they had criminal charges against them pending before
the fiscal's office, although non-strikers who were also facing criminal indictments were readily readmitted. These
strikers who were refused readmission on June 2, 1958 can thus be categorized as discriminatorily dismissed
employees and are entitled to backpay from said date. This is true even with respect to the petitioners Jose Pilapil,
Paulino Bugay, Jr. and Jose Garcia, Jr. who were found guilty only of misdemeanors which are not considered
sufficient to bar reinstatement (Teller, Labor Disputes and Collective Bargaining, p. 854), especially so because their
unlawful acts arose during incidents which were provoked by the respondents' men. However, since the employees
who were denied readmission have been out of the service of the Companies (for more than ten years) during which
they may have found other employment or other means of livelihood, it is only just and equitable that whatever they
may have earned during that period should be deducted from their back wages to mitigate somewhat the liability of
the company, pursuant to the equitable principle that no one is allowed to enrich himself at the expense of another
(Macleod & Co. of the Philippines v. Progressive Federation of Labor, 97 Phil. 205 [1955]).
The lower court gave inordinate significance to the payment to and acceptance by the dismissed employees of
separation pay. This Court has ruled that while employers may be authorized under Republic Act 1052 to terminate
employment of employees by serving the required notice, or, in the absence thereof, by paying the required
compensation, the said Act may not be invoked to justify a dismissal prohibited by law, e.g., dismissal for union
activities.
... While Republic Act No. 1052 authorizes a commercial establishment to terminate the
employment of its employee by serving notice on him one month in advance, or, in the absence
thereof, by paying him one month compensation from the date of the termination of his
employment, such Act does not give to the employer a blanket authority to terminate the
employment regardless of the cause or purpose behind such termination. Certainly, it cannot be
made use of as a cloak to circumvent a final order of the court or a scheme to trample upon the
right of an employee who has been the victim of an unfair labor practice. (Yu Ki Lam, et al. v.
Nena Micaller, et al., 99 Phil. 904 [1956].)
Finally, we do not share the respondents' view that the findings of fact of the Court of Industrial Relations are
supported by substantial and credible proof. This Court is not therefore precluded from digging deeper into the
factual milieu of the case (Union of Philippine Education Employees v. Philippine Education Company, 91 Phil. 93;
Lu Do & Lu Ym Corporation v. Philippine-Land-Air-Sea Labor Union, 11 SCRA 134 [1964]).

V. The petitioners (15 of them) ask this Court to cite for contempt the respondent Presiding Judge Arsenio Martinez
of the Court of Industrial Relations and the counsels for the private respondents, on the ground that the former wrote
the following in his decision subject of the instant petition for certiorari, while the latter quoted the same on pages
90-91 of the respondents' brief: .
... Says the Supreme Court in the following decisions:
In a proceeding for unfair labor practice, involving a determination as to
whether or not the acts of the employees concerned justified the adoption of the
employer of disciplinary measures against them, the mere fact that the
employees may be able to put up a valid defense in a criminal prosecution for
the same acts, does not erase or neutralize the employer's right to impose
discipline on said employees. For it is settled that not even the acquittal of an
employee of the criminal charge against him is a bar to the employer's right to
impose discipline on its employees, should the act upon which the criminal
charged was based constitute nevertheless an activity inimical to the employer's
interest... The act of the employees now under consideration may be considered
as a misconduct which is a just cause for dismissal. (Lopez, Sr., et al. vs.
Chronicle Publication Employees Ass'n. et al., G.R. No. L-20179-81, December
28, 1964.) (emphasis supplied)
The two pertinent paragraphs in the above-cited decision * which contained the underscored portions of the above
citation read however as follows:
Differently as regard the dismissal of Orlando Aquino and Carmelito Vicente, we are inclined to
uphold the action taken by the employer as proper disciplinary measure. A reading of the article
which allegedly caused their dismissal reveals that it really contains an insinuation albeit subtly of
the supposed exertion of political pressure by the Manila Chronicle management upon the City
Fiscal's Office, resulting in the non-filing of the case against the employer. In rejecting the
employer's theory that the dismissal of Vicente and Aquino was justified, the lower court
considered the article as "a report of some acts and omissions of an Assistant Fiscal in the exercise
of his official functions" and, therefore, does away with the presumption of malice. This being a
proceeding for unfair labor practice, the matter should not have been viewed or gauged in the light
of the doctrine on a publisher's culpability under the Penal Code. We are not here to determine
whether the employees' act could stand criminal prosecution, but only to find out whether the
aforesaid act justifies the adoption by the employer of disciplinary measure against them. This is
not sustaining the ruling that the publication in question is qualified privileged, but even on the
assumption that this is so, the exempting character thereof under the Penal Code does not
necessarily erase or neutralize its effect on the employer's interest which may warrant employment
of disciplinary measure. For it must be remembered that not even the acquittal of an employee, of
the criminal charges against him, is a bar to the employer's right to impose discipline on its
employees, should the act upon which the criminal charges was based constitute nevertheless an
activity inimical to the employer's interest.
In the herein case, it appears to us that for an employee to publish his "suspicion," which actually
amounts to a public accusation, that his employer is exerting political pressure on a public official
to thwart some legitimate activities on the employees, which charge, in the least, would sully the
employer's reputation, can be nothing but an act inimical to the said employer's interest. And the
fact that the same was made in the union newspaper does not alter its deleterious character nor
shield or protect a reprehensible act on the ground that it is a union activity, because such end can
be achieved without resort to improper conduct or behavior. The act of the employees now under
consideration may be considered as a misconduct which is a just cause for dismissal.** (Emphasis
ours)

It is plain to the naked eye that the 60 un-underscored words of the paragraph quoted by the respondent Judge do not
appear in the pertinent paragraph of this Court's decision in L-20179-81. Moreover, the first underscored sentence in
the quoted paragraph starts with "For it is settled ..." whereas it reads, "For it must be remembered ...," in this Court's
decision. Finally, the second and last underlined sentence in the quoted paragraph of the respondent Judge's
decision, appears not in the same paragraph of this Court's decision where the other sentence is, but in the
immediately succeeding paragraph.
This apparent error, however, does not seem to warrant an indictment for contempt against the respondent Judge and
the respondents' counsels. We are inclined to believe that the misquotation is more a result of clerical ineptitude than
a deliberate attempt on the part of the respondent Judge to mislead. We fully realize how saddled with many pending
cases are the courts of the land, and it is not difficult to imagine that because of the pressure of their varied and
multifarious work, clerical errors may escape their notice. Upon the other hand, the respondents' counsels have
the prima facie right to rely on the quotation as it appears in the respondent Judge's decision, to copy it verbatim,
and to incorporate it in their brief. Anyway, the import of the underscored sentences of the quotation in the
respondent Judge's decision is substantially the same as, and faithfully reflects, the particular ruling in this Court's
decision, i.e., that "[N]ot even the acquittal of an employee, of the criminal charges against him, is a bar to the
employer's right to impose discipline on its employees, should the act upon which the criminal charges were based
constitute nevertheless an activity inimical to the employer's interest."
Be that as it may, we must articulate our firm view that in citing this Court's decisions and rulings, it is the bounden
duty of courts, judges and lawyers to reproduce or copy the same word-for-word and punctuation mark-forpunctuation mark. Indeed, there is a salient and salutary reason why they should do this. Only from this Tribunal's
decisions and rulings do all other courts, as well as lawyers and litigants, take their bearings. This is because the
decisions referred to in article 8 of the Civil Code which reads, "Judicial decisions applying or interpreting the laws
or the Constitution shall form a part of the legal system of the Philippines," are only those enunciated by this Court
of last resort. We said in no uncertain terms in Miranda, et al. vs. Imperial, et al. (77 Phil. 1066) that "[O]nly the
decisions of this Honorable Court establish jurisprudence or doctrines in this jurisdiction." Thus, ever present is the
danger that if not faithfully and exactly quoted, the decisions and rulings of this Court may lose their proper and
correct meaning, to the detriment of other courts, lawyers and the public who may thereby be misled. But if inferior
courts and members of the bar meticulously discharge their duty to check and recheck their citations of authorities
culled not only from this Court's decisions but from other sources and make certain that they are verbatim
reproductions down to the last word and punctuation mark, appellate courts will be precluded from acting on
misinformation, as well as be saved precious time in finding out whether the citations are correct.
Happily for the respondent Judge and the respondents' counsels, there was no substantial change in the thrust of this
Court's particular ruling which they cited. It is our view, nonetheless, that for their mistake, they should be, as they
are hereby, admonished to be more careful when citing jurisprudence in the future. ACCORDINGLY, the decision
of the Court of Industrial Relations dated August 17, 1965 is reversed and set aside, and another is entered, ordering
the respondents to reinstate the dismissed members of the petitioning Unions to their former or comparatively
similar positions, with backwages from June 2, 1958 up to the dates of their actual reinstatements. Costs against the
respondents.
Concepcion, C.J., Reyes, J.B.L., Dizon, Makalintal, Fernando, Teehankee, Barredo, Villamor and Makasiar, JJ.,
concur.
Zaldivar, J., took no part.
G.R. No. 191714

February 26, 2014

T & H SHOPFITTERS CORPORATION/GIN QUEEN CORPORATION, STINNES HUANG, BEN

HUANG
and
ROGELIO
MADRIAGA, Petitioners,
vs.
T & H SHOPFITTERS CORPORATION/GIN QUEEN WORKERS UNION, ELPIDIO ZALDIVAR, DARI
OS GONZALES, WILLIAM DOMINGO, BOBBY CASTILLO, JIMMY M. PASCUA, GERMANO M.

BAJO, RICO L. MANZANO, ALLAN L. CALLORINA, ROMEO BLANCO, GILBERT M. GARCIA,

CARLOS F. GERILLO, EDUARDO A. GRANDE, EDILBRANDO MARTICIO, VIVENCIO SUSANO,
ROLANDO GARCIA, JR., MICHAEL FABABIER, ROWELL MADRIAGA, PRESNIL TOLENTINO,
MARVIN VENTURA, FRANCISCO RIVARES, PLACIDO TOLENTINO and ROLANDO
ROMERO, Respondents.
DECISION
MENDOZA, J.:
Assailed in this petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court are: 1) the November 12, 2009
Decision1 of the Court of Appeals (CA), in CA-G.R. SP No. 107188, which affirmed the July 24, 2007 and
November 13, 2008 Decision2 of the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC); and 2) its March 24, 2010
Resolution3 denying reconsideration of its decision.
The Facts
On September 7, 2004, the T&H Shopfitters Corporation/ Gin Queen Corporation workers union (THS-GQ Union)
and Elpidio Zaldivar,4 Darios Gonzales, William Domingo, Bobby Castillo, Jimmy M. Pascua, Germano M.
Bajo,5Rico L. Manzano, Allan L. Callorina,6 Romeo Blanco, Gilbert M. Garcia, Carlos F. Gerillo, Eduardo A.
Grande, Edilbrando Marticio, Vivencio Susano, Rolando Garcia, Jr., Michael Fababier, Rowell Madriaga, Presnil
Tolentino, Marvin Ventura, Francisco Rivares, Placido Tolentino, and Rolando Romero (respondents), all of whom
are officers and/or members of THS-GQ union, filed their Complaint7 for Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) by way of
union busting, and Illegal Lockout, with moral and exemplary damages and attorneys fees, against T&H Shopfitters
Corporation (T&H Shopfitters) and Gin Queen Corporation (Gin Queen) (collectively referred to as "petitioners"),
before the Labor Arbiter (LA).
Respondents treated T&H Shopfitters and Gin Queen as a single entity and their sole employer. In their desire to
improve their working conditions, respondents and other employees of petitioners held their first formal meeting on
November 23, 2003 to discuss the formation of a union. The following day or on November 24, 2003, seventeen
(17) employees were barred from entering petitioners factory premises located in Castillejos, Zambales, and
ordered to transfer to T&H Shopfitters warehouse at Subic Bay Freeport Zone (SBFZ) purportedly because of its
expansion. Afterwards, the said seventeen (17) employees were repeatedly ordered to go on forced leave due to the
unavailability of work.
On December 18, 2003, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), Regional Office No. III issued a
certificate of registration in favor of THS-GQ Union.
Respondents contended that the affected employees were not given regular work assignments, while subcontractors
were continuously hired to perform their functions. This development prompted respondents to seek the assistance
of the National Conciliation and Mediation Board. Subsequently, an agreement between petitioners and THS-GQ
Union was reached. Petitioners agreed to give priority to regular employees in the distribution of work assignments.
Respondents averred, however, that petitioners never complied with its commitment but instead hired contractual
workers.
On March 24, 2004, THS-GQ Union filed a petition for certification election. On July 12, 2004, an order was issued
to hold the certification election in both T&H Shopfitters and Gin Queen. Eventually, the certification election was
scheduled on October 11, 2004.
Meanwhile, through a memorandum, dated August 17, 2004, petitioner Ben Huang (Huang), Director for Gin
Queen, informed its employees of the expiration of the lease contract between Gin Queen and its lessor in
Castillejos, Zambales and announced the relocation of its office and workers to Cabangan, Zambales. Some of the
respondents, who visited the site in Cabangan, discovered that it was a "talahiban" or grassland. Later, the said union
officers and members were made to work as grass cutters in Cabangan, under the supervision of a certain Barangay

Captain Greg Pangan. Due to these circumstances, the employees assigned in Cabangan did not report for work. As
a consequence, the THS-GQ Union president was made to explain why he should not be terminated for
insubordination. The other employees who likewise failed to report in Cabangan were meted out with suspension.
On October 10, 2004, petitioners sponsored a field trip to Iba, Zambales, for its employees. The officers and
members of the THS-GQ Union were purportedly excluded from the field trip. On the evening of the field trip, a
certain Angel Madriaga, a sales officer of petitioners, campaigned against the union in the forthcoming certification
election.
The following day or on October 11, 2004, the employees were escorted from the field trip to the polling center in
Zambales to cast their votes. On October 13, 2004, the remaining employees situated at the SBFZ plant cast their
votes as well. Due to the heavy pressure exerted by petitioners, the votes for "no union" prevailed. On October 14,
2004, the THS-GQ Union filed its protest with respect to the certification election proceedings.
Respondents averred that the following week after the certification elections were held, petitioners retrenched THGGQ Union officers and members assigned at the Zambales plant. Respondents claimed that the work weeks of those
employees in the SBFZ plant were drastically reduced to only three (3) days in a month.
In its defense, Gin Queen, claiming that it is a corporation separate and distinct from T&H Shopfitters, stressed that
respondents were all employees. Gin Queen claimed that due to the decrease in orders from its customers, they had
to resort to cost cutting measures to avoid anticipated financial losses. Thus, it assigned work on a rotational basis. It
was of the impression that the employees, who opposed its economic measures, were merely motivated by spite in
filing the complaint for ULP against it.
In addition, Gin Queen explained that its transfer from Castillejos, Zambales to Cabangan, Zambales was a result of
the expiration of its lease agreement with Myra D. Lumibao (Myra), its lessor. Since the Cabangan site was bare and
still required construction, Gin Queen offered work, to employees who opted to stay, on rotation as well.
In its Decision,8 dated December 21, 2005, the LA dismissed respondents complaint and all their money claims for
lack of merit.
In dismissing the complaint, the LA explained:
x x x x.
In the case at bar, we carefully examined the grounds raised by the complainants [herein respondents] as basis for
claiming that the respondents [herein petitioners] committed unfair labor practices by way of illegal lockout, one of
which is the alleged transfer of 17 workers to Subic Bay Freeport Zone, however, we are dismay (sic) to know that
not even one of these 17 workers is a complainant in these cases. While the labor union may represent its members
in filing cases before this Office, at least these members must show their intention to file a case by signing in the
complaint to prove that they have grievances against their employer which was lacking in these cases. Further, there
was no showing that the transfer of these 17 workers is considered an unfair labor practice of the respondents
considering that their transfer was effected long before the union was organized.
We also analyzed the allegations of the complainants that the transfer of the working cite (sic) of the respondent Gin
Queen Corporation was a part of the unfair labor practices committed by the respondents, however, the
complainants failed miserably to controvert the documentary evidence adduced by the respondent Gin Queen
Corporation that the lease contract agreement of the place had already expired and it was the management
prerogative to transfer as a cost cutting measures. Again the transfer of the place of work would not be considered as
unfair labor practice.
Complainants alleged that the respondents committed unfair labor practices by means of lockout wherein the
respondents should have temporarily refused to provide work to the complainants by a result of labor or industrial

dispute. Complainants failed to show that the rotation of work for them is considered an unfair labor practice and
considered a Lockout.
Complainants rather submitted several notices showing that the company has no sufficient orders coming from
clients and does not have enough raw materials for production as basis for these complainants not to render work
and be rotated, and thus controvert their allegations that there was lockout committed by the respondents. Further,
the documentary evidences adduced by the complainants clearly show that respondents never terminated the
complainants when they were given their notices of suspension negating the claim that there was lockout
committed by respondents.
x x x x.9
Aggrieved, respondents appealed to the NLRC. In its July 24, 2007 Decision, the NLRC reversed the LA decision
and ruled in favor of respondents. The dispositive portion of the said decision reads:
WHEREFORE, the decision appealed from is hereby REVERSED.
Respondents T & H Shopfitters Corp., Gin Queen Corp. (or MDL, as it is now called), Stennis Huang, as well as
the presidents of the respondent corporations as of November 2003 and the date of the execution of this decision are
hereby ordered to pay each of the complainants moral and exemplary damages amounting to P50,000.00
and P35,000.00 respectively. In addition, they shall pay the complainants attorneys fees equivalent to ten percent
(10%) of the total judgment award.
SO ORDERED.
In granting the appeal, the NLRC reasoned:
Based on the above-mentioned affidavits,10 it may be concluded that the respondents [herein petitioners] committed
unfair labor practice acts consisting in interfering with the exercise of the employees right to self-organization
(specifically, sponsoring a field trip on the day preceding the certification election, warning the employees of dire
consequences should the union prevail, and escorting them to the polling center) and discriminating in regard to
conditions of employment in order to discourage union membership (assigning union officers and active union
members as grass cutters on rotation basis).
xxxx
Furthermore, it is noteworthy that, based on their Articles of Incorporation, T & H Corporation and Gin Queen
Corporation are engaged in the same line of business. It should also be noted that respondents did not controvert the
allegations to the effect that Myra D. Lumibao, the supposed lessor of respondent corporations, is the wife of
respondent Stennis Huang, and that Gin Queen Corporation has been renamed MDL, but still carries on the same
business in the same premises using the same machines and facilities. These circumstances, together with the
supposed assignment of respondent Stennis Huangs interest in Gin Queen Corporation to a third party are badges of
fraud that justify the piercing of the veil of corporate fiction. x x x
Thus, based on the foregoing, respondents T & H Shopfitters Corporation, Gin Queen Corporation (now known as
MDL) and Stennis Huang, as well as the presidents of the respondent corporations as of November 2003 and the
date of execution of this decision may be held liable for unfair labor practice and the corresponding award of moral
and exemplary damages.11
Petitioners filed a motion for reconsideration but the NLRC denied the same in its November 13, 2008 Decision.
Dissatisfied with the adverse ruling, petitioners instituted a petition for certiorari under Rule 65 of the Rules of Court
before the CA arguing grave abuse of discretion on the part of the NLRC in reversing the LA decision.

In its Decision, dated November 12, 2009, the CA sustained the NLRC ruling. The fallo of which reads:
WHEREFORE, premises considered, the petition for certiorari is DENIED. The NLRC Decisions dated July 24,
2007 and November 13, 2008 in NLRC NCR CA NO. 048258 (NLRC RAB III-09-7882-04, NLRC RAB III-097980-04) are AFFIRMED.
SO ORDERED.
The CA held that errors of judgment are not within the province of a special civil action for certiorari. It declared
that factual findings of quasi-judicial agencies that had acquired expertise in matters entrusted to their jurisdiction
were accorded not only respect but finality if they were supported by substantial evidence. The CA noted that the
NLRC considered the evidence and applied the law in this case, thus, no grave abuse of discretion could be imputed
on the part of the NLRC in reversing the LA ruling.
Petitioners moved for reconsideration but the same was denied by the CA in its March 24, 2010 Resolution.
Not in conformity with the ruling of the CA, petitioners seek relief with this Court raising the following ISSUES
I. WHETHER OR NOT PETITIONERS T & H SHOPFITTERS CORPORATION AND GIN QUEEN
CORPORATION ARE ONE AND THE SAME CORPORATION.
II. WHETHER OR NOT PETITIONER GIN QUEEN CORPORATION IS LIABLE TO THE
RESPONDENTS FOR UNFAIR LABOR PRACTICE.
III. WHETHER OR NOT THE AWARD OF MORAL AND EXEMPLARY DAMAGES IN FAVOR OF
THE RESPONDENTS IS PROPER.
IV. WHETHER OR NOT THE AWARD OF TEN PERCENT (10%) ATTORNEYS FEES IN FAVOR
OF THE RESPONDENT IS PROPER.12
Simply put, the issue for the Courts resolution is whether ULP acts were committed by petitioners against
respondents in the case at bench.
In support of their position, petitioners stress that T&H Shopfitters and Gin Queen are corporations separate and
distinct from each other. Consequently, T&H Shopfitters and Stinnes Huang, an officer of T&H Shopfitters, cannot
be held liable for ULP for the reason that there is no employer-employee relationship between the former and
respondents. Further, Gin Queen avers that its decision to implement an enforced rotation of work assignments for
respondents was a management prerogative permitted by law, justified by the decrease in the orders it received from
its customers. It explains that its failure to present concrete proof of its decreasing orders was due to the
impossibility of proving a negative assertion. It also asserts that the transfer from Castillejos to Cabangan was made
in good faith and solely because of the expiration of its lease contract in Castillejos.
The Courts Ruling
As to the issue of ULP, petitioners argument is utterly without merit.
In the case at bench, petitioners are being accused of violations of paragraphs (a), (c), and (e) of Article 257
(formerly Article 248) of the Labor Code, 13 to wit:
Article 257. Unfair labor practices of employers.It shall be unlawful for an employer to commit any of the
following unfair labor practices:

(a) To interfere with, restrain or coerce employees in the exercise of their right to self-organization;
xxxx
(c) To contract out services or functions being performed by union members when such will interfere with, restrain,
or coerce employees in the exercise of their right to self-organization;
xxxx
(e) To discriminate in regard to wages, hours of work, and other terms and conditions of employment in order to
encourage or discourage membership in any labor organization. x x x
The concept of ULP is embodied in Article 256 (formerly Article 247) of the Labor Code, 14 which provides:
Article 256. Concept of unfair labor practice and procedure for prosecution thereof.Unfair labor practices violate
the constitutional right of workers and employees to self-organization, are inimical to the legitimate interests of both
labor and management, including their right to bargain collectively and otherwise deal with each other in an
atmosphere of freedom and mutual respect, disrupt industrial peace and hinder the promotion of healthy and stable
labor-management relations.
xxxx
In essence, ULP relates to the commission of acts that transgress the workers right to organize. As specified in
Articles 248 [now Article 257] and 249 [now Article 258] of the Labor Code, the prohibited acts must necessarily
relate to the workers' right to self-organization x x x.15
In the case of Insular Life Assurance Co., Ltd. Employees Association NATU v. Insular Life Assurance Co.
Ltd.,16 this Court had occasion to lay down the test of whether an employer has interfered with and coerced
employees in the exercise of their right to self-organization, that is, whether the employer has engaged in conduct
which, it may reasonably be said, tends to interfere with the free exercise of employees rights; and that it is not
necessary that there be direct evidence that any employee was in fact intimidated or coerced by statements of threats
of the employer if there is a reasonable inference that anti-union conduct of the employer does have an adverse
effect on self-organization and collective bargaining.
The questioned acts of petitioners, namely: 1) sponsoring a field trip to Zambales for its employees, to the exclusion
of union members, before the scheduled certification election; 2) the active campaign by the sales officer of
petitioners against the union prevailing as a bargaining agent during the field trip; 3) escorting its employees after
the field trip to the polling center; 4) the continuous hiring of subcontractors performing respondents functions; 5)
assigning union members to the Cabangan site to work as grass cutters; and 6) the enforcement of work on a
rotational basis for union members, all reek of interference on the part of petitioners.
Indubitably, the various acts of petitioners, taken together, reasonably support an inference that, indeed, such were
all orchestrated to restrict respondents free exercise of their right to self-organization. The Court is of the
considered view that petitioners undisputed actions prior and immediately before the scheduled certification
election, while seemingly innocuous, unduly meddled in the affairs of its employees in selecting their exclusive
bargaining representative. In Holy Child Catholic School v. Hon. Patricia Sto. Tomas, 17 the Court ruled that a
certification election was the sole concern of the workers, save when the employer itself had to file the petition x x
x, but even after such filing, its role in the certification process ceased and became merely a bystander. Thus,
petitioners had no business persuading and/or assisting its employees in their legally protected independent process
of selecting their exclusive bargaining representative. The fact and peculiar timing of the field trip sponsored by
petitioners for its employees not affiliated with THS-GQ Union, although a positive enticement, was undoubtedly
extraneous influence designed to impede respondents in their quest to be certified. This cannot be countenanced.

Not content with achieving a "no union" vote in the certification election, petitioners launched a vindictive campaign
against union members by assigning work on a rotational basis while subcontractors performed the latters functions
regularly. Worse, some of the respondents were made to work as grass cutters in an effort to dissuade them from
further collective action.1wphi1 Again, this cannot be countenanced.
More importantly, petitioners' bare denial of some of the complained acts and unacceptable explanations, a mere
afte1ihought at best, cannot prevail over respondents' detailed narration of the events that transpired. At this
juncture, it bears to emphasize that in labor cases, the quantum of proof necessary is substantial evidence,18 or that
amount of relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to suppoti a conclusion, even if other
minds, equally reasonable, might conceivably opine otherwise.19
In fine, mindful of the nature of the charge of ULP, including its civil and/or criminal consequences, the Court finds
that the NLRC, as correctly sustained by the CA, had sufficient factual and legal bases to support its finding of ULP.
Anent the issue on the award of attorney's fees, the applicable law concerning the grant thereof in labor cases is
Article 11120 of the Labor Code. Pursuant thereto, the award of 10% attorney's fees is limited to cases of unlawful
withholding of wages. In this case, however, the Court cannot find any claim or proof that petitioners unlawfully
withheld the wages of respondents. Consequently, the grant of 10% attorney's fees in favor of respondents is not
justified under the circumstances. Accordingly, the Court deems it proper to delete the same.
WHEREFORE, the November 12, 2009 Decision of the Court of Appeals and its March 24, 2010 Resolution, in
CA-G.R. SP No. 107188, are AFFIRMED, except with respect to the award of attorney's fees which is hereby
DELETED.
SO ORDERED.
JOSE
Associate Justice

CATRAL

MENDOZA

[G.R. No. 156098. June 27, 2005]

HOLY CROSS OF DAVAO COLLEGE, INC., petitioner, vs. HOLY CROSS OF DAVAO FACULTY
UNION - KAMAPI, respondent.
DECISION
SANDOVAL-GUTIERREZ, J.:
At bar is a petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure, as amended,
assailing the Decision[1] dated June 5, 2002 and Resolution[2] dated October 18, 2002 rendered by the Court of
Appeals in CA-G.R. SP No. 65507, entitled Holy Cross of Davao College, Inc. vs. Holy Cross of Davao Faculty
Union - KAMAPI.
The facts as borne by the records are:
Holy Cross of Davao College, Inc., petitioner, is a tertiary level educational institution at Sta. Ana Avenue,
Davao City.
Sometime in June 1997, petitioner and Holy Cross of Davao College Faculty Union KAMAPI,[3] respondent,
executed a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) providing for a faculty development scholarship for academic
teaching personnel.

On January 16, 1998, petitioner received a letter of invitation for the 1999 Monbusho scholarship grant (InService Training for Teachers)[4] offered and sponsored by the Japanese Government, through the Japan Information
and Cultural Center (JICC).
This prompted Jean Legaspi, a permanent English teacher in petitioners high school department, to submit her
application.
Meantime, on March 31, 1999, petitioner issued policy statement and guidelines on educational trips abroad
for the school year 1998 to 1999.
In a letter dated August 25, 1999, JICC informed Jean Legaspi that she was selected as a recipient of the
scholarship. Consequently, she requested petitioner to allow her to be on study leave with grant-in aid equivalent
to her 18 months salary and allowance, pursuant to Section 1, Article XIII of the CBA. However, petitioner denied
her request, claiming that she is not entitled to grant-in aid under its Policy Statement and Guidelines for Trips
Abroad for Professional Growth. Nevertheless, petitioner granted her 12 months study leave without pay from
October 1999 to September 2000.
Before she left for Japan, she asked respondent union KAMPI to submit to the Grievance Committee
petitioners refusal to grant her claim for grant-in aid, but the same was not settled.
Thus, respondent filed with the National Conciliation and Mediation Board (NCMB), Regional Office No. XI,
Davao City, a complaint for payment of grant-in aid against petitioner. In a Submission Agreement dated June 23,
2000, the parties stipulated to submit the case for voluntary arbitration.
On March 26, 2001, after the parties submitted their pleadings and position papers, the Voluntary Arbitrator
rendered a Decision ordering petitioner to pay respondents member, Jean A. Legaspi, her grant-in aid benefits, the
dispositive portion of which reads:
WHEREFORE, premises considered, decision is hereby rendered:
1.
Declaring that there is non-implementation of Article XIII, Section 1 of the existing collective bargaining
agreement (CBA) in the case of Miss Jean A. Legaspi, a bonafide member of the complainant faculty union;
2.
Ordering respondent Holy Cross of Davao College to pay Miss Jean A. Legaspi her grant-in aid benefit
equivalent to her salary, COLA and other benefits under the law and collective bargaining agreement during the
period of her scholarship grant; and
3.
Directing respondent to cease and desist from committing a similar offense to prevent another dispute in the
future, thus, ensure industrial peace.
SO ORDERED.
Petitioner then filed a motion for reconsideration but the same was denied in a Resolution dated June 20, 2001.
Thereafter, petitioner filed with the Court of Appeals a petition for review under Rule 43 of the 1997 Rules of
Civil Procedure, as amended.
On June 5, 2002, the Appellate Court promulgated its Decision affirming the Voluntary Arbitrators assailed
Decision. The Court of Appeals held:
The terms of the CBA are clear and leave little room for further interpretation. In this case, the provision on faculty
development operated both to grant and limit the rights of the parties. As such, while the provision obliges
petitioner to provide grant-in aid programs to its faculty, it also requires such faculty to be bound in employment to
petitioner for a certain period of time, all in the recognized need to increase the competence of the schools
faculty. Legaspi satisfied all the requirements under the CBA. She agreed to keep her part of the bargain under the
terms of the CBA. Despite her increased professional competence after undergoing foreign training, she bound
herself to continue working for petitioner for at least two years for every year of scholarship study.

Since the collective bargaining agreement is considered the law between the parties, containing as it does the agreed
terms of employment of the employee with his employer, unilaterally imposed orders or rules qualifying the terms
contained in the agreement are subordinate to the CBA. At most, such rules, such as the rules on trips abroad
formulated by petitioner a few months before Legaspis application, are merely suppletory and can neither
contradict nor undermine the terms found in the CBA.
xxx

xxx

Of course, petitioner asseverates that far from deviating from the terms of the CBA, petitioner in fact merely
enforces its terms, in that Section 1 of Article XIII specifies what petitioner calls the substantive conditions for
availment of the benefit, to wit: that the course must be related to her functions with petitioner and that it must be in
the pursuit of a higher degree. None of these conditions, according to petitioner, was satisfied by the Monbusho
scholarship because the training will be conducted in a foreign language and will only lead to the grant of a
certificate of completion and not a masters or higher degree.
Even on these ratiocinations, however, petitioner still fails to persuade this court. Contrary to petitioners insistence,
Legaspis foreign training is clearly related to her work with petitioner and will lead to an advancement in her
qualifications for her job.
First of all, we stress that it is petitioners president herself who, presumably after determining the worth of allowing
its faculty to undergo an in-service training in a premier foreign institution, immediately advertised the availability
of the scholarship. That petitioner itself encouraged its faculty to apply for the scholarship effectively demonstrates
that petitioner believed that availment of the training will contribute not only to the professional advancement of its
faculty but also to the development of the quality of education in the school.
Second, and more importantly, a cursory examination of the contents of the course manifests its relevance to
Legaspis work with petitioner. The training program which focuses on areas such as (a) Educational Management
(e.g. Educational Administration and Finance, School Management), (b) Methods of Education (e.g. TeachingLearning Process System, Curriculum Development, Educational Evaluation), (c) Study of Special Subjects (e.g.
Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Physical Education), and (d) Observation Study (e.g. Inspection of a Class
Participation in Special Extra-curricular Practice, Inspection of Various Educational Research Services) obviously
relates to enhancing Legaspis effectiveness as a teacher. The fact that the medium of instruction is Japanese does
not negate the programs relevance to Legaspis work as an English teacher because the course contents were
designed to hone her skills in effectively teaching her students.
Further, while no degree but only a certificate will be conferred on Legaspi, she should not be barred from availing
of the benefits under the CBA. Indeed, the CBA merely states higher studies and did not specify to which
trainings the benefit will apply. If the CBA intended that such trainings be confined to those which will formally
grant degrees as petitioner contends, the agreement should have so stated. Contrary thereto, however, the CBA
provides the award of grant-in aid benefits to faculty members who will pursue higher studies. The term is so
broad as to include programs that would grant certificates and not degrees. In any case, the unassailable truth is that
the certificate which is granted by a premier foreign institute, is an added higher qualification in favor of Legaspi in
recognition of her increased competence in handling her classes under petitioners auspices.
In any event, the construction of any ambiguity in the CBA, such as which course would be relevant to Legaspis
job, and whether such course comprises higher studies should be made in favor of the employee, Legaspi, in
consonance with the rule that labor laws and agreements should be construed in favor of the working man.
WHEREFORE, the assailed decision is hereby AFFIRMED. Costs against petitioner.
SO ORDERED.
On October 18, 2002, the Court of Appeals issued a Resolution denying petitioners motion for
reconsideration.

Hence, this petition for review on certiorari.

Petitioner contends that the Appellate Court erred in interpreting the parties CBA, thereby, restricting its
exercise of academic freedom; that it is not obliged to grant Jean Legaspi a grant-in aid considering that she failed to
comply with the substantive requirements set forth in their CBA, such as (1) that the course is within her area of
competence; and (2) that she will acquire higher academic degree; and that the Monbusho scholarship is a nondegree program outside her area of competence (English).
Petitioners contentions lack merit.
The basic issue for our resolution is whether Jean Legaspi is entitled to grant-in aid benefits in light of the
CBA between the parties.
To begin with, any doubt or ambiguity in the contract (CBA) between management and the union members
should be resolved in favor of the latter. This is pursuant to Article 1702 of the Civil Code which provides: (I)n
case of doubt, all labor legislation and all labor contracts shall be construed in favor of the safety and decent living
for the laborer.[5]
Section 1, Article XIII of the CBA provides:
Section 1. FACULTY DEVELOPMENT. It has always been the policy of the Holy Cross of Davao College that
academic teaching personnel must develop within their areas of competence and in so doing have exercised its
prerogative to demand that academic teaching personnel take the necessary measure to effect their upgrading in
acquiring higher academic degree. In view thereof, the Management shall grant to all academic personnel a
grant-in-aid program, where the academic teaching personnel, whenever scholarship opportunities should
arise, be afforded a leave of absence to further their studies in Institutions of Higher Learning with a grantin-aid equivalent to their salary and allowance (when there is a mandated wage order) that the concerned
academic teaching personnel is receiving at the time of the scholarship grant, under the following conditions:
That whenever the school wishes to grant faculty development scholarships, notice to the entire faculty of the
department concerned shall be made through a public announcement in the bulletin board. In cases where there are
two (2) or more applicants, the Department Head shall set a committee chosen from among the regular and
permanent faculty of the department composed of at least three (3) but not more than five (5) members.
That the academic teaching personnel grantee shall finish his/her scholarship grant within time frame of the
scholarship grant unless prevented by some causes over, above and beyond his/her control.
That the academic teaching personnel grantee shall sign a contract with the Holy Cross of Davao College to serve
therein for at least two (2) years for every year of scholarship study.
That should he/she fail to comply with the conditions of the scholarship grant, she/she shall reimburse the Holy
Cross of Davao College with all the amount he/she has received during the pendency of the grant together with all
interest thereon allowed by law. No clearance shall be given until full reimbursement plus interest would have been
made.
Along the same line, paragraph 2 of petitioners Policy Statement and Guidelines for Trips Abroad for
Professional Growth (SY 1998-1999) reads:
The school recognizes that educational trips abroad promote both personal and professional growth. Hence,
employees may travel abroad for study tours and to attend seminars, conferences, and other related academic
pursuits. The school may provide financial assistance subject to the following guidelines:
xxx

xxx

2.
That the employee is the official representative of the school upon recommendation of the office head. As
such, he/she receives regular salary.

x x x.

xxx

The above provisions state that academic teaching personnel, like Jean Legaspi, as recipient of a scholarship
grant are entitled to a leave of absence with a grant-in-aid equivalent to their monthly salary and
allowance, provided such grant is to promote their professional growth or to enhance their studies in institutions of
higher learning. Such provisions need no interpretation for they are clear. Contracts which are not ambiguous are to
be interpreted according to their literal meaning and not beyond their obvious intendment. [6]
In Mactan Workers Union vs. Aboitiz,[7] we held that the terms and conditions of a collective bargaining
contract constitute the law between the parties. Those who are entitled to its benefits can invoke its
provisions. In the event that an obligation therein imposed is not fulfilled, the aggrieved party has the right to go to
court for redress.
Thus, the Court of Appeals did not err in its assailed Decision and Resolution.
WHEREFORE, the petition is DENIED. The assailed Decision dated June 5, 2002 and Resolution dated
October 18, 2002 of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. SP No. 65507 are AFFIRMED. Costs against petitioner.
SO ORDERED.
G.R. No. 88210 January 23, 1991
PHILIPPINE
AIRLINES,
INC., petitioner,
vs.
SECRETARY OF LABOR AND EMPLOYMENT, FRANKLIN M. DRILON, and PHILIPPINE AIRLINES
EMPLOYEES ASSOCIATION (PALEA), respondents.
Ricardo V. Puno, Jr., Caesar R. Dulay, Solon, R. Garcia, Rene B. Gorospe & Bienvenido T. Jamoralinz, Jr. for
petitioner.
E.N.A. Cruz, Entero & Associates for PALEA.

GRIO-AQUINO, J.:p
In issue in this case is the authority of the Secretary of Labor to order the petitioner Philippine Airlines, Inc. to
reinstate officers and members of the union who participated in an illegal strike and to desist from taking any
disciplinary or retaliatory action against them.
The 1986-1989 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) between the Philippine Airlines (PAL) and the Philippine
Airlines Employees Association (PALEA) provided for pay increases for various categories of employees in Section
1, Article V entitled "PAY SCALE." Besides the pay increases, the CBA also provided for the formation of a
PAL/PALEA Payscale Panel
(f) . . . to undertake the study, review, correction, updating, complete overhaul, re-classification or
re-grouping of positions as may be required of the payscale and position classification to evolve
updated payscales as soon as possible. (p. 76, Rollo.)
and that
(iii) . . . the Payscale Panel shall exert all reasonable efforts to complete its studies so as to evolve
new updated payscale and position classification by January 01, 1988, (p. 76, Rollo.)

As agreed by the parties, the PAL/PALEA Payscale Panel was formed in due time and went to work. By July, 1988,
the Job Evaluation Committee of the panel had finished the reconciliation and initial evaluation of positions in all
departments within PAL.
In November, 1988, the PALEA members of the panel proposed the amount of PHP 3,349 as the minimum salary
entry level for the lowest job classification (Job Grade 1), while the PAL panel members proposed PHP 2,310 and a
PHP 200 across-the-board increase for employees who could not avail of the payscale adjustments. The panel
conferences continued but there was no meeting of minds. PALEA would not accept less than the amount it
proposed, while the PAL panel members alleged that they had no authority to offer more.
PALEA accused PAL of bargaining in bad faith.
On December 29, 1988, PALEA filed with the National Conciliation and Mediation Board (NCMB) a notice of
strike on account of: (1) bargaining deadlock; and (2) unfair labor practice by bargaining in bad faith.
On January 3, 1989, PAL filed with the NCMB a motion to dismiss PALEA's notice of strike for being premature as
the issues raised were not strikeable since there still existed a PAL-PALEA CBA which would not yet expire until
September 30, 1989 or with nine (9) more months to run.
During the conciliation meeting, the following evolved as the real issues:
1. determination of the minimum entry rate
2. wage adjustment due to payscale study
3. retroactive pay as a consequence of the upgraded payscale or goodwill bonus. (p. 38, Rollo.)
On January 6, 1989, Attorney Jesus C. Sebastian, NCMB-NCR Executive Conciliator/Mediator, advised PALEA
president, George Pulido, that the issues raised in the notice of strike were "appropriate only for preventive
mediation," hence, not valid grounds for a lawful strike. However, when subsequently a representative of NCMB
supervised the conduct of PALEA'S strike vote, PAL's counsel was baffled for it was inconsistent with the NCMB
order treating the strike notice as preventive mediation case No. PM-01-007-89. PAL's counsel sought clarification
from NCMB'S Sebastian. He assured PAL that the NCMB representatives could not certify the strike vote.
On January 12, 1989, PALEA submitted the strike vote results to the NCMB. The next day, January 13, 1989, PAL
petitioned Secretary of Labor Franklin Drilon to immediately assume jurisdiction over the dispute in order to avert
the impending strike. The reasons for PAL's petition were, as stated by the Secretary himself:
The Philippine Airlines, Inc. is a corporation where the government has substantial equity holding.
It is engaged in an industry imbued with national interest. It is the flag carrier of the Republic of
the Philippines. Being the sole airline that services domestic routes, a prolonged work stoppage
will push back the national economic recovery program of the government and consequently result
to enormous damage to the economy of the country. Hundreds of thousands of people directly and
indirectly dependent on the continued operations of the firm including the huge work force of the
company will likewise be prejudiced. The viability of the firm will also be endangered. These
considerations have in the past guided this Office in consistently exercising its powers under
Article 263(g) of the Labor Code, as amended, in handling labor disputes in the Company. The
current situation is no exception to this rule. This Office is of the view that the present work
stoppage at Philippine Airlines, Inc. will adversely affect the national interest. Thus, this Office
hereby assumes jurisdiction over the instant dispute. (pp. 38-39, Rollo.)
Inexplicably, the Secretary failed to act promptly on PAL's petition for his assumption of jurisdiction.

Seven (7) days passed with no reaction from Secretary Drilon. On January 20, 1989, PALEA declared a strike
paralyzing PAL's entire operations the next day, January 21, 1989, and resulting in serious inconvenience to
thousands of passengers who were stranded in 43 airports throughout the country, and the loss of millions of pesos
in unearned revenue for PAL. Late in the day, at 7:50 P.M., Secretary Drilon issued an order assuming jurisdiction
over the labor dispute which had already exploded into a full-blown strike, ordering the strikers to lift their pickets
and return to work, directing management to accept all returning employees, and resolving the issues subject of the
strike, by awarding the following monetary benefits to the strikers, while prohibiting the company from taking
retaliatory action against them:
. . . to resolve the impasse between the herein parties, this Office finds the following award just
and reasonable:
1. As far as the issue of minimum entry level is concerned, the company is directed to adjust the
same to P2,500.00 from its present level effective January 1, 1989.
2. The company is ordered to grant the amount of P3.3 million per month to cover across-theboard increases of covered regular employees subject to the distribution of the union as embodied
in their proposed scheme but in no instance should the lowest adjustment be less than P300.00. In
line with this, the scheme proposed by the union and submitted to NCMB on January 20,1989 is
herein adopted.
It is understood, however, that in items 1 and 2 above, the amount which is higher should be
granted.
3. A goodwill bonus in the amount of P3,000.00 to be paid in four equal pay period installments
beginning February 15 and up to March 31, 1989 is hereby awarded. (p. 39, Rollo.)
Declaring the strike valid, the Secretary stated:
Except for the fact that the Union's notice of strike was treated as a preventive mediation case (at
the instance of NCMB), it should be noted that the Union complied with all the requirements for a
valid strike. It observed the cooling-off periods required and submitted the necessary strike vote. If
ever there is any ground to discipline the Union officers for non-compliance with the law, it would
be based on the "non-filing" of the strike notice, which "non-filing" was a consequence of the
NCMB'S efforts to create the appropriate atmosphere to resolve the dispute by treating the notice
of strike as a preventive mediation case. Otherwise put, the strike would have been legal in all
respects had not the NCMB, in its good faith effort to settle the dispute, treated the notice of strike
as a case for preventive mediation. Under these circumstances, and in the interest of industrial
peace and the promotion of the concept of preventive mediation, the parties are directed to desist
from committing any retaliatory act as a result of the work stoppage. The UNION, however, is
hereby warned that in the future this office will not tolerate such conduct and will apply the full
force of the law. (pp. 3-4,Rollo.)
The petitioner filed a motion for reconsideration. The Secretary denied it in a minute resolution on May 8, 1989 or
three months later.
In this petition for review, PAL avers that the Secretary of Labor gravely abused his discretion amounting to excess
or lack of jurisdiction:
1. in ruling on the legality of the strike;
2. in directing PAL to desist from taking retaliatory action against the officers and members of the Union
responsible for the illegal strike; and

3. in failing to seasonably exercise his authority to avert the illegal strike and protect the rights and interests of PAL
whose business is affected with public interest.
Under Art. 263 of the Labor Code, the Labor Secretary's authority to resolve a labor dispute within 30 days from the
date of assumption of jurisdiction, encompasses only the issues in the dispute, not the legality or illegality of any
strike that may have been resorted to in the meantine (Binamira vs. Ogan-Occena, 148 SCRA 677, 685 [1987]).
Indeed, as found by the Labor Secretary in his Order of January 21, 1989, the only issues involved in the dispute
were:
1. determination of the minimum entry rate
2. wage adjustment due to payscale study
3. retroactive pay as a consequence of the upgraded payscale or goodwill bonus.
The legality or illegality of the strike was not submitted to the Secretary of Labor for resolution.
The jurisdiction to decide the legality of strikes and lock-outs is vested in Labor Arbiters, not in the Secretary of
Labor. Art. 217, par. a, subpar. 5 of the Labor Code provides:
Art. 217. Jurisdiction of Labor Arbiters and the Commission.
(a) The Labor Arbiters shall have the original and exclusive jurisdiction to hear and decide within
thirty (30) working days after submission of the case by the parties for decision, the following
cases involving all workers, whether agricultural or non- agricultural.
xxx xxx xxx
5. Cases arising from any violation of Article 265 of this code, including questions involving the
legality of strikes and lock-outs. (Emphasis supplied.)
In ruling on the legality of the PALEA strike, the Secretary of Labor acted without or in excess of his jurisdiction.
There is merit in PAL's contention that the Labor Secretary erred in declaring the strike valid and in prohibiting PAL
from taking retaliatory or disciplinary action against the strikers for the damages suffered by the Airline as a result
of the illegal work stoppage.
PALEA's strike on January 20, 1989 was illegal for three (3) reasons:
1. It was premature for there was an existing CBA which still had nine (9) months to run, i.e., up
to September 30, 1989. The law expressly provides that neither party to a collective bargaining
agreement shall terminate nor modify such agreement during its lifetime. While either party can
serve a written notice to terminate or modify the agreement at least sixty (60) days prior to its
expiration date (known as the "freedom period") it shall nevertheless be the duty of both parties to
keep thestatus quo and to continue in full force and effect the terms and conditions of the existing
agreement during the freedom period and/or until a new agreement is reached by them (Art. 253,
Labor Code).
2. It violated the no-strike provision of the CBA, to wit:
The Association agrees that there shall be no strikes, walk outs, stoppage, or
slowdown of work, or any other form of interference with any of the operations

of the Company during the period between the signing of the Agreement up to
September 30, 1989. (Emphasis supplied, p-118, Rollo.)
3. The NCMB had declared the notice of strike as "appropriate for preventive mediation." The
effect of that declaration (which PALEA did not ask to be reconsidered or set aside) was to drop
the case from the docket of notice of strikes, as provided in Rule 41 of the NCMB Rules, as if
there was no notice of strike. During the pendency of preventive mediation proceedings no strike
could be legally declared. The Secretary must have thought so too, that is why he failed to act, for
a period of seven (7) days, on PAL's petition for him to assume jurisdiction over the labor dispute.
The strike which the union mounted, while preventive mediation proceedings were ongoing, was
aptly described by the petitioner as "an ambush" (p. 2, Rollo).
Since the strike was illegal, the company has a right to take disciplinary action against the union officers who
participated in it, and against any union members who committed illegal acts during the strike, Art. 264 of the Labor
Code provides:
Art. 264. Prohibited activities.. . .
xxx xxx xxx
Any worker whose employment has been terminated as a consequence of an unlawful lockout
shall be entitled to reinstatement with full back wages. Any union officer who knowingly
participates in an illegal strike and any worker or union officer who knowingly participates in the
commission of illegal acts during a strike may be declared to have lost his employment
status: Provided, That mere participation of a worker in a lawful strike shall not constitute
sufficient ground for termination of his employment, even if a replacement had been hired by the
employer during such lawful strike. (Emphasis supplied.)
The Labor Secretary exceeded his jurisdiction when he restrained PAL from taking disciplinary action against its
guilty employees, for, under Art. 263 of the Labor Code, all that the Secretary may enjoin is the holding of the
strike, but not the company's right to take action against union officers who participated in the illegal strike and
committed illegal acts. The prohibition which the Secretary issued to PAL constitutes an unlawful deprivation of
property and denial of due process for it prevents PAL from seeking redress for the huge property losses that it
suffered as a result of the union's illegal mass action.
The Secretary may have realized that he was partly to blame for PAL's damages because of his failure to act
promptly and use his authority to avert the illegal strike under Article 263(g) of the Labor Code.
Nevertheless, the Secretary's delay does not excuse the reckless and irresponsible action of the union in declaring the
illegal strike. The liability of the union for that is primary and exclusive.
WHEREFORE, the petition for certiorari is granted. The orders dated January 21, 1989 and May 8, 1989 of the
Secretary of Labor in NCMB NCR Case No. PM-01-007-89 are set aside and nullified insofar as the said orders
declare valid the PALEA strike of January 20-21, 1989 and restrain the petitioner from taking appropriate legal
action against PALEA's officers who led the illegal strike, and any union members who may have committed illegal
acts during said strike. The monetary benefits awarded to the union in the said orders are, however, affirmed. Costs
against respondent PALEA.
SO ORDERED.
G.R. No. L-17620

August 31, 1962

FAR
EASTERN
UNIVERSITY, petitioner,
vs.
THE COURT OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, PHILIPPINE ASSOCIATION OF COLLEGES AND
UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS (PACUP) and TOMAS N. AGUIRRE, respondents.
Crispin
D.
Baizas
Mariano
B.
Tuason
for
Eulogio R. Lerum for the other respondents.

&
respondent

Associates
Court
of

for
Industrial

petitioner.
Relations.

CONCEPCION, J.:
Appeal by certiorari, taken by the Far Eastern University, hereafter referred to as the University, from resolution of
the Court of Industrial Relations sitting en banc, modifying a decision of one of the Judges of said Court. The main
facts are set forth in said decision, from which we quote:
From the evidence on record, it appears that Tomas N. Aguirre became a faculty member of the respondent
in 1948. He was first employed at the rate of P6.00 per hour and then was contracted to teach in the Boys'
High School Department in the same university at the rate of P30.00 per class, earning an average of
P500.00 to P600.00 a month. Aguirre joined the PACUP, a legitimate labor organization in June 1953. In
July or August, 1953, upon orders of the president of the PACUP, Jose M. Hernandez, Aguirre began to
campaign and recruit members for the PACUP. As a result of his efforts in campaigning for membership,
he was able to influence seven members from the faculty of the university (Exhibits "B", "B-1" to "B-6",
inclusive). In his campaign for membership, he approached practically all of the faculty members of the
respondent's Institute of Education and some from the Arts and Sciences, Business Administration and
Finance, but most of them were afraid to join the union. They were afraid of any retaliation that the
respondent may make because of their joining the union.
In the year 1953, respondent formed a committee to classify all faculty members and determine the rates of
their backpay and assignments. Ninety-six of the more than four hundred faculty members were classified
as full time instructors. Aguirre was one of those who was classified by the said committee as full time
instructor in the respondent's Institute of Education, with a fixed compensation of P450.00 a month,
effective September 1, 1953.
During the months of December, 1953 up to May, 1954, for teaching in the Far Eastern University,
respondent herein, Aguirre was paid the following: December, 1953-P210.00; January, 1954 P302.40;
February, 1954 P313.20; March, 1954 P249.00. In June, 1954, respondent stopped giving him
teaching assignments.
Aguirre claims that in June, 1954, he was no longer given an assignment because of his union activities
while respondent claims that Aguirre was not given assignment because of decreased enrollment in the
university. He further avers that after recruiting some members, his classification as full time instructor
changed to reserved full time instructor and his teaching load was decreased to two hours a day. Hence, his
reduced earnings from December, 1953 to May, 1954 as previously mentioned. His salary as a full time
instructor was P5,400.00 per annum or P450.00 per month, irrespective of his teaching load. Respondent,
thru its witness, the dean in the Institute of Education where Aguirre was teaching, testified and admitted
that the reason for Aguirre's not receiving any teaching assignment in June, 1954 was because enrollment in
the Institute of Education was going down steadily in the Filipino Language class where Aguirre was
teaching. Among the other Filipino Language instructors are Baldomero de Jesus, Teodoro Gener, Rosario
Bernards, Dolores Gupit, Inigo Regalado, and Flordeliza Mendoza who are older members of the faculty
than Aguirre except Regalado, Bernards and Mendoza. The dean of the Institute of Education, Luz A.
Zafra, admitted also that in the assignment of subjects to faculty members, length of service, experience,
preparation and professional growth as well as student-faculty relation were taken into consideration.
Hence if these above-mentioned factors, particularly length of service and experience, were really taken
into consideration, Aguirre a full time professor should have been given the assignment in stead of

Regalado and Mendoza who were only part time professors and who started teaching after him. The other
Tagalo instructors (professors under the classification) who were given assignments when Aguirre was not,
are not members of the PACUP. It should also be noted that since before the last war, Aguirre had been
teaching in the University of the Philippines.
It is true that there were charges brought by respondent against Aguirre but the same had been investigated
and found to be groundless. On the other hand, Aguirre brought charge against the respondent before the
Department of Education when his teaching load was reduced and the Director of Private Schools, in his
decision of November 9, 1954, directed the respondent to pay the salary differential which Aguirre fail to
earn from December 1, 1953 to 1954 and to give Aguirre assignment in the college department during the
first semester of the current school year under the same condition before his teaching load was reduced.
The Secretary of Education, in his decision, dated June 22, 1955, affirmed the decision of the Director of
Private Schools and on December 8, 1956, the Executive Secretary, by authority of the President of the
Philippines affirmed the decision of the Director of Private School as well as the Secretary of Education's
decision, previously mentioned. Of course, those proceedings in no way could considered as controlling or
affecting the case at bar. At best, they may serve as a grim reminder of the actions, of the governmental
entity that could do something to bolster the relationship between the university and the faculty members.
The allegation of respondent to the effect that it suffered reduce enrollment in 1953-1954, hence
necessitating the laying off of Aguirre, cannot be taken into consideration after a careful examination of the
balance sheet submitted by the respondent in relation to its motion to dismiss. Said balance sheet shows
that in the 1952-1953 fiscal year, respondent made a net profit of P158,035.25 and in 1953-1954,
P258,619.98, while in 1954-1955, a net profit of P707,003.70 and in 1955-1956, P999,766.88. The figures
show that respondent from 1952 to 1956, has been steadily increasing its income until in 1958-1959 when
it made net income of P1,511,293.42. And even on the assumption the enrollment in the department where
Aguirre was teaching reduced, still the Court cannot validly reconcile the fact that Aguirre who was a full
time professor receiving a fixed monthly salary could not any further be given assignment the time
professors and whose length of service in the university cannot compare with that of Aguirre were given
assignment and suffered no reeducating in salary. Undoubtedly, this Court cannot but conclude that when
the respondent changed status of Aguirre from a full time professor at P450.00 a month to that of a reserved
full time professor with a teaching load of two hours and finally got no assignments in June, 1964, it was
motivated other than decreased enrollment, especially in the case of the evidence that Aguirre campaigned
for union membership among the professors, instructors and teachers of the respondent and the further fact,
that other full time instructors similarly situated but are not union members did not suffer the same facts of
abrupt reduction in their teaching load and salary. As indicated, Aguirre was later deprived of any teaching
load in the Institute of Education. Even part time professors as Panganiban, Mendoza and Regalado had
assignments to the exclusion of Aguirre who was a full time professor. This eventuality, was apparently,
the fear of most of the faculty members who refused to join the PACUP when Aguirre asked them to
become members.
Ordinarily, back wages are granted whenever there is a finding of a commission of unfair labor practices.
However, in this particular case the testimony of Aguirre, himself as well as the documentary evidence on
the record show that since June, 1958, Aguirre began teaching at the Philippine College of Commerce with
an income of P100.00 a month and on November 17, 1955, he began working as a permanent employee in
the Central Bank of the Philippines with a compensation of P3,000.00 per annum. On September 5, 1956,
his salary was raised to P3,600.00 per annum. The permanent employment obtained by Aguirre in the
Central Bank of the Philippines as well as in the Philippine College of Commerce is substantial and under
the concept of the Industrial Peace Act, his employment elsewhere in a permanent capacity is sufficient to
bar his reinstatement to his former position in the respondent. While it may be true that his earnings with
the Central Bank may be less than that he was receiving from the Far Eastern University, yet his status with
the Central Bank, is permanent and he could teach as a sideline in any school, as in fact he is connected
with the Philippine College of Commerce, a fact that could not happen if he were still connected with the
Far Eastern University.
At the instance of the Philippine Association of Colleges and University Professors, hereafter referred to as the
PACUP, and/or Tomas N. Aguirre, on September 28, 1954, an Acting Prosecutor of the Court of Industrial

Relations filed a complaint for unfair labor practice against the University, which later moved on November 17,
1954, to dismiss the complaint. Subsequently, or on February 4, 1955, the complainant and/or the offended party,
Tomas N. Aguirre filed a motion to withdraw said complaint upon the ground that there was a decision of the
Director of Private Schools ordering his reinstatement and the payment of back wages, as well as wage differential,
and that the University was "using the pendency" of the case "as a ground for not complying with the said decision".
Acting upon this latter motion, on March 29, 1955, the Court dismissed said complaint. However, on August 30,
1955 the order of dismissal was, on motion of the complainant dated April 22, 1955, set aside for the reason that the
expected amicable settlement of the case had not materialized. On October 16, 1955, the University filed a
"supplemental pleading" to its motion to dismiss of November 17, 1954 both of which were denied by the Court on
June 23, 1956. Later on the University filed its answer and, the issue having been joined, the case was tried, after
which Judge Arsenio L. Martinez of said Court rendered the aforementioned decision finding the University guilty
of unfair labor practice and sentencing said institution to pay to Aguirre the salary differential due him from
December 1, 1953 to May 31, 1954, based on Aguirre's salary of P450.00 a month, as well as back wages at the
same rate, from June 1, 1954 to November 17, 1955, after deducting therefrom the compensation paid to him by the
Philippine College of Commerce from June 1, 1955 to November 17, 1955, as well as to cease and desist from
further committing unfair labor practices. However, said Judge did not order the reinstatement of Aguirre in the
University, upon the ground that his employment in the Central Bank of the Philippines, is, within the purview of
the Industrial Peace Act, a substantial equivalent of his position as full time instructor in said University.
On motion for reconsideration filed by the complainant, a majority of the judges of said Court sitting en banc,
affirmed the decision of Judge Martinez, insofar as the commission of unfair labor practice charged and the payment
of the salary differential and back wages are concerned, but held that Aguirre's employment in the Central Bank and
the Philippine College of Commerce are not the substantial equivalent of his aforementioned position as full time
instructor in the University, and, accordingly, modified said decision by, likewise, sentencing the University to
reinstate Tomas N. Aguirre, in addition to paying him the aforementioned wages differential and back wages plus
"other emoluments". Hence this appeal by certiorari taken by the University. The Court of Industrial Relation, as
one of the appellees herein, has filed a motion, which we consider as its answer, to dismiss the appeal for lack of
merit upon the ground that appellant raises no question of law.
Appellant's contention is that the employment of Aguirre in the Central Bank and his teaching load in the Philippine
College of Commerce are substantially equivalent to his former position in the University. Upon the other hand, the
resolution appealed reached the opposite conclusion for the following reasons:
(a) Aguirre's work in the respondent university is that of a professor, ]while his work in the Central Bank is
clerical in nature;
(b) As professor Aguirre's maximum teaching period is five (5) hours daily; while in the bank he works
eight (8) hours a day;
(c) Although his work in the bank allows him to teach part time in the Philippine College of Commerce for
one hour, he could also do the same work even if he were employed in the university; and
(d) Aguirre was receiving from the respondent university P5,400.00 a year, while he receives from the
Central Bank P3,000.00 a year only. This alone fact decides the issue, namely, that Aguirre's position in the
Central Bank is not substantially equivalent to his position in the Far Eastern University. "Any employment
at lower wage rate is not substantially equivalent employment" [Willard, Inc. (1937 2 NLRB 1094,
Moorseville Cotton Mills vs. NLRB (CCA-4, 1940), 2. Labor Cases. 18.576; 110 fed. (2d) 79; Puleski
Veneer Corn. (1938) 10 NLRB 136; Quidnick Dye Works, Inc. (1937) 2 NLRB 963].
Although Mr. Aguirre was, not a professor, but a full time instructor in the University, we agree with the opinion of
the lower court, sitting en banc. In addition to the circumstances relied upon by the latter, one important factor, not
mentioned in the resolution appealed from, is decisively in favor of the conclusion therein reached, and that is that
Mr. Aguirre is an instructor in Tagalog, and that, as such, his position as researcher in the Central Bank has no future
for him. The situation would perhaps have been different had his line been economics. Inasmuch, however, as Mr.

Aguirre has especialized in the Tagalog dialect, his work as a researcher in the Central Bank is inferior to his job as
full time instructor in the University, not so much because his salary in the latter is substantially bigger, even if we
add thereto his emoluments in the Philippine College of Commerce, but, specially, because of the future his position
as instructor in the University offers him as a career, which is non-existent in the Central Bank.
WHEREFORE, the resolution appealed from is hereby affirmed, with costs against petitioner. It is so
ordered..1wph1.t
G.R. No. 95445 August 6, 1991
MANILA PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHERS ASSOCIATION, FIDEL FABABIER MERLIN ANONUEVO,
MINDA GALANG and other teacher-members so numerous similarly situated, petitioners-appellants,
vs.
THE HON. PERFECTO LAGUIO JR., in his capacity as Presiding Judge of the Regional Trial Court of
Manila, Branch 18, HON. ISIDRO CARIO, in his capacity as Secretary of Education, Culture and Sports
and the HON. ERLINDA LOLARGA in her capacity as Manila City Schools Superintendent, respondentsappellees.
G.R No. 95590 August 6, 1991
ALLIANCE OF CONCERNED TEACHERS (ACT), ENRIQUE D. TORRES, RODRIGO G. NATIVIDAD,
FRANCISCO A. NERECINA, EVA V. FERIA, LUCIA R. CARRASCO, LEO R. RAMBOYONG, ZENEIDA
PEREZ, MARIA ACEJO AND OTHER SIMILARLY SITUATED PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHERS TOO
NUMEROUS
TO
BE
IMPLEADED, petitioners,
vs.
HON. ISIDRO CARIO in his capacity as Secretary of Education, Culture and Sports and HON.
GUILLERMO CARAGUE, in his capacity as Secretary of Budget and Management, respondents.
Free Legal Assistance Group, Movement of Attorneys for Brotherhood Integrity & Nationalism and Union of
Lawyers and Advocates for petitioners in G.R. No. 95590.
Gregorio Fabros for petitioners in G.R. No. 95445.

NARVASA, J.:p
The series of events that touched off these cases started with the so-called "mass action" undertaken by some 800
public school teachers, among them members of the petitioning associations in both cases, on September 17, 1990 to
"dramatize and highlight" 1 the teachers' plight resulting from the alleged failure of the public authorities to act upon
grievances that had time and again been brought to the latter's attention.
The petition in G.R. No. 95590 alleges in great detail the character and origins of those grievances as perceived by
the petitioners, and the attempts to negotiate their correction; 2 these are more briefly, but quite adequately and with
no sacrifice of relevant content, set forth in the petition in G.R. No. 954451, portions of which are quoted hereunder
without necessarily affirming their objective truth or correctness:
3. Together with other teachers embracing the Teachers and Employees Consultative Council
(TECC) and the Alliance of Concerned Teachers, the petitioners, in accordance with their
Constitution and By-Laws, resolved to engage in mass concerted actions, after peaceful dialogues
with the heads of the Department of the Budget and Management, Senate and House of
Representatives in public hearings as well as after exhausting all administrative remedies, to press
for, among other things, the immediate payment of due chalk, clothing allowances, 13th month

pay for 1989 arising from the implementation of the Salary Standardization Law, the recall of
DECS Order 39 s. 1990 directing the oversizing of classes and overloading of teachers pursuant to
the cost-cutting measures of the government, the hiring of 47,000 new teachers to ease the
overload of existing teachers, the return of the additional 1% real property taxes collected by local
government units to education purposes to be administered by the Local School Boards, and
consequent recall of DBM Circulars Nos. 904 and 9011 and local budget circular No. 47
consistent with RA 5447 and the new Constitution mandating that education shall enjoy the
highest budgetary priority in the national budget, and other equally important demands; The
dialogues and conferences initiated by the petitioners and other teacher organizations were as early
as March 14, 1989, March 14, 1990, April 23, 1990, May 28, 1990, June 5, 1990, September 3,
1990 and September 14, 1990 with the Civil Service Commission, the Senate and House of
Representatives, Department of Budget and Management and the Department of Education,
Culture and Sports, but all these did not result in the granting of the demands of the petitioners,
leaving them with no other recourse but to take direct mass action such as the one they engaged in
three weeks ago.
4. On September 14, 1990, the petitioners and other teachers in other cities and municipalities in
Metro Manila, staged a protest rally at the DECS premises without disrupting classes as a last call
for the government to negotiate the granting of demands. No response was made by the
respondent Secretary of Education, despite the demonstration, so the petitioners began the ongoing
protest mass actions on September, 17,1990. ... 3
September 17, 1990 fell on a Monday, which was also a regular school day. There is no question that the some 800
teachers who joined the mass action did not conduct their classes on that day; instead, as alleged in the petition in
G.R. No. 95590, 4 they converged at the Liwasang Bonifacio in the morning whence they proceeded to the National
Office of the Department of Education, Culture and Sport (DECS) for a whole-day assembly. At about 1:00 o'clock
p.m., three representatives of the group were allowed to see the respondent Secretary of Education who "brushed
aside their grievances," warned them that they would lose their jobs for going on illegal and unauthorized mass
leave. Upon leaving said respondent's presence, they were handed an order directing all participants in the mass
action to return to work in 24 hours or face dismissal, and a memorandum directing the DECS officials concerned to
initiate dismissal proceedings against those who did not comply and to hire their replacements. 5 Those directives
notwithstanding, the mass actions continued into the week, with more teachers joining in the days that followed. In
its issue of September 19, 1990, the newspaper Manila Standard reported that the day previous, the respondent
Secretary of Education had relieved 292 teachers who did not return to their classes. The next day, however, another
daily, Newsday, reported that the Secretary had revoked its dismissal order and instead placed 56 of the 292 teachers
under preventive suspension, despite which the protesters' numbers had swelled to 4,000. 6
On the record, what did happen was that, based on reports submitted by the principals of the various public schools
in Metro Manila, the respondent Secretary of Education had filed motu proprio administrative complaints against
the teachers who had taken part in the mass actions and defied the return-to-work order on assorted charges like
grave misconduct, gross neglect of duty, gross violation of the Civil Service Law, absence without official leave,
etc., and placed them under 90-day preventive suspension. The respondents were served copies of the charge sheets
and given five (5) days to submit answer or explanation. Later, on October 8, 1990, the respondent Secretary
constituted an investigating committee of four (4) to determine and take the appropriate course of action on the
formal charges and designated the special prosecutors on detail with the DECS to handle their prosecution during
the formal hearings. 7
On October 11, 1990, the respondent Secretary of Education rendered the first of his now questioned decisions on
the administrative complaints. In Case No. DECS 90-002, he found twenty (20) respondent teachers guilty of the
charges preferred against them and dismissed them from office, effective immediately. 8 In the other investigations
that followed and as of December 3, 1990, 658 teachers were dismissed, 40 were suspended for one (1) year, 33 for
nine (9) months, and 122 for six (6) months; 398 were exonerated. 9
Earlier, on September 19, 1990, the petitioners in G.R. No. 95445 had filed with the Regional Trial Court of Manila
Branch 18, a petition 10 for prohibition, declaratory relief and preliminary mandatory injunction to restrain the

implementation of the return-to-work order of September 17, 1990 and the suspension or dismissal of any teacher
pursuant thereto and to declare said order null and void. Issuance ex-parte of a temporary restraining order was
sought, but seeing no compelling reason therefor, the Regional Trial Court instead set the application for preliminary
injunction for hearing, and heard the same, on September 24, 1990. Thereafter and following the submission of
memorandums by the parties, said Court rendered judgment declaring the assailed return-to-work order valid and
binding, and dismissing the petition for lack of merit. 11
Review of said judgment is sought in G. R. No. 95445.
G.R. No. 95590 is a parallel original proceeding for prohibition, mandamus and certiorari grounded on the same
state of facts and instituted for substantially the same purpose i.e., the invalidation of the return-to-work order of the
respondent Secretary of Education and all orders of suspension and/or dismissal thereafter issued by said respondent
against the teachers who had taken part in the mass actions of September 17, 1990 and the days that followed.
Both cases were ordered consolidated by Resolution issued on October 25, 1990, 12 and separate comments were
filed by the Solicitor General on behalf of the public respondents, in G.R. No. 95445 on October 31, 1990, and in
G.R. No. 95590 on December 5, 1990. 13 On November 20, 1990 the parties were heard in oral argument on the
petitioners' united pleas for a temporary restraining order/mandatory injunction to restore the status quo ante and
enjoin the public respondents from continuing with the issuance of suspension orders and proceeding with the
administrative cases against the teachers involved in the mass actions.
Said pleas were denied by the Court in its Resolution of December 18, 1990, 14 and a motion for reconsideration
filed by the petitioners in G.R. No. 95590 was likewise denied.
In two separate but identically-worded motions filed on their behalf by Atty. Froilan M. Bacungan, 15 the following
persons, to wit: Florita D. Guazon, Elisea G. Lazo, Gonzala G. Sioson, Esperanza Valero, Nenita Pangilinan, Ramon
David, Aurora Bosi, Encarnita David, Socorro Sentin, Crispulo Santos, Rodriguez Bagana, Rodolfo D. Bacsal,
Ruben Bersamina, Rodolfo Arroyo, Irene Gadil, Rebecca Roldan, Rosita Samson, Priscilla Avendia, Arturo
Cabuhat, Rosalinda Caoili, Angelina Corpuz, Purisima Lena, Elsie Somera, Dedaica Jusay, Teresita Partoza, Gloria
Salvador, Catherine San Agustin, Nestor Aguirre, Lorenzo Real, Celia Ronquillo, Vicente Carranza, Jessie
Villanueva, Yolanda Alura, Clara Alvarez, Danilo Llamas, Ladera Panita Myrna, Sena, Zenaida Ligon, Daisy S.
Conti, Danilo Caballes, Susan Maragat, Roberto Manlangit and Elizabeth T. Aguirre, seek leave to withdraw as
parties in G.R. No. 95590. These movants claim that they are such parties although not individually so named in the
petition in said case, being among those referred to in its title as "other similarly situated public school teachers too
numerous to be impleaded," who had been administratively charged, then preventively suspended and/or dismissed
in the wake of the mass actions of September 1990. They assert that since this Court is not a trier of facts, they have
opted to appeal the questioned decisions or actuations of the respondent Secretary of Education to the Civil Service
Commission where they believe they will have "... all the opportunity to introduce evidence on how (Secretary)
Cario violated their constitutional rights to due process of law ... security of tenure and ... peaceably to assemble
and petition the government for redress of grievances ...."
An opposition to the first motion was filed 16 which, briefly, contended that, as this Court had already found that the
petitioners had gone on an unlawful strike and that public respondent Cario's acts were prima facie lawful, the
motion was either an attempt at forum-shopping or meant to avoid the "inevitable outcome" of issues already
pending final determination by the Court.
The Court's Resolution of December 18, 1990, supra, denying the petitioners' plea for restoration of the status quo
ante and to restrain/enjoin further suspensions of, and the initiation or continuation of, administrative proceedings
against the teachers involved, is based on the following postulates:
(1) the undenied indeed, the pleaded and admitted fact that about 800 teachers, among them the
individual petitioners and other unnamed but "similarly situated" members of the petitioning
associations in both cases, unauthorizedly absented themselves from their classes on a regular
schoolday, September 17, 1990, in order to participate in a "mass action" to dramatize their

grievances concerning, in the main, the alleged failure of the public authorities, either to
implement at all or to implement in a just and correct manner, certain laws and measures intended
to benefit them materially;
(2) the fact, too, that in the days that followed, more mass actions for the same purpose were
undertaken, notwithstanding a return-to-work order issued by the respondent Secretary of
Education; more teachers joined the so-called "peaceful assemblies" on September 18, 1990 and
the number rising to 4,000 on September 19, 1990; 17
(3) that from the pleaded and admitted facts, these "mass actions" were to all intents and purposes
a strike; they constituted a concerted and unauthorized stoppage of, or absence from, work which
it was the teachers' duty to perform, undertaken for essentially economic reasons;
(4) that this court had already definitively ruled that employees in the public (civil) service, unlike
those in the private sector, do not have the right to strike, although guaranteed the right to selforganization, to petition Congress for the betterment of employment terms and conditions and to
negotiate with appropriate government agencies for the improvement of such working conditions
as are not fixed by law; 18
(5) that upon the foregoing premises, it was prima facie lawful and within his statutory authority
for the respondent Secretary of Education to take the actions complained of, to wit: issue a returnto-work order, prefer administrative charges against, and place under preventive suspension, those
who failed to comply with said order, and dismiss from the service those who failed to answer or
controvert the charges; 19
The Court has not since been presented with any consideration of law or established fact that would impair the
validity of these postulates or preclude continued reliance thereon for the purpose of resolving the present petitions
on their merits.
The underlying issue here is due process; not whether the petitioners have a right to strike, which it is clear they do
not, however justifiable their reasons, nor whether or not there was in fact such a strike, it being equally evident
from the pleadings that there was, and there being no dispute about this. What therefore, is brought before the Court
is the question of whether or not any rights of the petitioners under the due process clause of the Constitution as it
applies to administrative proceedings were violated in the initiation, conduct, or disposition of the investigations
complained of.
Indeed, what the petitioners in G.R. No. 95590 proclaim about denial of due process being their "paramount
complaint" ... "central to their prayer for interlocutory relief' 20 could as well be said of the merits of their main cause
as of their plea for a restraining order pendente lite or a preliminary injunction.
There are, however, insuperable obstacles to the Court's taking up that issue and resolving it in these cases. Said
issue is not ripe for adjudication by this Court in the exercise of its review jurisdiction; and this, for the obvious
reason that it is one of fact. The petitions and subsequent pleadings of the petitioners allege facts and circumstances
which, it is claimed, show denial of due process, citing as supposedly "representative samples" 21among others: (a)
that teachers were dismissed on the sole basis of unsworn reports of their principals and without evidence of their
alleged failure to obey the return-to-work order; (b) that the charge sheets failed to specify the particular charges or
offenses allegedly committed; (c) that some teachers were not furnished sworn complaints, and others were
suspended without any formal charges; (d) that teachers who attempted to return within a reasonable time after
notice of the return-to-work order were not accepted back; and similar allegations.
These are however denied and disputed by the public respondents, who set forth their own version, initially in their
separate Comments in both cases and, later and in greater detail, in their Consolidated Memorandum of December 3,
1990, supra, from which the following passages are quoted:

(6) Petitioners in G.R. No. 95545 and G.R. No. 95590 admit engaging in a strike (referred by
semantic interplay as "concerted activity" or "mass action") directed against public respondent
Cariobeginning September 17, 1990, MPSTA Petition, pp. 3, 9; ACT Petition, pp. 1516).
To avoid the disruption of classes, public respondent Cario, also on September 17, 1990, issued a
'return to work order' reminding striking workers that in law, they cannot engage in strike and
warning them that dismissal proceedings will be instituted against them if they do not return to
work with 24 hours from their walkout (MPSTA Petition, p. 4; ACT Petition, p. 15) and a
memorandum to DECS officials instructing them to notify the striking teachers to return to work
within 24 hours from their walkout and to initiate dismissal proceedings against those who defy
the return to work order as well as to hire temporary replacements, MPSTA Petition, p. 4; ACT
Petition, pp. 15-16).
The striking teachers who did not heed the return-to-work order were administratively charged and
preventively suspended for ninety days for grave misconduct, gross neglect of duty,
insubordination, refusal to perform official duty, absence without leave beginning September 17,
1990 and other violations of Civil Service Law, rules and regulations. All of striking teachers were
served with the suspension orders and the change sheets notifying them of the charges and giving
them five (5) days from receipt of the charge sheets within which to file their respective answers.
With the filing of the administrative complaints and the receipt of the answers of some of the
teachers involved, public respondent Carino on October 8, 1990 issued a Memorandum forming
an Investigation Committee composed of Atty, Reno Capinpin of DECS Administrative Services
as Chairman Dr. Alberto Mendoza, representing the Division Supervisors, Atty. Evangeline de
Castro, representing the City Superintendent of Schools of Manila, and Atty. Isaias Meleto
representing the National PPSTA Organization, as members. Copy of the aforesaid Memorandum
is hereto attached as Annex "I."
The committee was authorized to meet everyday, even as Special Prosecutors from the
Department of justice on detail with the DECS were designated to handle the prosecution during
the formal hearings. (Ibid.)
Petitioners in GR No. 95545' and 'G.R. No. 95590' admit having received the charge sheets and
notices of preventive suspension wherein they were given five days from receipt of the charges
within which to file their answers (MPSTA Petition, p. 4-1 ACT Petition, p. 16, Annexes x , to ,
AA ).
xxx xxx xxx
... Many striking teachers received their preventive suspension orders and the charge sheets from
their respective principals when they visited their schools. Many refused to receive and sign
receipt therefor; others tore up the preventive suspension orders and charge sheets in front of
their principals. Instead, they took the occasion to belittle and insult the substitute teachers who
took over their classrooms temporarily.
The striking teachers were given a period of five days to file their Answers in line with Sec. 8,
Rule III of Rules on Administrative Disciplinary Cases in CSC Memorandum Circular No. 46, s.
1989. The motion for extension of time to file Answer was denied by DECS Task Force because it
was dilatory the alleged reason being that Atty. Fabros is handling 2,000 cases of teachers. The
DECS was constrained by Sec. 38(d) of P.D. 807 and Sec. 8 of the Memorandum Circular
mentioned which mandate that administrative cases must be decided within 30 days from the filing
of the charges. Another reason was that many refused to receive the notice of charges. Also, to
delay the resolution of the cases was to their disadvantage.

Moreover, another reason proferred was that the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Manila still had to
act on the petition before it. However, the Motion was filed AFTER the RTC Manila had already
dismissed the Petition.
Nevertheless, answers to the administrative complaints started pouring in at the DECS, as
prepared personally by the striking teachers or by their lawyers.
After initial assessments of the reports coming in from the principals of the schools concerned and
the answers of the striking teachers, the DECS Special Task Force prepared on October 9, 1990
and submitted to respondent Secretary Carino the Guidelines and Criteria as to the nature of the
evidence to be assessed and the corresponding penalty to be imposed against the striking teachers,
which was approved by respondent Secretary Carino on the same day. A copy of the aforesaid
Guidelines and Criteria is hereto attached as Annex "2." Thereafter, the DECS Special Task Force
proceeded with its task of investigating the cases against the striking teachers.
Those who refused to sign the DECS return-to-work order, the preventive suspension orders and
the charge sheets, some even tearing up the documents presented to them by their principals were
considered by the DECS Special Task Force as having waived their right to be heard; their cases
had to be resolved on the basis of the records. Nevertheless, the DECS Special Task Force
summoned the principals concerned, who then testified under oath confirming their reports on the
absences of the striking teachers. Some clarificatory questions were asked of them on the manner
of the service of the DECS orders and the situation obtaining in their schools.
For those who answered the charge sheets, the DECS Special Task Force set the administrative
cases for hearing. Many of the striking teachers refused to appear at the hearings but preferred to
submit their case on the basis of their answers.
With regard to those who attended the hearings, each of the absent or striking teachers was
investigated and asked questions under oath on their answers and the reasons for their absences
and/or joining the teachers' strike. Some teachers reiterated their answers to the charge sheets,
either giving justifiable reasons for their absences on the days mentioned or maintaining their
stubborn stand that they have all the right to absent themselves from classes in the exercise of their
constitutional right to join mass action to demand from the government what are supposedly due
them. Still the DECS Special Task Force was not satisfied with their written answers and
explanation during the hearings. The principals of the striking teachers were summoned and they
confirmed under oath their reports of absences and/or on teachers joining the strike.
After having conducted fully their investigations, the DECS Special Task Force submitted in
series their investigation reports and recommendation for each category of striking teachers to
respondent Secretary Carino. The investigation reports, together with their supporting documents,
submitted by the DECS Special Task Force indicated clearly the manner and conduct of the
administrative hearings, the nature and weight of the evidence adduced, and the correspondingly
penalty or exoneration recommended.
On the bases of the investigation reports and recommendations of the DECS Special Task Force,
and after evaluating the reports and its documents attached, respondent Secretary Carino
promulgated the decisions either for exoneration, suspension or dismissal. Copies of the DECS
decisions of exoneration, suspension or dismissal were forwarded to the principals of the striking
teachers concerned. Those exonerated were allowed to resume their duties and received their back
salaries. Some of the teachers either suspended or dismissed have already received the copies of
the decisions, either personally or through mail.
xxx xxx xxx 22

This copious citation is made, not to suggest that the Court finds what is stated therein to be true and the contrary
averments of the petitions to be false, but precisely to stress that the facts upon which the question of alleged denial
of due process would turn are still in issue, actively controverted, hence not yet established.
It is not for the Court, which is not a trier of facts, as the petitioners who would now withdraw correctly put it, to
make the crucial determination of what in truth transpired concerning the disputed incidents. Even if that were
within its competence, it would be at best a monumental task. At any rate, the petitioners cannot-as it seems they
have done lump together into what amounts to a class action hundreds of individual cases, each with its own
peculiar set of facts, and expect a ruling that would justly and correctly resolve each and everyone of those cases
upon little more than general allegations, frontally disputed as already pointed out, of incidents supposedly
"representative" of each case or group of cases.
This case illustrates the error of precipitate recourse to the Supreme Court, especially when numerous parties
desparately situated as far as the facts are concerned gather under the umbrella of a common plea, and generalization
of what should be alleged with particularity becomes unavoidable. The petitioners' obvious remedy was NOT to halt
the administrative proceedings but, on the contrary, to take part, assert and vindicate their rights therein, see those
proceedings through to judgment and if adjudged guilty, appeal to the Civil Service Commission; or if, pending said
proceedings, immediate recourse to judicial authority was believed necessary because the respondent Secretary or
those acting under him or on his instructions were acting without or in excess of jurisdiction, or with grave abuse of
discretion, to apply, not directly to the Supreme Court, but to the Regional Trial Court, where there would be an
opportunity to prove the relevant facts warranting corrective relief.
Parties-litigant are duty bound to observe the proper order of recourse through the judicial hierarchy; they by-pass
the rungs of the judicial ladder at the peril of their own causes. 23 This Court is a court of last resort. Its review
jurisdiction is limited to resolving questions of law where there is no dispute of the facts or the facts have already
been determined by lower tribunals, except only in criminal actions where capital penalties have been imposed.
WHEREFORE, both petitioners are DISMISSED, without prejudice to any appeals, if still timely, that the individual
petitioners may take to the Civil Service Commission on the matters complained of. The motions to withdraw,supra,
are merely NOTED, this disposition rendering any express ruling thereon unnecessary. No pronouncement as to
costs.
SO ORDERED.
G.R. No. L-31195 June 5, 1973
PHILIPPINE BLOOMING MILLS EMPLOYMENT ORGANIZATION, NICANOR TOLENTINO,
FLORENCIO, PADRIGANO RUFINO, ROXAS MARIANO DE LEON, ASENCION PACIENTE,
BONIFACIO
VACUNA,
BENJAMIN
PAGCU
and
RODULFO
MUNSOD, petitioners,
vs.
PHILIPPINE BLOOMING MILLS CO., INC. and COURT OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, respondents.
L.S. Osorio & P.B. Castillo and J.C. Espinas & Associates for petitioners.
Demetrio B. Salem & Associates for private respondent.

MAKASIAR, J.:
The petitioner Philippine Blooming Mills Employees Organization (hereinafter referred to as PBMEO) is a
legitimate labor union composed of the employees of the respondent Philippine Blooming Mills Co., Inc., and

petitioners Nicanor Tolentino, Florencio Padrigano, Rufino Roxas, Mariano de Leon, Asencion Paciente, Bonifacio
Vacuna, Benjamin Pagcu and Rodulfo Munsod are officers and members of the petitioner Union.
Petitioners claim that on March 1, 1969, they decided to stage a mass demonstration at Malacaang on March 4,
1969, in protest against alleged abuses of the Pasig police, to be participated in by the workers in the first shift (from
6 A.M. to 2 P.M.) as well as those in the regular second and third shifts (from 7 A.M. to 4 P.M. and from 8 A.M. to
5 P.M., respectively); and that they informed the respondent Company of their proposed demonstration.
The questioned order dated September 15, 1969, of Associate Judge Joaquin M. Salvador of the respondent Court
reproduced the following stipulation of facts of the parties parties
3. That on March 2, 1969 complainant company learned of the projected mass demonstration at
Malacaang in protest against alleged abuses of the Pasig Police Department to be participated by
the first shift (6:00 AM-2:00 PM) workers as well as those working in the regular shifts (7:00
A.M. to 4:00 PM and 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM) in the morning of March 4, 1969;
4. That a meeting was called by the Company on March 3, 1969 at about 11:00 A.M. at the
Company's canteen, and those present were: for the Company: (1) Mr. Arthur L. Ang (2) Atty. S.
de Leon, Jr., (3) and all department and section heads. For the PBMEO (1) Florencio Padrigano,
(2) Rufino Roxas, (3) Mariano de Leon, (4) Asencion Paciente, (5) Bonifacio Vacuna and (6)
Benjamin Pagcu.
5. That the Company asked the union panel to confirm or deny said projected mass demonstration
at Malacaang on March 4, 1969. PBMEO thru Benjamin Pagcu who acted as spokesman of the
union panel, confirmed the planned demonstration and stated that the demonstration or rally
cannot be cancelled because it has already been agreed upon in the meeting. Pagcu explained
further that the demonstration has nothing to do with the Company because the union has no
quarrel or dispute with Management;
6. That Management, thru Atty. C.S. de Leon, Company personnel manager, informed PBMEO
that the demonstration is an inalienable right of the union guaranteed by the Constitution but
emphasized, however, that any demonstration for that matter should not unduly prejudice the
normal operation of the Company. For which reason, the Company, thru Atty. C.S. de Leon
warned the PBMEO representatives that workers who belong to the first and regular shifts, who
without previous leave of absence approved by the Company, particularly , the officers present
who are the organizers of the demonstration, who shall fail to report for work the following
morning (March 4, 1969) shall be dismissed, because such failure is a violation of the existing
CBA and, therefore, would be amounting to an illegal strike;
7. That at about 5:00 P.M. on March 3, 1969, another meeting was convoked Company
represented by Atty. C.S. de Leon, Jr. The Union panel was composed of: Nicanor Tolentino,
Rodolfo Munsod, Benjamin Pagcu and Florencio Padrigano. In this afternoon meeting of March 3,
1969, Company reiterated and appealed to the PBMEO representatives that while all workers may
join the Malacaang demonstration, the workers for the first and regular shift of March 4, 1969
should be excused from joining the demonstration and should report for work; and thus utilize the
workers in the 2nd and 3rd shifts in order not to violate the provisions of the CBA, particularly
Article XXIV: NO LOCKOUT NO STRIKE'. All those who will not follow this warning of the
Company shall be dismiss; De Leon reiterated the Company's warning that the officers shall be
primarily liable being the organizers of the mass demonstration. The union panel countered that it
was rather too late to change their plans inasmuch as the Malacaang demonstration will be held
the following morning; and
8. That a certain Mr. Wilfredo Ariston, adviser of PBMEO sent a cablegram to the Company
which was received 9:50 A.M., March 4, 1969, the contents of which are as follows:

'REITERATING
REQUEST
EXCUSE
DAY
SHIFT
EMPLOYEES
DEMONSTRATION MARCH 4, 1969.' (Pars. 3-8, Annex "F", pp. 42-43, rec.)

JOINING

Because the petitioners and their members numbering about 400 proceeded with the demonstration despite the pleas
of the respondent Company that the first shift workers should not be required to participate in the demonstration and
that the workers in the second and third shifts should be utilized for the demonstration from 6 A.M. to 2 P.M. on
March 4, 1969, respondent Company prior notice of the mass demonstration on March 4, 1969, with the respondent
Court, a charge against petitioners and other employees who composed the first shift, charging them with a
"violation of Section 4(a)-6 in relation to Sections 13 and 14, as well as Section 15, all of Republic Act No. 875, and
of the CBA providing for 'No Strike and No Lockout.' " (Annex "A", pp. 19-20, rec.). The charge was accompanied
by the joint affidavit of Arthur L. Ang and Cesareo de Leon, Jr. (Annex "B", pp. 21-24, rec.). Thereafter, a
corresponding complaint was filed, dated April 18, 1969, by Acting Chief Prosecutor Antonio T. Tirona and Acting
Prosecutor Linda P. Ilagan (Annex "C", pp. 25-30, rec.)
In their answer, dated May 9, 1969, herein petitioners claim that they did not violate the existing CBA because they
gave the respondent Company prior notice of the mass demonstration on March 4, 1969; that the said mass
demonstration was a valid exercise of their constitutional freedom of speech against the alleged abuses of some
Pasig policemen; and that their mass demonstration was not a declaration of strike because it was not directed
against the respondent firm (Annex "D", pp. 31-34, rec.)
After considering the aforementioned stipulation of facts submitted by the parties, Judge Joaquin M. Salvador, in an
order dated September 15, 1969, found herein petitioner PBMEO guilty of bargaining in bad faith and herein
petitioners Florencio Padrigano, Rufino Roxas, Mariano de Leon, Asencion Paciente, Bonifacio Vacuna, Benjamin
Pagcu, Nicanor Tolentino and Rodulfo Munsod as directly responsible for perpetrating the said unfair labor practice
and were, as a consequence, considered to have lost their status as employees of the respondent Company (Annex
"F", pp. 42-56, rec.)
Herein petitioners claim that they received on September 23, 1969, the aforesaid order (p. 11, rec.); and that they
filed on September 29, 1969, because September 28, 1969 fell on Sunday (p. 59, rec.), a motion for reconsideration
of said order dated September 15, 1969, on the ground that it is contrary to law and the evidence, as well as asked
for ten (10) days within which to file their arguments pursuant to Sections 15, 16 and 17 of the Rules of the CIR, as
amended (Annex "G", pp. 57-60, rec. )
In its opposition dated October 7, 1969, filed on October 11, 1969 (p. 63, rec.), respondent Company averred that
herein petitioners received on September 22, 1969, the order dated September 17 (should be September 15), 1969;
that under Section 15 of the amended Rules of the Court of Industrial Relations, herein petitioners had five (5) days
from September 22, 1969 or until September 27, 1969, within which to file their motion for reconsideration; and that
because their motion for reconsideration was two (2) days late, it should be accordingly dismissed, invoking Bien vs.
Castillo, 1 which held among others, that a motion for extension of the five-day period for the filing of a motion for
reconsideration should be filed before the said five-day period elapses (Annex "M", pp. 61-64, rec.).
Subsequently, herein petitioners filed on October 14, 1969 their written arguments dated October 11, 1969, in
support of their motion for reconsideration (Annex "I", pp. 65-73, rec.).
In a resolution dated October 9, 1969, the respondent en banc dismissed the motion for reconsideration of herein
petitioners for being pro forma as it was filed beyond the reglementary period prescribed by its Rules (Annex "J",
pp. 74-75, rec.), which herein petitioners received on October 28, 196 (pp. 12 & 76, rec.).
At the bottom of the notice of the order dated October 9, 1969, which was released on October 24, 1969 and
addressed to the counsels of the parties (pp. 75-76, rec.), appear the requirements of Sections 15, 16 and 17, as
amended, of the Rules of the Court of Industrial Relations, that a motion for reconsideration shall be filed within
five (5) days from receipt of its decision or order and that an appeal from the decision, resolution or order of the
C.I.R., sitting en banc, shall be perfected within ten (10) days from receipt thereof (p. 76, rec.).

On October 31, 1969, herein petitioners filed with the respondent court a petition for relief from the order dated
October 9, 1969, on the ground that their failure to file their motion for reconsideration on time was due to
excusable negligence and honest mistake committed by the president of the petitioner Union and of the office clerk
of their counsel, attaching thereto the affidavits of the said president and clerk (Annexes "K", "K-1" and "K-2", rec.).
Without waiting for any resolution on their petition for relief from the order dated October 9, 1969, herein
petitioners filed on November 3, 1969, with the Supreme Court, a notice of appeal (Annex "L", pp. 88-89, rec.).
I
There is need of briefly restating basic concepts and principles which underlie the issues posed by the case at bar.
(1) In a democracy, the preservation and enhancement of the dignity and worth of the human personality is the
central core as well as the cardinal article of faith of our civilization. The inviolable character of man as an
individual must be "protected to the largest possible extent in his thoughts and in his beliefs as the citadel of his
person." 2
(2) The Bill of Rights is designed to preserve the ideals of liberty, equality and security "against the assaults of
opportunism, the expediency of the passing hour, the erosion of small encroachments, and the scorn and derision of
those who have no patience with general principles." 3
In the pithy language of Mr. Justice Robert Jackson, the purpose of the Bill of Rights is to withdraw "certain
subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials,
and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One's rights to life, liberty and property, to free
speech, or free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to a
vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections." 4 Laski proclaimed that "the happiness of the individual, not the
well-being of the State, was the criterion by which its behaviour was to be judged. His interests, not its power, set
the limits to the authority it was entitled to exercise." 5
(3) The freedoms of expression and of assembly as well as the right to petition are included among the immunities
reserved by the sovereign people, in the rhetorical aphorism of Justice Holmes, to protect the ideas that we abhor or
hate more than the ideas we cherish; or as Socrates insinuated, not only to protect the minority who want to talk, but
also to benefit the majority who refuse to listen. 6 And as Justice Douglas cogently stresses it, the liberties of one are
the liberties of all; and the liberties of one are not safe unless the liberties of all are protected. 7
(4) The rights of free expression, free assembly and petition, are not only civil rights but also political rights
essential to man's enjoyment of his life, to his happiness and to his full and complete fulfillment. Thru these
freedoms the citizens can participate not merely in the periodic establishment of the government through their
suffrage but also in the administration of public affairs as well as in the discipline of abusive public officers. The
citizen is accorded these rights so that he can appeal to the appropriate governmental officers or agencies for redress
and protection as well as for the imposition of the lawful sanctions on erring public officers and employees.
(5) While the Bill of Rights also protects property rights, the primacy of human rights over property rights is
recognized. 8 Because these freedoms are "delicate and vulnerable, as well as supremely precious in our society" and
the "threat of sanctions may deter their exercise almost as potently as the actual application of sanctions," they "need
breathing space to survive," permitting government regulation only "with narrow specificity." 9
Property and property rights can be lost thru prescription; but human rights are imprescriptible. If human rights are
extinguished by the passage of time, then the Bill of Rights is a useless attempt to limit the power of government
and ceases to be an efficacious shield against the tyranny of officials, of majorities, of the influential and powerful,
and of oligarchs political, economic or otherwise.

In the hierarchy of civil liberties, the rights of free expression and of assembly occupy a preferred position as they
are essential to the preservation and vitality of our civil and political institutions; 10 and such priority "gives these
liberties the sanctity and the sanction not permitting dubious intrusions." 11
The superiority of these freedoms over property rights is underscored by the fact that a mere reasonable or rational
relation between the means employed by the law and its object or purpose that the law is neither arbitrary nor
discriminatory nor oppressive would suffice to validate a law which restricts or impairs property rights. 12 On the
other hand, a constitutional or valid infringement of human rights requires a more stringent criterion, namely
existence of a grave and immediate danger of a substantive evil which the State has the right to prevent. So it has
been stressed in the main opinion of Mr. Justice Fernando in Gonzales vs. Comelec and reiterated by the writer of
the opinion in Imbong vs. Ferrer. 13 It should be added that Mr. Justice Barredo in Gonzales vs. Comelec, supra, like
Justices Douglas, Black and Goldberg in N.Y. Times Co. vs. Sullivan, 14 believes that the freedoms of speech and of
the press as well as of peaceful assembly and of petition for redress of grievances are absolute when directed against
public officials or "when exercised in relation to our right to choose the men and women by whom we shall be
governed," 15 even as Mr. Justice Castro relies on the balancing-of-interests test. 16 Chief Justice Vinson is partial to
the improbable danger rule formulated by Chief Judge Learned Hand, viz. whether the gravity of the evil,
discounted by its improbability, justifies such invasion of free expression as is necessary to avoid the danger. 17
II
The respondent Court of Industrial Relations, after opining that the mass demonstration was not a declaration of
strike, concluded that by their "concerted act and the occurrence temporary stoppage of work," herein petitioners are
guilty bargaining in bad faith and hence violated the collective bargaining agreement with private respondent
Philippine Blooming Mills Co., inc.. Set against and tested by foregoing principles governing a democratic society,
such conclusion cannot be sustained. The demonstration held petitioners on March 4, 1969 before Malacaang was
against alleged abuses of some Pasig policemen, not against their employer, herein private respondent firm, said
demonstrate was purely and completely an exercise of their freedom expression in general and of their right of
assembly and petition for redress of grievances in particular before appropriate governmental agency, the Chief
Executive, again the police officers of the municipality of Pasig. They exercise their civil and political rights for
their mutual aid protection from what they believe were police excesses. As matter of fact, it was the duty of herein
private respondent firm to protect herein petitioner Union and its members fro the harassment of local police
officers. It was to the interest herein private respondent firm to rally to the defense of, and take up the cudgels for, its
employees, so that they can report to work free from harassment, vexation or peril and as consequence perform more
efficiently their respective tasks enhance its productivity as well as profits. Herein respondent employer did not even
offer to intercede for its employees with the local police. Was it securing peace for itself at the expenses of its
workers? Was it also intimidated by the local police or did it encourage the local police to terrorize or vex its
workers? Its failure to defend its own employees all the more weakened the position of its laborers the alleged
oppressive police who might have been all the more emboldened thereby subject its lowly employees to further
indignities.
In seeking sanctuary behind their freedom of expression well as their right of assembly and of petition against
alleged persecution of local officialdom, the employees and laborers of herein private respondent firm were fighting
for their very survival, utilizing only the weapons afforded them by the Constitution the untrammelled enjoyment
of their basic human rights. The pretension of their employer that it would suffer loss or damage by reason of the
absence of its employees from 6 o'clock in the morning to 2 o'clock in the afternoon, is a plea for the preservation
merely of their property rights. Such apprehended loss or damage would not spell the difference between the life and
death of the firm or its owners or its management. The employees' pathetic situation was a stark reality abused,
harassment and persecuted as they believed they were by the peace officers of the municipality. As above intimated,
the condition in which the employees found themselves vis-a-vis the local police of Pasig, was a matter that vitally
affected their right to individual existence as well as that of their families. Material loss can be repaired or
adequately compensated. The debasement of the human being broken in morale and brutalized in spirit-can never be
fully evaluated in monetary terms. The wounds fester and the scars remain to humiliate him to his dying day, even
as he cries in anguish for retribution, denial of which is like rubbing salt on bruised tissues.

As heretofore stated, the primacy of human rights freedom of expression, of peaceful assembly and of petition for
redress of grievances over property rights has been sustained. 18 Emphatic reiteration of this basic tenet as a
coveted boon at once the shield and armor of the dignity and worth of the human personality, the all-consuming
ideal of our enlightened civilization becomes Our duty, if freedom and social justice have any meaning at all for
him who toils so that capital can produce economic goods that can generate happiness for all. To regard the
demonstration against police officers, not against the employer, as evidence of bad faith in collective bargaining and
hence a violation of the collective bargaining agreement and a cause for the dismissal from employment of the
demonstrating employees, stretches unduly the compass of the collective bargaining agreement, is "a potent means
of inhibiting speech" and therefore inflicts a moral as well as mortal wound on the constitutional guarantees of free
expression, of peaceful assembly and of petition. 19
The collective bargaining agreement which fixes the working shifts of the employees, according to the respondent
Court Industrial Relations, in effect imposes on the workers the "duty ... to observe regular working hours." The
strain construction of the Court of Industrial Relations that a stipulated working shifts deny the workers the right to
stage mass demonstration against police abuses during working hours, constitutes a virtual tyranny over the mind
and life the workers and deserves severe condemnation. Renunciation of the freedom should not be predicated on
such a slender ground.
The mass demonstration staged by the employees on March 4, 1969 could not have been legally enjoined by any
court, such an injunction would be trenching upon the freedom expression of the workers, even if it legally appears
to be illegal picketing or strike. 20 The respondent Court of Industrial Relations in the case at bar concedes that the
mass demonstration was not a declaration of a strike "as the same not rooted in any industrial dispute although there
is concerted act and the occurrence of a temporary stoppage work." (Annex "F", p. 45, rec.).
The respondent firm claims that there was no need for all its employees to participate in the demonstration and that
they suggested to the Union that only the first and regular shift from 6 A.M. to 2 P.M. should report for work in
order that loss or damage to the firm will be averted. This stand failed appreciate the sine qua non of an effective
demonstration especially by a labor union, namely the complete unity of the Union members as well as their total
presence at the demonstration site in order to generate the maximum sympathy for the validity of their cause but also
immediately action on the part of the corresponding government agencies with jurisdiction over the issues they
raised against the local police. Circulation is one of the aspects of freedom of expression. 21 If demonstrators are
reduced by one-third, then by that much the circulation of the issues raised by the demonstration is diminished. The
more the participants, the more persons can be apprised of the purpose of the rally. Moreover, the absence of onethird of their members will be regarded as a substantial indication of disunity in their ranks which will enervate their
position and abet continued alleged police persecution. At any rate, the Union notified the company two days in
advance of their projected demonstration and the company could have made arrangements to counteract or prevent
whatever losses it might sustain by reason of the absence of its workers for one day, especially in this case when the
Union requested it to excuse only the day-shift employees who will join the demonstration on March 4, 1969 which
request the Union reiterated in their telegram received by the company at 9:50 in the morning of March 4, 1969, the
day of the mass demonstration (pp. 42-43, rec.). There was a lack of human understanding or compassion on the part
of the firm in rejecting the request of the Union for excuse from work for the day shifts in order to carry out its mass
demonstration. And to regard as a ground for dismissal the mass demonstration held against the Pasig police, not
against the company, is gross vindictiveness on the part of the employer, which is as unchristian as it is
unconstitutional.
III
The respondent company is the one guilty of unfair labor practice. Because the refusal on the part of the respondent
firm to permit all its employees and workers to join the mass demonstration against alleged police abuses and the
subsequent separation of the eight (8) petitioners from the service constituted an unconstitutional restraint on the
freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and freedom petition for redress of grievances, the respondent firm
committed an unfair labor practice defined in Section 4(a-1) in relation to Section 3 of Republic Act No. 875,
otherwise known as the Industrial Peace Act. Section 3 of Republic Act No. 8 guarantees to the employees the right
"to engage in concert activities for ... mutual aid or protection"; while Section 4(a-1) regards as an unfair labor

practice for an employer interfere with, restrain or coerce employees in the exercise their rights guaranteed in
Section Three."
We repeat that the obvious purpose of the mass demonstration staged by the workers of the respondent firm on
March 4, 1969, was for their mutual aid and protection against alleged police abuses, denial of which was
interference with or restraint on the right of the employees to engage in such common action to better shield
themselves against such alleged police indignities. The insistence on the part of the respondent firm that the workers
for the morning and regular shift should not participate in the mass demonstration, under pain of dismissal, was as
heretofore stated, "a potent means of inhibiting speech." 22
Such a concerted action for their mutual help and protection deserves at least equal protection as the concerted
action of employees in giving publicity to a letter complaint charging bank president with immorality, nepotism,
favoritism an discrimination in the appointment and promotion of ban employees. 23 We further ruled in the
Republic Savings Bank case, supra, that for the employees to come within the protective mantle of Section 3 in
relation to Section 4(a-1) on Republic Act No. 875, "it is not necessary that union activity be involved or that
collective bargaining be contemplated," as long as the concerted activity is for the furtherance of their interests. 24
As stated clearly in the stipulation of facts embodied in the questioned order of respondent Court dated September
15, 1969, the company, "while expressly acknowledging, that the demonstration is an inalienable right of the Union
guaranteed by the Constitution," nonetheless emphasized that "any demonstration for that matter should not unduly
prejudice the normal operation of the company" and "warned the PBMEO representatives that workers who belong
to the first and regular shifts, who without previous leave of absence approved by the Company, particularly the
officers present who are the organizers of the demonstration, who shall fail to report for work the following morning
(March 4, 1969) shall be dismissed, because such failure is a violation of the existing CBA and, therefore, would be
amounting to an illegal strike (;)" (p. III, petitioner's brief). Such threat of dismissal tended to coerce the employees
from joining the mass demonstration. However, the issues that the employees raised against the local police, were
more important to them because they had the courage to proceed with the demonstration, despite such threat of
dismissal. The most that could happen to them was to lose a day's wage by reason of their absence from work on the
day of the demonstration. One day's pay means much to a laborer, more especially if he has a family to support. Yet,
they were willing to forego their one-day salary hoping that their demonstration would bring about the desired relief
from police abuses. But management was adamant in refusing to recognize the superior legitimacy of their right of
free speech, free assembly and the right to petition for redress.
Because the respondent company ostensibly did not find it necessary to demand from the workers proof of the truth
of the alleged abuses inflicted on them by the local police, it thereby concedes that the evidence of such abuses
should properly be submitted to the corresponding authorities having jurisdiction over their complaint and to whom
such complaint may be referred by the President of the Philippines for proper investigation and action with a view to
disciplining the local police officers involved.
On the other hand, while the respondent Court of Industrial Relations found that the demonstration "paralyzed to a
large extent the operations of the complainant company," the respondent Court of Industrial Relations did not make
any finding as to the fact of loss actually sustained by the firm. This significant circumstance can only mean that the
firm did not sustain any loss or damage. It did not present evidence as to whether it lost expected profits for failure
to comply with purchase orders on that day; or that penalties were exacted from it by customers whose orders could
not be filled that day of the demonstration; or that purchase orders were cancelled by the customers by reason of its
failure to deliver the materials ordered; or that its own equipment or materials or products were damaged due to
absence of its workers on March 4, 1969. On the contrary, the company saved a sizable amount in the form of wages
for its hundreds of workers, cost of fuel, water and electric consumption that day. Such savings could have amply
compensated for unrealized profits or damages it might have sustained by reason of the absence of its workers for
only one day.
IV

Apart from violating the constitutional guarantees of free speech and assembly as well as the right to petition for
redress of grievances of the employees, the dismissal of the eight (8) leaders of the workers for proceeding with the
demonstration and consequently being absent from work, constitutes a denial of social justice likewise assured by
the fundamental law to these lowly employees. Section 5 of Article II of the Constitution imposes upon the State
"the promotion of social justice to insure the well-being and economic security of all of the people," which
guarantee is emphasized by the other directive in Section 6 of Article XIV of the Constitution that "the State shall
afford protection to labor ...". Respondent Court of Industrial Relations as an agency of the State is under obligation
at all times to give meaning and substance to these constitutional guarantees in favor of the working man; for
otherwise these constitutional safeguards would be merely a lot of "meaningless constitutional patter." Under the
Industrial Peace Act, the Court of Industrial Relations is enjoined to effect the policy of the law "to eliminate the
causes of industrial unrest by encouraging and protecting the exercise by employees of their right to selforganization for the purpose of collective bargaining and for the promotion of their moral, social and economic
well-being." It is most unfortunate in the case at bar that respondent Court of Industrial Relations, the very
governmental agency designed therefor, failed to implement this policy and failed to keep faith with its avowed
mission its raison d'etre as ordained and directed by the Constitution.
V
It has been likewise established that a violation of a constitutional right divests the court of jurisdiction; and as a
consequence its judgment is null and void and confers no rights. Relief from a criminal conviction secured at the
sacrifice of constitutional liberties, may be obtained through habeas corpus proceedings even long after the finality
of the judgment. Thus, habeas corpus is the remedy to obtain the release of an individual, who is convicted by final
judgment through a forced confession, which violated his constitutional right against self-incrimination; 25or who is
denied the right to present evidence in his defense as a deprivation of his liberty without due process of law, 26even
after the accused has already served sentence for twenty-two years. 27
Both the respondents Court of Industrial Relations and private firm trenched upon these constitutional immunities of
petitioners. Both failed to accord preference to such rights and aggravated the inhumanity to which the aggrieved
workers claimed they had been subjected by the municipal police. Having violated these basic human rights of the
laborers, the Court of Industrial Relations ousted itself of jurisdiction and the questioned orders it issued in the
instant case are a nullity. Recognition and protection of such freedoms are imperative on all public offices including
the courts 28 as well as private citizens and corporations, the exercise and enjoyment of which must not be nullified
by mere procedural rule promulgated by the Court Industrial Relations exercising a purely delegate legislative
power, when even a law enacted by Congress must yield to the untrammelled enjoyment of these human rights.
There is no time limit to the exercise of the freedoms. The right to enjoy them is not exhausted by the delivery of
one speech, the printing of one article or the staging of one demonstration. It is a continuing immunity to be invoked
and exercised when exigent and expedient whenever there are errors to be rectified, abuses to be denounced,
inhumanities to be condemned. Otherwise these guarantees in the Bill of Rights would be vitiated by rule on
procedure prescribing the period for appeal. The battle then would be reduced to a race for time. And in such a
contest between an employer and its laborer, the latter eventually loses because he cannot employ the best an
dedicated counsel who can defend his interest with the required diligence and zeal, bereft as he is of the financial
resources with which to pay for competent legal services. 28-a
VI
The Court of Industrial Relations rule prescribes that motion for reconsideration of its order or writ should filed
within five (5) days from notice thereof and that the arguments in support of said motion shall be filed within ten
(10) days from the date of filing of such motion for reconsideration (Sec. 16). As above intimated, these rules of
procedure were promulgated by the Court of Industrial Relations pursuant to a legislative delegation. 29
The motion for reconsideration was filed on September 29, 1969, or seven (7) days from notice on September 22,
1969 of the order dated September 15, 1969 or two (2) days late. Petitioners claim that they could have filed it on
September 28, 1969, but it was a Sunday.

Does the mere fact that the motion for reconsideration was filed two (2) days late defeat the rights of the petitioning
employees? Or more directly and concretely, does the inadvertent omission to comply with a mere Court of
Industrial Relations procedural rule governing the period for filing a motion for reconsideration or appeal in labor
cases, promulgated pursuant to a legislative delegation, prevail over constitutional rights? The answer should be
obvious in the light of the aforecited cases. To accord supremacy to the foregoing rules of the Court of Industrial
Relations over basic human rights sheltered by the Constitution, is not only incompatible with the basic tenet of
constitutional government that the Constitution is superior to any statute or subordinate rules and regulations, but
also does violence to natural reason and logic. The dominance and superiority of the constitutional right over the
aforesaid Court of Industrial Relations procedural rule of necessity should be affirmed. Such a Court of Industrial
Relations rule as applied in this case does not implement or reinforce or strengthen the constitutional rights affected,'
but instead constrict the same to the point of nullifying the enjoyment thereof by the petitioning employees. Said
Court of Industrial Relations rule, promulgated as it was pursuant to a mere legislative delegation, is unreasonable
and therefore is beyond the authority granted by the Constitution and the law. A period of five (5) days within which
to file a motion for reconsideration is too short, especially for the aggrieved workers, who usually do not have the
ready funds to meet the necessary expenses therefor. In case of the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court, a
period of fifteen (15) days has been fixed for the filing of the motion for re hearing or reconsideration (See. 10, Rule
51; Sec. 1, Rule 52; Sec. 1, Rule 56, Revised Rules of Court). The delay in the filing of the motion for
reconsideration could have been only one day if September 28, 1969 was not a Sunday. This fact accentuates the
unreasonableness of the Court of Industrial are concerned.
It should be stressed here that the motion for reconsideration dated September 27, 1969, is based on the ground that
the order sought to be reconsidered "is not in accordance with law, evidence and facts adduced during the hearing,"
and likewise prays for an extension of ten (10) days within which to file arguments pursuant to Sections 15, 16 and
17 of the Rules of the Court of Industrial Relations (Annex "G", pp. 57-60, rec.); although the arguments were
actually filed by the herein petitioners on October 14, 1969 (Annex "I", pp. 70-73, rec.), long after the 10-day period
required for the filing of such supporting arguments counted from the filing of the motion for reconsideration.
Herein petitioners received only on October 28, 1969 the resolution dated October 9, 1969 dismissing the motion for
reconsideration for being pro forma since it was filed beyond the reglementary period (Annex "J", pp. 74-75, rec.)
It is true that We ruled in several cases that where a motion to reconsider is filed out of time, or where the arguments
in suppf such motion are filed beyond the 10 day reglementary period provided for by the Court of Industrial
Relations rules, the order or decision subject of 29-a reconsideration becomes final and unappealable. But in all these
cases, the constitutional rights of free expression, free assembly and petition were not involved.
It is a procedural rule that generally all causes of action and defenses presently available must be specifically raised
in the complaint or answer; so that any cause of action or defense not raised in such pleadings, is deemed waived.
However, a constitutional issue can be raised any time, even for the first time on appeal, if it appears that the
determination of the constitutional issue is necessary to a decision of the case, the very lis mota of the case without
the resolution of which no final and complete determination of the dispute can be made. 30 It is thus seen that a
procedural rule of Congress or of the Supreme Court gives way to a constitutional right. In the instant case, the
procedural rule of the Court of Industrial Relations, a creature of Congress, must likewise yield to the constitutional
rights invoked by herein petitioners even before the institution of the unfair labor practice charged against them and
in their defense to the said charge.
In the case at bar, enforcement of the basic human freedoms sheltered no less by the organic law, is a most
compelling reason to deny application of a Court of Industrial Relations rule which impinges on such human
rights. 30-a
It is an accepted principle that the Supreme Court has the inherent power to "suspend its own rules or to except a
particular case from its operation, whenever the purposes of justice require." 30-b Mr. Justice Barredo in his
concurring opinion in Estrada vs. Sto. Domingo. 30-c reiterated this principle and added that
Under this authority, this Court is enabled to cove with all situations without concerning itself
about procedural niceties that do not square with the need to do justice, in any case, without
further loss of time, provided that the right of the parties to a full day in court is not substantially

impaired. Thus, this Court may treat an appeal as a certiorari and vice-versa. In other words,
when all the material facts are spread in the records before Us, and all the parties have been duly
heard, it matters little that the error of the court a quo is of judgment or of jurisdiction. We can
then and there render the appropriate judgment. Is within the contemplation of this doctrine that
as it is perfectly legal and within the power of this Court to strike down in an appeal acts without
or in excess of jurisdiction or committed with grave abuse of discretion, it cannot be beyond the
admit of its authority, in appropriate cases, to reverse in a certain proceed in any error of
judgment of a court a quo which cannot be exactly categorized as a flaw of jurisdiction. If there
can be any doubt, which I do not entertain, on whether or not the errors this Court has found in the
decision of the Court of Appeals are short of being jurisdiction nullities or excesses, this Court
would still be on firm legal grounds should it choose to reverse said decision here and now even if
such errors can be considered as mere mistakes of judgment or only as faults in the exercise of
jurisdiction, so as to avoid the unnecessary return of this case to the lower court for the sole
purpose of pursuing the ordinary course of an appeal. (Emphasis supplied). 30-d
Insistence on the application of the questioned Court industrial Relations rule in this particular case at bar would an
unreasoning adherence to "Procedural niceties" which denies justice to the herein laborers, whose basic human
freedoms, including the right to survive, must be according supremacy over the property rights of their employer
firm which has been given a full hearing on this case, especially when, as in the case at bar, no actual material
damage has be demonstrated as having been inflicted on its property rights.
If We can disregard our own rules when justice requires it, obedience to the Constitution renders more imperative
the suspension of a Court of Industrial Relations rule that clash with the human rights sanctioned and shielded with
resolution concern by the specific guarantees outlined in the organic law. It should be stressed that the application in
the instant case Section 15 of the Court of Industrial Relations rules relied upon by herein respondent firm is
unreasonable and therefore such application becomes unconstitutional as it subverts the human rights of petitioning
labor union and workers in the light of the peculiar facts and circumstances revealed by the record.
The suspension of the application of Section 15 of the Court of Industrial Relations rules with reference to the case
at is also authorized by Section 20 of Commonwealth Act No. 103, the C.I.R. charter, which enjoins the Court of
Industrial Relations to "act according to justice and equity and substantial merits of the case, without regard to
technicalities or legal forms ..."
On several occasions, We emphasized this doctrine which was re-stated by Mr. Justice Barredo, speaking for the
Court, in the 1970 case of Kapisanan, etc. vs. Hamilton, etc., et. al., 30-e thus:
As to the point that the evidence being offered by the petitioners in the motion for new trial is not
"newly discovered," as such term is understood in the rules of procedure for the ordinary courts,
We hold that such criterion is not binding upon the Court of Industrial Relations. Under Section 20
of Commonwealth Act No. 103, 'The Court of Industrial Relations shall adopt its, rules or
procedure and shall have such other powers as generally pertain to a court of justice: Provided,
however, That in the hearing, investigation and determination of any question or controversy and
in exercising any duties and power under this Act, the Court shall act according to justice and
equity and substantial merits of the case, without regard to technicalities or legal forms and shall
not be bound by any technical rules of legal evidence but may inform its mind in such manner as it
may deem just and equitable.' By this provision the industrial court is disengaged from the rigidity
of the technicalities applicable to ordinary courts. Said court is not even restricted to the specific
relief demanded by the parties but may issue such orders as may be deemed necessary or
expedient for the purpose of settling the dispute or dispelling any doubts that may give rise to
future disputes. (Ang Tibay v. C.I.R., G.R. No. 46496, Feb. 17, 1940; Manila Trading & Supply
Co. v. Phil. Labor, 71 Phil. 124.) For these reasons, We believe that this provision is ample
enough to have enabled the respondent court to consider whether or not its previous ruling that
petitioners constitute a minority was founded on fact, without regard to the technical meaning of
newly discovered evidence. ... (Alonso v. Villamor, 16 Phil. 315; Chua Kiong v. Whitaker, 46
Phil. 578). (emphasis supplied.)

To apply Section 15 of the Court of Industrial Relations rules with "pedantic rigor" in the instant case is to rule in
effect that the poor workers, who can ill-afford an alert competent lawyer, can no longer seek the sanctuary of
human freedoms secured to them by the fundamental law, simply because their counsel erroneously believing
that he received a copy of the decision on September 23, 1969, instead of September 22, 1969 - filed his motion for
reconsideration September 29, 1969, which practically is only one day late considering that September 28, 1969 was
a Sunday.
Many a time, this Court deviated from procedure technicalities when they ceased to be instruments of justice, for the
attainment of which such rules have been devised. Summarizing the jurisprudence on this score, Mr. Justice
Fernando, speaking for a unanimous Court in Palma vs. Oreta, 30-f Stated:
As was so aptly expressed by Justice Moreland in Alonso v. Villamor (16 Phil. 315 [1910]. The
Villamor decision was cited with approval in Register of Deeds v. Phil. Nat. Bank, 84 Phil. 600
[1949]; Potenciano v. Court of Appeals, 104 Phil. 156 [1958] and Uy v. Uy, 14243, June 30, 1961,
2 SCRA 675.), decided as far back as 1910, "technicality. when it deserts its proper-office as an
aid to justice and becomes its great hindrance and chief enemy, deserves scant consideration from
courts." (Ibid., p, 322.) To that norm, this Court has remained committed. The late Justice Recto in
Blanco v. Bernabe, (63 Phil. 124 [1936]) was of a similar mind. For him the interpretation of
procedural rule should never "sacrifice the ends justice." While "procedural laws are no other than
technicalities" view them in their entirety, 'they were adopted not as ends themselves for the
compliance with which courts have organized and function, but as means conducive to the
realization the administration of the law and of justice (Ibid., p.,128). We have remained
steadfastly opposed, in the highly rhetorical language Justice Felix, to "a sacrifice of substantial
rights of a litigant in altar of sophisticated technicalities with impairment of the sacred principles
of justice." (Potenciano v. Court of Appeals, 104 Phil. 156, 161 [1958]). As succinctly put by
Justice Makalintal, they "should give way to the realities of the situation." (Urbayan v. Caltex, L15379, Aug. 31, 1962, 5 SCRA 1016, 1019). In the latest decision in point promulgated in 1968,
(Udan v. Amon, (1968, 23 SCRA citing McEntee v. Manotok, L-14968, Oct. 27, 1961, 3 SCRA
272.) Justice Zaldivar was partial to an earlier formulation of Justice Labrador that rules of
procedure "are not to be applied in a very rigid, technical sense"; but are intended "to help secure
substantial justice." (Ibid., p. 843) ... 30-g
Even if the questioned Court of Industrial Relations orders and rule were to be given effect, the dismissal or
termination of the employment of the petitioning eight (8) leaders of the Union is harsh for a one-day absence from
work. The respondent Court itself recognized the severity of such a sanction when it did not include the dismissal of
the other 393 employees who are members of the same Union and who participated in the demonstration against the
Pasig police. As a matter of fact, upon the intercession of the Secretary of Labor, the Union members who are not
officers, were not dismissed and only the Union itself and its thirteen (13) officers were specifically named as
respondents in the unfair labor practice charge filed against them by the firm (pp. 16-20, respondent's Brief;
Annexes "A", "B" and "C", pp. 20-30, rec.). Counsel for respondent firm insinuates that not all the 400 or so
employee participated in the demonstration, for which reason only the Union and its thirteen (13) officers were
specifically named in the unfair labor practice charge (p. 20, respondent's brief). If that were so, then many, if not
all, of the morning and regular shifts reported for work on March 4, 1969 and that, as a consequence, the firm
continued in operation that day and did not sustain any damage.
The appropriate penalty if it deserves any penalty at all should have been simply to charge said one-day
absence against their vacation or sick leave. But to dismiss the eight (8) leaders of the petitioner Union is a most
cruel penalty, since as aforestated the Union leaders depend on their wages for their daily sustenance as well as that
of their respective families aside from the fact that it is a lethal blow to unionism, while at the same time
strengthening the oppressive hand of the petty tyrants in the localities.
Mr. Justice Douglas articulated this pointed reminder:
The challenge to our liberties comes frequently not from those who consciously seek to destroy
our system of Government, but from men of goodwill good men who allow their proper

concerns to blind them to the fact that what they propose to accomplish involves an impairment of
liberty.
... The Motives of these men are often commendable. What we must remember, however, is
thatpreservation of liberties does not depend on motives. A suppression of liberty has the same
effect whether the suppress or be a reformer or an outlaw. The only protection against misguided
zeal is a constant alertness of the infractions of the guarantees of liberty contained in our
Constitution. Each surrender of liberty to the demands of the moment makes easier another,
larger surrender. The battle over the Bill of Rights is a never ending one.
... The liberties of any person are the liberties of all of us.
... In short, the Liberties of none are safe unless the liberties of all are protected.
... But even if we should sense no danger to our own liberties, even if we feel secure because we
belong to a group that is important and respected, we must recognize that our Bill of Rights is a
code of fair play for the less fortunate that we in all honor and good conscience must be
observe. 31
The case at bar is worse.
Management has shown not only lack of good-will or good intention, but a complete lack of sympathetic
understanding of the plight of its laborers who claim that they are being subjected to indignities by the local police,
It was more expedient for the firm to conserve its income or profits than to assist its employees in their fight for their
freedoms and security against alleged petty tyrannies of local police officers. This is sheer opportunism. Such
opportunism and expediency resorted to by the respondent company assaulted the immunities and welfare of its
employees. It was pure and implement selfishness, if not greed.
Of happy relevance is the 1967 case of Republic Savings Bank vs. C.I.R., 32 where the petitioner Bank dismissed
eight (8) employees for having written and published "a patently libelous letter ... to the Bank president demanding
his resignation on the grounds of immorality, nepotism in the appointment and favoritism as well as discrimination
in the promotion of bank employees." Therein, thru Mr. Justice Castro, We ruled:
It will avail the Bank none to gloat over this admission of the respondents. Assuming that the
latter acted in their individual capacities when they wrote the letter-charge they were nonetheless
protected for they were engaged in concerted activity, in the exercise of their right of self
organization that includes concerted activity for mutual aid and protection, (Section 3 of the
Industrial Peace Act ...) This is the view of some members of this Court. For, as has been aptly
stated, the joining in protests or demands, even by a small group of employees, if in furtherance of
their interests as such, is a concerted activity protected by the Industrial Peace Act. It is not
necessary that union activity be involved or that collective bargaining be contemplated. (Annot., 6
A.L.R. 2d 416 [1949]).
xxx xxx xxx
Instead of stifling criticism, the Bank should have allowed the respondents to air their grievances.
xxx xxx xxx
The Bank defends its action by invoking its right to discipline for what it calls the respondents'
libel in giving undue publicity to their letter-charge. To be sure, the right of self-organization of
employees is not unlimited (Republic Aviation Corp. vs. NLRB 324 U.S. 793 [1945]), as the right
of the employer to discharge for cause (Philippine Education Co. v. Union of Phil. Educ.

Employees, L-13773, April 29, 1960) is undenied. The Industrial Peace Act does not touch the
normal exercise of the right of the employer to select his employees or to discharge them. It is
directed solely against the abuse of that right by interfering with the countervailing right of self
organization (Phelps Dodge Corp. v. NLRB 313 U.S. 177 [1941])...
xxx xxx xxx
In the final sum and substance, this Court is in unanimity that the Bank's conduct, identified as an
interference with the employees' right of self-organization or as a retaliatory action, and/or as a
refusal to bargain collectively, constituted an unfair labor practice within the meaning and
intendment of section 4(a) of the Industrial Peace Act. (Emphasis supplied.) 33
If free expression was accorded recognition and protection to fortify labor unionism in the Republic Savings case,
supra, where the complaint assailed the morality and integrity of the bank president no less, such recognition and
protection for free speech, free assembly and right to petition are rendered all the more justifiable and more
imperative in the case at bar, where the mass demonstration was not against the company nor any of its officers.
WHEREFORE, judgement is hereby rendered:
(1) setting aside as null and void the orders of the respondent Court of Industrial Relations dated September 15 and
October 9, 1969; and
(2) directing the re instatement of the herein eight (8) petitioners, with full back pay from the date of their separation
from the service until re instated, minus one day's pay and whatever earnings they might have realized from other
sources during their separation from the service.
With costs against private respondent Philippine Blooming Company, Inc.
Zaldivar, Castro, Fernando and Esguerra, JJ., concur.
Makalintal, C.J, took no part.
FIRST DIVISION

[G.R. No. 108001. March 15, 1996]

SAN

MIGUEL CORPORATION, ANGEL G. ROA and MELINDA MACARAIG, petitioners,

vs. NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION (Second Division), LABOR ARBITER
EDUARDO J. CARPIO, ILAW AT BUKLOD NG MANGGAWA (IBM), ET AL., respondents.

SYLLABUS
1.

LABOR LAW AND SOCIAL LEGISLATION; LABOR CODE; LABOR ARBITER; ORIGINAL AND
EXCLUSIVE JURISDICTION; TERMINATION DISPUTES AND UNFAIR LABOR PRACTICES;
EXCEPTIONS; NOT PRESENT IN CASE AT BAR. - The law in point is Article 217 (a) of the Labor
Code. It is elementary that this law is deemed written into the CBA. In fact, the law speaks in plain and
unambiguous terms that termination disputes, together with unfair labor practices, are matters falling under the
original and exclusive jurisdiction of the Labor Arbiter. The sole exception can be found under Article 262 of
the same Code, which provides: The voluntary arbitrator or panel of voluntary arbitrators, upon agreement of
the parties, shall also hear and decide all other labor disputes including unfair labor practices and bargaining

deadlocks. The exception, being present, the Labor Arbiter properly has jurisdiction over the complaint filed
by the respondent union for illegal dismissal and unfair labor practice. The filing of a request for
reconsideration by the respondent union, which is the condition sine qua non to categorize the termination
dispute and the ULP complaint as a grievable dispute as per CBA, was decidedly absent in the case at
bench. Hence, the respondent union acted well within their rights in filing their complaint directly with the
Labor Arbiter.
2.

ID.; ID.; ID.; ID.; ID.; DETERMINED BY ALLEGATIONS OF THE COMPLAINT. The questioned
discharges due to alleged redundancy can hardly be considered company personnel policies and therefore need
not directly be subject to the grievance machinery nor to voluntary arbitration. All of the dismissed employees
were officers and members of their respective unions, and their employers failed to give a satisfactory
explanation as to why this group of employees was singled out. It may be the case that the discharges may
really be for a bona fide authorized caused under Article 283 of the Labor Code. But it is also possible that
such may be a scheme to camouflage the real intention of discriminating against union members. In any case,
these matters will be best ventilated in a hearing before the Labor Arbiter. The complaint alleges facts
sufficient to constitute a bona fide case of ULP, cognizable by the Labor Arbiter. This is consistent with the
rule that jurisdiction over the subject matter is determined by the allegations of the complaint.

APPEARANCES OF COUNSEL
Roco Guag Kapunan Migallos & Jardeleza for petitioners.
The Solicitor General for public respondent.
Potenciano A. Flores, Jr. for private respondents.
DECISION
HERMOSISIMA, JR., J.:
In the herein petition for certiorari under Rule 65, petitioners question the jurisdiction of the Labor Arbiter to
hear a complaint for unfair labor practice, illegal dismissal, and damages, notwithstanding the provision for
grievance and arbitration in the Collective Bargaining Agreement.
Let us unfurl the facts.
Private respondents, employed by petitioner San Miguel Corporation (SMC) as mechanics, machinists, and
carpenters, were and still are, bona fide officers and members of private respondent Ilaw at Buklod ng Manggagawa.
On or about July 31, 1990, private respondents were served a Memorandum from petitioner Angel G. Roa,
Vice-President and Manager of SMCs Business Logistics Division (BLD), to the effect that they had to be
seperated from the service effective October 31, 1990 on the ground of redundancy or excesss personnel.
Respondent union, in behalf of private respondents, opposed the intended dismissal and asked for a dialogue with
management.
Accordingly, a series of dialogues were held between petitioners and private respondents. Even before the
conclusion of said dialogues, the aforesaid petitioner Angel Roa issued another Memorandum on October 1, 1990
informing private respondents that they would be dismissed from work effective as of the close of business hours on
November 2, 1990. Private respondents were in fact purged on the date aforesaid.
Thus, on February 25, 1991, private respondents filed a complaint against petitioners for Illegal Dismissal and
Unfair Labor Practices, with a prayer for damages and attorneys fees, with the Arbitration Branch of respondent
National Labor Relations Commission. The complaint[1] was assigned to Labor Arbiter Eduardo F. Carpio for
hearing and proper disposition.
On April 15, 1991, petitioners filed a motion to dismiss the complaint, alleging that respondent Labor Arbiter
had no jurisdiction over the subject matter of the complaint, and that respondent Labor Arbiter must defer
consideration of the unfair labor practice complaint until after the parties have gone through the grievance procedure
provided for in the existing Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). Respondent Labor Arbiter denied this motion
in a Resolution, dated September 23, 1991.

The petitioners appealed the denial to respondent Commission on November 8, 1991. Unimpressed by the
grounds therefor, respondent Commission dismissed the appeal in its assailed Resolution, dated August 11,
1992. Petitioners promptly filed a Motion for Reconsideration which, however, was denied through the likewise
assailed Resolution, dated October 29, 1992.
Hence, the instant petition for certiorari alleging the following grounds was filed by the petitioners:
I.
RESPONDENT LABOR ARBITER CANNOT EXERCISE JURISDICTION OVER THE ALLEGED ILLEGAL
TERMINATION AND ALLEGED ULP CASES WITHOUT PRIOR RESORT TO GRIEVANCE AND
ARBITRATION PROVIDED UNDER THE CBA.
II
THE STRONG STATE POLICY ON THE PROMOTION OF VOLUNTARY MODES OF SETTLEMENT OF
LABOR DISPUTES CRAFTED IN THE CONSTITUTION AND THE LABOR CODE DICTATES THE
SUBMISSION OF THE CBA DISPUTE TO GRIEVANCE AND ARBITRATION. [2]
Petitioners posit the basic principle that a collective bargaining agreement is a contract between management
and labor that must bind and be enforced in the first instance as between the parties thereto. In this case, the CBA
between the petitioners and respondent union provides, under Section 1, Article V entitled ARBITRATION, that
wages, hours of work, conditions of employment and/or employer-employee relations shall be settled by
arbitration. Petitioners thesis is that the dispute as to the termination of the union members and the unfair labor
practice should first be settled by arbitration, and not directly by the labor arbiter, following the above provision of
the CBA, which ought to be treated as the law between the parties thereto.
The argument is unmeritorious. The law in point is Article 217 (a) of the Labor Code. It is elementary that this
law is deemed written into the CBA. In fact, the law speaks in plain and unambiguous terms that termination
disputes, together with unfair labor practices, are matters falling under the original and exclusive jurisdiction of the
Labor Arbiter, to wit:
Article 217. Jurisdiction of Labor Arbiters and the Commission - (a) Except as otherwise provided under this Code,
the Labor Arbiters shall have original and exclusive jurisdiction to hear and decide x x x the following cases
involving all workers, whether agricultural or non-agricultural:
(1) Unfair labor practice cases:
(2) Termination disputes;
x x x

xxx

x x x.

The sole exception to the above rule can be found under Article 262 of the same Code, which provides:
Aricle 262. Jurisdiction over other labor disputes - The voluntary arbitrator or panel of voluntary arbitrators, upon
agreement of the parties, shall also hear and decide all other labor disputes including unfair labor practices and
bargaining deadlocks. (As added by R.A. 6715)
We subjected the records of this case, particularly the CBA, to meticulous scrutiny and we find no agreement
between SMC and the respondent union that would state in unequivocal language that petitioners and the respondent
union conform to the submission of termination disputes and unfair labor practices to voluntary arbitration. Section
1, Article V of the CBA, cited by the herein petitioners, certainly does not provide so. Hence, consistent with the
general rule under Article 217 (a) of the Labor Code, the Labor Arbiter properly has jurisdiction over the complaint
filed by the respondent union on February 25, 1991 for illegal dismissal and unfair labor practice.

Petitioners point however to Section 2, Article III of the CBA, under the heading Job Security, to show that the
dispute is a proper subject of the grievance procedure, viz:
x x x The UNION, however, shall have the right to seek reconsideration of any discharge, lay-off or disciplinary
action, and such requests for reconsideration shall be considered a dispute or grievance to be dealt with in
accordance with the procedure outlined in Article IV hereof [on Grievance Machinery] x x x [3] (Emphasis ours)
Petitioners allege that respondent union requested management for a reconsideration and review of the companys
decision to terminate the employment of the union members. By this act, petitioners argue, respondent union
recognized that the questioned dismissal is a grievable dispute by virtue of Section 2, Article III of the CBA. This
allegation was strongly denied by the respondent union. In a Memorandum filed for the public respondent NLRC,
the Solicitor General supported the position of the respondent union that it did not seek reconsideration from the
SMC management in regard to the dismissal of the employees.
Petitioners fail miserably to prove that, indeed, the respondent union requested for a reconsideration or review
of the management decision to dismiss the private respondents. A punctilious examination of the records
indubitably reveals that at no time did the respondent union exercise its right to seek reconsideration of the
companys move to terminate the employment of the union members, which request for reconsideration would have
triggered the application of Section 2, Article III of the CBA, thus resulting in the treatment of the dispute as a
grievance to be dealt with in accordance with the Grievance Machinery laid down in Article IV of, the CBA. Stated
differently, the filing of a request. for reconsideration by the respondent union, which is the condition sine qua
non to categorize the termination dispute and the ULP complaint as a grievable dispute, was decidedly absent in the
case at bench. Hence, the respondent union acted well within their rights in filing their complaint for illegal
dismissal and ULP directly with the Labor Arbiter under Article 217 (a) of the Labor Code.
Second. Petitioners insist that involved in the controversy is the interpretation and implementation of the CBA
which is grievable and arbitrable by law under Article 217(c) of the Labor Code, viz:
ART. 217(c). Cases arising from the interpretation or implementation of collective bargaining agreements and
those arising from the interpretation or enforcement of company personnel policies shall be disposed of by the Labor
Arbiter by referring the same to the grievance machinery and voluntary arbitration as may be provided in said
agreements. (As amended by R.A. 6715).
Petitioners theorize that since respondents questioned the discharges, the main question for resolution is
whether SMC had the management right or prerogative to effect the discharges on the ground of redundancy, and
this necessarily calls for the interpretation or implementation of Article III (Job Security) in relation to Article IV
(Grievance Machinery)of the CBA.[4]
Petitioners theory does not hold water. There is no connection whatsoever between SMCs management
prerogative to effect the discharges and the interpretation or implementation of Articles III and IV of the CBA. The
only relevant provision under Article III that may need interpretation or implementation is Section 2 which was cited
herein. However, as patiently pointed out by this court, said provision does not come into play considering that the
union never exercised its right to seek reconsideration of the discharges effected by the company. It would have
been different had the union sought reconsideration. Such recourse under Section 2 would have been treated as a
grievance under Article IV (Grievance Machinery) of the CBA, thus calling for the possible interpretation or
implementation of the entire provision on Grievance Machinery as agreed upon by the parties. This was not the case
however. The union brought the termination dispute directly to the Labor Arbiter rendering Articles III and IV of
the CBA inapplicable for the resolution of this case.
The discharges, petitioners also contend, call for the interpretation or enforcement of company personnel
policies, particulary SMCs personnel policies on lay-offs arising from redundacy, and so, they may be considered
grievable and arbitrable by virtue of Article 2 17(c). Not necessarily so. Company personnel policies are guiding
principles stated in broad, long-range terms that express the philosophy or beliefs of an organizations top authority
regarding personnel matters. They deal with matters affecting efficiency and well-being of employees and include,
among others, the procedure in the administration of wages, benefits, promotions, transfer and other personnel
movements which are usually not spelled out in the collective agreement. The usual source of grievances, however,

is the rules and regulations governing disciplinary actions. [5] Judging therefrom, the questioned discharges due to
alleged redundancy can hardly be cosidered company personnel policies and therefore need not directly be subject to
the grievance machinery nor to voluntary arbitration.
Third. Petitioners would like to persuade us that respondents ULP claims are merely conclusory and cannot
serve to vest jurisdiction to the Labor Arbiters. Petitioners argue with passion: How was the discharges (sic) right
to self-organization restrained by their termination? Respondent did not show.. There is no allegation of the
existence of anti-union animus or of the ultimate facts showing how the discharges affected the rights to selforganization of individual respondents.[6] In short, petitioners maintain that respondents complaint does not allege
a genuine case for ULP.
The Court is not convinced.
The complaint alleges that:
5. Individual complainants are bona fide officers and members of complainant Ilaw at Buklod ng Manggagawa
(IBM). They are active and militant in the affairs and activities of the union.
xxx

xxx

xxx

23. The dismissal or lock-out from work of the individual complainants clearly constitutes an act of unfair labor
practices in the light of the fact that the work being performed by the individual complainants are being contracted
out by the respondent company, and, therefore, deprives individual complainants of their right to work and it
constitutes a criminal violation of existing laws.
xxx

xxx

xxx

25. The acts of the respondent company in economically coercing employees to accept payment of seperation and/or
retirement benefits, pending final resolution of the labor disputes between the parties constitute acts of unfair labor
practice in the light of the fact that there is undue interference, restraint, and coercion of employees in the exercise
of their right to self-organization and collective bargaining.[7]
Short of pre-empting the proceedings before the Labor Arbiter, the above complaint, makes Out a genuine case
for ULP.
In Manila Pencil Co. v. CIR,[8] This Court had occasion to observe that even where business conditions
justified a lay-off of employees, unfair labor practices were committed in the form of discriminatory dismissal where
only unionists were permanently dismissed. This was despite the valid excuse given by the Manila Pencil Company
that the dismissal of the employees was due to the reduction of the companys dollar allocations for importation and
that both union members and non-union members were laid-off. The Court, thru Justice Makalintal, rebuffed the
petitioner Company and said:
x x x The explanation, however, does not by any means account for the permanent dismissal of five of the
unionists, where it does not appear that non-unionists were similarly dismissed.
xxx

xxx

xxx

And the discrimination shown by the Company strongly is confirmed by the fact that during the period from October
1958 to August 17, 1959 it hired from fifteen to twenty new employees and ten apprentices. It says these employees
were for its new lead factory, but is (sic) not shown that the five who had been permanently dismissed were not
suitable for work in that new factory.
A similar ruling was made by this Court in Peoples Bank and Trust Co. v. Peoples Bank and Trust Co.
Employees Union[9] involving the lay-off by a bank of sixty-five (65) employees who were active union members

allegedly by reason of retrechment. The Court likewise found the employer in that case to have committed ULP in
effecting the discharges.
This Court was more emphatic however in Bataan Shipyard and Engineering Co., Inc. v. NLRC, et al.:[10]
Under the circumstances obtaining in this case, We are inclined to believe that the company had indeed been
discriminatory in selecting the employees who were to be retrenched. All of the retrenched employees are
officers and members of the NAFLU. The record of the case is bereft of any satisfactory explanation from the
Company regarding this situation. As such, the action taken by the firm becomes highly suspect. It leads Us to
conclude that the firm had been discriminating against membership in the NAFLU, an act which amounts to
interference in the employees exercise of their right of self-organization. Under Art. 249 (now Art. 248) of the
Labor Code of the Philippines, such interference is considered an act of unfair labor practice on the part of the
Company x x x. (Emphasis ours)
It matters not that the cause of termination in the above cited cases was retrenchment while that in the instant
case was redundancy. The important fact is that in all of these cases, including the one at bar, all of the dismissed
employees were officers and members of their respective unions, and their employers failed to give a satisfactory
explanation as to why this group of employees was singled out.
It may be the case that employees other than union members may have been terminated also by petitioner SMC
on account of its redundancy program. If that is true, the discharges may really be for a bona fide authorized cause
under Article 283[11] of the Labor Code. On the other hand, it is also possible that such may only be a clever scheme
of the petitioner company to camouflage its real intention of discriminating against union members particularly the
private respondents. In any case, these matters will be best ventilated in a hearing before the Labor Arbiter.
It is for the above reason that we cannot hold the petitioners guilty of the ULP charge. This will be the task of
the Labor Arbiter. We however find that based on the cicumstances surrounding this case and settled jurisprudence
on the subject, the complaint filed by the private respondents on February 25, 1991 alleges facts sufficient to
costitute a bona fide case of ULP, and therefore properly cognizable by the Labor Arbiter under Article 2 17(a) of
the Labor Code. This is consistent with the rule that jurisdictioin over the subject matter is determined by the
allegations of the complaint.[12]
Finally, petitioners try to impress on this Court the strong State policy on the promotion of voluntary modes of
settlement of labor disputes crafted in the Constitution and the Labor Code which dictate the submission of the CBA
dispute to grievance and arbitration.[13]
In this regard, the response of the Solicitor General is apt:
Petitioners deserve commendation for divulging and bringing to public respondents attention the noble legislative
intent behind the law mandating the inclusion of grievance and voluntary arbitration provisions in the
CBA. However, in the absence of an express legal conferment thereof, jurisdiction cannot be appropriated by an
official or tribunal (sic) no matter how well-intentioned it is, even in the pursuit of the clearest substantial right
(Concurring Opinion of Justice Barredo, Estanislao v. Honrado, 114 SCRA 748, 29 June 1982). [14]
In the same manner, petitioners cannot arrogate into the powers of voluntary arbitrators the original and exclusive
jurisdiction of Labor Arbiters over unfair labor practices, termination disputes, and claims for damages, in the
absence of an express agreement between the parties in order for Article 262 [15] of the Labor Law to apply in the
case at bar.[16]
WHEREFORE, the instant petition is DISMISSED for lack of merit and the resolutions of the National Labor
Relations Commission dated August 11, 1992 and October 29, 1992 are hereby AFFIRMED.
SO ORDERED
G.R. No. 118915 February 4, 1997

CAPITOL MEDICAL CENTER OF CONCERNED EMPLOYEES-UNIFIED FILIPINO SERVICE

WORKERS,
(CMC-ACE-UFSW), petitioners,
vs.
HON. BIENVENIDO E. LAGUESMA, Undersecretary of the Department of Labor and Employment;
CAPITOL MEDICAL CENTER EMPLOYEES ASSOCIATION-ALLIANCE OF FILIPINO WORKERS
AND CAPITOL MEDICAL CENTER INCORPORATED AND DRA. THELMA CLEMENTE,
President, respondents.

HERMOSISIMA, JR., J.:

This petition for certiorari and prohibition seeks to reserves and set aside the Order dated November 18, 1994 of
public respondent Bienvenido E. Laguesma, Undersecretary of the Department of Labor and Employment in Case
No. OS.-A-136-94 1 which dismissed the petition for certification election filed by petitioner for lack of merit and
further directed private respondent hospital to negotiate a collective bargaining agreement with respondent union,
Capitol Medical Center Employees Association-Alliance of Filipino Workers.
The antecedent facts are undisputed.
On February 17, 1992, Med-Arbiter Rasidali C. Abdullah issued an Order which granted respondent union's petition
for certification election among the rank-and-file employees of the Capitol Medical Center. 2 Respondent CMC
appealed the Order to the Office of the Secretary by questioning the legal status of respondent union's affiliation
with the Alliance of Filipino Workers (AFW). To correct any supposed infirmity in its legal status, respondent union
registered itself independently and withdrew the petition which had earlier been granted. Thereafter, it filed another
petition for certification election.
On May 29, 1992, Med-Arbiter Manases T. Cruz issued an order granting the petition for certification
election. 3Respondent CMC again appealed to the Office of the Secretary which affirmed 4 the Order of the MedArbiter granting the certification election.
On December 9, 1992, elections were finally held with respondent union garnering 204 votes, 168 in favor of no
union and 8 spoiled ballots out of a total of 380 votes cast. Thereafter, on January 4, 1993, Med-Arbiter Cruz issued
an Order certifying respondent union as the sole and exclusive bargaining representative of the rank and file
employees at CMC. 5
Unsatisfied with the outcome of the elections, respondent CMC again appealed to the Office of the Secretary of
Labor which appeal was denied on February 26, 1993. 6 A subsequent motion for reconsideration filed by
respondent CMC was likewise denied on March 23, 1993. 7
Respondent CMC's basic contention was the supposed pendency of its petition for cancellation of respondent union's
certificate of registration in Case No. NCR-OD-M-92211-028. In the said case, Med-Arbiter Paterno Adap issued an
Order dated February 4, 1993 which declared respondent union's certificate of registration as null and
void. 8 However, this order was reversed on appeal by the Officer-in-Charge of the Bureau of Labor Relations in her
Order issued on April 13, 1993. The said Order dismissed the motion for cancellation of the certificate of
registration of respondent union and declared that it was not only a bona fide affiliate or local of a federation
(AFW), but a duly registered union as well. Subsequently, this case reached this Court in Capitol Medical Center,
Inc. v. Hon. Perlita Velasco, G.R. No. 110718, where we issued a Resolution dated December 13, 1993, dismissing
the petition of CMC for failure to sufficiently show that public respondent committed grave abuse of
discretion. 9 The motion for reconsideration filed by CMC was likewise denied in our Resolution dated February 2,
1994. 10 Thereafter, on March 23, 1994, we issued an entry of judgment certifying that the Resolution dated
December 13, 1993 has become final and executory. 11

Respondent union, after being declared as the certified bargaining agent of the rank-and-file employees of
respondent CMC by Med-Arbiter Cruz, presented economic proposals for the negotiation of a collective bargaining
agreement (CBA). However, respondent CMC contended that CBA negotiations should be suspended in view of the
Order issued on February 4, 1993 by Med-Arbiter Adap declaring the registration of respondent union as null and
void. In spite of the refusal of respondent CMC, respondent union still persisted in its demand for CBA negotiations,
claiming that it has already been declared as the sole and exclusive bargaining agent of the rank-and-file employees
of the hospital.
Due to respondent CMC's refusal to bargain collectively, respondent union filed a notice of strike on March 1, 1993.
After complying with the other legal requirements, respondent union staged a strike on April 15, 1993. On April 16,
1993, the Secretary of Labor assumed jurisdiction over the case and issued an order certifying the same to the
National Labor Relations Commission for compulsory arbitration where the said case is still pending. 12
It is at this juncture that petitioner union, on March 24, 1994, filed a petition for certification election among the
regular rank-and-file employees of the Capitol Medical Center Inc. It alleged in its petition that: 1) three hundred
thirty one (331) out of the four hundred (400) total rank-and-file employees of respondent CMC signed a petition to
conduct a certification election; and 2) that the said employees are withdrawing their authorization for the said union
to represent them as they have joined and formed the union Capitol Medical Center Alliance of Concerned
Employees (CMC-ACE). They also alleged that a certification election can now be conducted as more that 12
months have lapsed since the last certification election was held. Moreover, no certification election was conducted
during the twelve (12) months prior to the petition, and no collective bargaining agreement has as yet been
concluded between respondent union and respondent CMC despite the lapse of twelve months from the time the said
union was voted as the collective bargaining representative.
On April 12, 1994, respondent union opposed the petition and moved for its dismissal. It contended that it is the
certified bargaining agent of the rank-and-file employees of the Hospital, which was confirmed by the Secretary of
Labor and Employment and by this Court. It also alleged that it was not remiss in asserting its right as the certified
bargaining agent for it continuously demanded the negotiation of a CBA with the hospital despite the latter's
avoidance to bargain collectively. Respondent union was even constrained to strike on April 15, 1993, where the
Secretary of Labor intervened and certified the dispute for compulsory arbitration. Furthermore, it alleged that
majority of the signatories who supported the petition were managerial and confidential employees and not members
of the rank-and-file, and that there was no valid disaffiliation of its members, contrary to petitioner's allegations.
Petitioner, in its rejoinder, claimed that there is no legal impediment to the conduct of a certification election as
more than twelve (12) months had lapsed since respondent union was certified as the exclusive bargaining agent and
no CBA was as yet concluded. It also claimed that the other issues raised could only be resolved by conducting
another certification election.
In its surrejoinder, respondent union alleged that the petition to conduct a certification election was improper,
immoral and in manifest disregard of the decisions rendered by the Secretary of Labor and by this Court. It claimed
that CMC employed "legal obstructionism's" in order to let twelve months pass without a CBA having been
concluded between them so as to pave the way for the entry of petitioner union.
On May 12, 1994, Med-Arbiter Brigida Fadrigon, issued an Order granting the petition for certification election
among
the
rank
and
file
employees. 13 It ruled that the issue was the majority status of respondent union. Since no certification election was
held within one year from the date of issuance of a final certification election result and there was no bargaining
deadlock between respondent union and the employees that had been submitted to conciliation or had become the
subject of a valid notice of strike or lock out, there is no bar to the holding of a certification election. 14
Respondent union appeared from the said Order, alleging that the Med-Arbiter erred in granting the petition for
certification election and in holding that this case falls under Section 3, Rule V Book V of the Rules Implementing
the Labor Code. 15 It also prayed that the said provision must not be applied strictly in view of the facts in this case.

Petitioner union did not file any opposition to the appeal.

On November 18, 1994, public respondent rendered a Resolution granting the appeal. 16 He ratiocinated that while
the petition was indeed filed after the lapse of one year form the time of declaration of a final certification result, and
that no bargaining deadlock had been submitted for conciliation or arbitration, respondent union was not remiss on
its right to enter into a CBA for it was the CMC which refused to bargain collectively. 17
CMC and petitioner union separately filed motions for reconsideration of the said Order.
CMC contended that in certification election proceedings, the employer cannot be ordered to bargain collectively
with a union since the only issue involved is the determination of the bargaining agent of the employees.
Petitioner union claimed that to completely disregard the will of the 331 rank-and-file employees for a certification
election would result in the denial of their substantial rights and interests. Moreover,it contended that public
respondent's "indictment" that petitioner "capitalize (sic) on the ensuing delay which was caused by the Hospital, . .
." was unsupported by the facts and the records.
On January 11, 1995, public respondent issued a Resolution which denied the two motions for reconsideration hence
this petition. 18
The pivotal issue in this case is whether or not public respondent committed grave abuse of discretion in dismissing
the petition for certification election, and in directing the hospital to negotiate a collective bargaining agreement
with the said respondent union.
Petitioner alleges that public respondent Undersecretary Laguesma denied it due process when it ruled against the
holding of a certification election. It further claims that the denial of due process can be gleaned from the manner by
which the assailed resolution was written, i.e., instead of the correct name of the mother federation UNIFIED, it was
referred to as UNITED; and that the respondent union's name CMCEA-AFW was referred to as CMCEA-AFLO.
Petitioner maintains that such errors indicate that the assailed resolution was prepared with "indecent haste."
We do not subscribe to petitioner's contention.
The errors pointed to by petitioner can be classified as mere typographical errors which cannot materially alter the
substance and merit of the assailed resolution.
Petitioner cannot merely anchor its position on the aforementioned erroneous' names just to attain a reversal of the
questioned resolution. As correctly observed by the Solicitor General, petitioner is merely "nit-picking vainly trying
to make a monumental issue out of a negligible error of the public respondent." 19
Petitioner also assails public respondents' findings that the former "capitalize (sic) on the ensuing delay which was
caused by the hospital and which resulted in the non-conclusion of a CBA within the certification year.'' 20 It further
argues that the denial of its motion fro a fair hearing was clear case of denial of its right to due process.
Such contention of petitioner deserves scant consideration.
A perusal of the record shows that petitioner failed to file its opposition to oppose the grounds for respondent
union's appeal.
It was given an opportunity to be heard but lost it when it refused to file an appellee's memorandum.
Petitioner insists that the circumstances prescribed in Section 3, Rule V, Book V Of the Rules Implementing the
Labor Code where a certification election should be conducted, viz: (1) that one year had lapsed since the issuance
of a final certification result; and (2) that there is no bargaining deadlock to which the incumbent or certified

bargaining agent is a party has been submitted to conciliation or arbitration, or had become the subject of a valid
notice of strike or lockout, are present in this case. It further claims that since there is no evidence on record that
there exists a CBA deadlock, the law allowing the conduct of a certification election after twelve months must be
given effect in the interest of the right of the workers to freely choose their sole and exclusive bargaining agent.
While it is true that, in the case at bench, one year had lapsed since the time of declaration of a final certification
result, and that there is no collective bargaining deadlock, public respondent did not commit grave abuse of
discretion when it ruled in respondent union's favor since the delay in the forging of the CBA could not be attributed
to the fault of the latter.
A scrutiny of the records will further reveal that after respondent union was certified as the bargaining agent of
CMC, it invited the employer hospital to the bargaining table by submitting its economic proposal for a CBA.
However, CMC refused to negotiate with respondent union and instead challenged the latter's legal personality
through a petition for cancellation of the certificate of registration which eventually reached this Court. The decision
affirming the legal status of respondent union should have left CMC with no other recourse but to bargain
collectively; but still it did not. Respondent union was left with no other recourse but to file a notice of strike against
CMC for unfair labor practice with the National Conciliation and Mediation Board. This eventually led to a strike on
April 15, 1993.
Petitioner union on the other hand, after this Court issued an entry of judgment on March 23, 1994, filed the subject
petition for certification election on March 24, 1994, claiming that twelve months had lapsed since the last
certification election.
Was there a bargaining deadlock between CMC and respondent union, before the filing of petitioner of a petition for
certification election, which had been submitted to conciliation or had become the subject of a valid notice of strike
or lockout?
In the case of Divine Word University of Tacloban v. Secretary of Labor and Employment, 21 we had the occasion to
define what a deadlock is, viz:\
A "deadlock" is . . . the counteraction of things producing entire stoppage; . . . . There is a
deadlock when there is a complete blocking or stoppage resulting from the action of equal and
opposed forces . . . . The word is synonymous with the word impasse, which . . "presupposes
reasonable effort at good faith bargaining which, despite noble intentions, does not conclude in
agreement between the parties."
Although there is no "deadlock" in its strict sense as there is no "counteraction" of forces present in this case nor
"reasonable effort at good faith bargaining," such can be attributed to CMC's fault as the bargaining proposals of
respondent union were never answered by CMC. In fact, what happened in this case is worse than a bargaining
deadlock for CMC employed all legal means to block the certification of respondent union as the bargaining agent
of the rank-and-file; and use it as its leverage for its failure to bargain with respondent union. Thus, we can only
conclude that CMC was unwilling to negotiate and reach an agreement with respondent union. CMC has not at any
instance shown willingness to discuss the economic proposals given by respondent union. 22
As correctly ratiocinated by public respondent, to wit:
For herein petitioner to capitalize on the ensuing delay which was caused by the hospital and
which resulted in the non-conclusion of a CBA within the certification year, would be to negate
and render a mockery of the proceedings undertaken before this Department and to put an
unjustified premium on the failure of the respondent hospital to perform its duty to bargain
collectively as mandated in Article 252 of the Labor Code, as amended, which states".
"Article 252. Meaning of duty to bargain collectively the duty to bargain
collectively means the performance of a mutual obligation to meet and convene

promptly and expeditiously in good faith for the purpose of negotiating an

agreement with respect to wages, hours of work and all other terms and
conditions of employment including proposals for adjusting any grievance or
questions arising under such agreement and executing a contract incorporating
such agreements if requested by either party but such duty does not compel any
party to agree to a proposal or to make any concession."
The duly certified bargaining agent, CMCEA-AFW, should not be made to further bear the brunt
flowing from the respondent hospital's reluctance and thinly disguised refusal to bargain. 23
If the law proscribes the conduct of a certification election when there is a bargaining deadlock submitted to
conciliation or arbitration, with more reason should it not be conducted if, despite attempts to bring an employer to
the negotiation table by the "no reasonable effort in good faith" on the employer certified bargaining agent, there
was to bargain collectively.
In the case of Kaisahan ng Manggagawang Pilipino vs. Trajano 201 SCRA 453 (1991), penned by Chief Justice
Andres R. Narvasa, the factual milieu of which is similar to this case, this Court allowed the holding of a
certification election and ruled that the one year period known as the "certification year" has long since expired. We
also ruled, that:
. . . prior to the filing of the petition for election in this case, there was no such "bargaining
deadlock . . (which) had been submitted to conciliation or arbitration or had become the subject of
a valid notice of strike or lockout." To be sure, there are in the record assertions by NAFLU that
its attempts to bring VIRON to the negotiation table had been unsuccessful because of the latter's
recalcitrance, and unfulfilled promises to bargain collectively; but there is no proof that it had
taken tiny action to legally coerce VIRON to comply with its statutory duty to bargain
collectively. It could have charged VIRON with unfair labor practice; but it did not. It could have
gone on a legitimate strike in protest against VIRON's refusal to bargain collectively and compel
it to do so; but it did not. There are assertions by NAFLU, too, that its attempts to bargain
collectively had been delayed by continuing challenges to the resolution pronouncing it the sole
bargaining representative in VIRON; but there is no adequate substantiation thereof, or of how it
did in fact prevent initiation of the bargaining process between it and VIRON. 24
Although the statements pertinent to this case are merely obiter, still the fact remains that in the Kaisahan case,
NAFLU was counselled by this Court on the steps that it should have undertaken to protect its interest, but which it
failed to do so.
This is what is strikingly different between the Kaisahan case and the case at bench for in the latter case, there was
proof that the certified bargaining agent, respondent union, had taken an action to legally coerce the employer to
comply with its statutory duty to bargain collectively, i.e., charging the employer with unfair labor practice and
conducting a strike in protest against the employer's refusal to bargain. 25 It is only just and equitable that the
circumstances in this case should be considered as similar in nature to a "bargaining deadlock" when no certification
election could be held. This is also to make sure that no floodgates will be opened for the circumvention of the law
by unscrupulous employers to prevent any certified bargaining agent from negotiating a CBA. Thus, Section 3, Rule
V, Book V of the Implement Rules should be interpreted liberally so as to include a circumstance, e.g. where a CBA
could not be concluded due to the failure of one party to willingly perform its duty to bargain collectively.
The order for the hospital to bargain is based on its failure to bargain collectively with respondent union.
WHEREFORE, the Resolution dated November 18, 1994 of public respondent Laguesma is AFFIRMED and the
instant petition is hereby DISMISSED.
SO ORDERED

G.R. No. 74425 October 7, 1986

BULLETIN
PUBLISHING
CORPORATION, petitioner,
vs.
HON. AUGUSTO S. SANCHEZ, CRESENCIANO B. TRAJANO, PRIMITIVA C. BATERBONIA,
ROLANDO G. OLALIA, ISIDRO S. MOLINA, EDUARDO C. MORALES, ZACARIAS F. FLORES, JR.,
PEDRO M. GALLO, LORETO F. MIJARES, LUIS B. ILAGAN, ERNESTO O. VALDEZ, EUGENIO L.
RIVERA, BENJAMIN B. BERNAS, LORETO D. DE LOS REYES, BONIFACIO A. SOTELO, FE F.
ARRE, FELIPE R. OLARTE, RAYMOND T. RIVERA, STEWART C. CACHO, DOMINADOR V.
CURAY, FERNANDO S. LAZARO, ERNESTO L. BAUTISTA, VICENTE O. ABANILLA, JOSE B.
BERNAL, RAMIRO A. NEBRES, ALCANTARA S. DE LA PAZ and LUIS F. GARCIA, respondents.
Guillermo S. Santos for petitioner.
Mildred Ramos for respondent Bulletin Publishing Corporation Supervisors Union.
Olalia, Dimapilis & Associates for private respondents.

ALAMPAY, J.:
Petitioner Bulletin Publishing Corporation invokes the equity jurisdiction of this Court in this case for certiorari,
prohibition, and for preliminary injunction, with a plea for the issuance of an ex-parte restraining order prohibiting
private respondents from declaring a strike. The purpose of Petitioner is to prevent the private respondents, members
of the Bulletin Publishing Corporation Supervisors Union (BSU), from staging a strike against the said publishing
company.
Petitioner also prays that this Court declare null and void Registration Certificate No. 10547 issued by the Ministry
of Labor and Employment to the aforestated Supervisors Union or BSU.
The crux of the dispute in the present case is whether or not supervisors in petitioner company may, for purposes of
collective bargaining, form a union separate and distinct from the existing union organized by the rank-and-file
employees of the same company.
Petitioner corporation has been engaged in the business of newspaper and magazine publishing for over half a
century. its current publications include the national daily "Bulletin Today" (now Manila Daily Bulletin), the tabloid
"Tempo", and a weekly magazine called "Panorama". The total number of the personnel complement of the said
firm (exclusive of the editorial staff, contract workers and casuals, etc.), constituting the rank-and-file regular
members, is said to be over three hundred persons. The supervisory employees number forty-eight. About three
hundred employees belonging to the rank-and-file had previously formed the Bulletin Employees Union. This labor
organization (BEU) presently administers their current Collective Bargaining Agreement which began on July 15,
1984 and remain effective up to July 15, 1987. Ever since, there has been only one bargaining unit in the petitioner
company and this is the BEU - the union of the rank-and-file employees. Supervisory employees were never
included in said bargaining unit nor had they ever sought inclusion in the said BEU labor union, much less
registered any protest or challenged to their non-inclusion therein.
On March 12, 1986, 25 out of 48 supervisors in the Bulletin Publishing Corporation formed a labor union and
adopted a charter therefor, calling themselves members of the "Bulletin Publishing Corporation Supervisors Union"
or BSU. A petition for registration of BSU, was filed with the Ministry of Labor and Employment. On March 26,
1986, Registration Certificate No. 10547-LC was issued. On March 31, 1986, a letter was sent to the management of
petitioner corporation by BSU giving notice of the registration of the BSU and demanding its recognition as the sole
bargaining agent of all the supervisors in the company. BSU supervisors union, is, at present, an affiliate of the

National Federation of Labor Unions (NAFLU) and the Kilusang Mayo Union (KMU). BSU is alleged to be
supported in its strike move by the said groups. (Petition, p. 13, Rollo, p. 10).
On April 8, 1986, a petition for direct certification was filed by the BSU as the bargaining representative of the
supervisors. On April 12, 1986, a notice of strike by BSU was filed with the Ministry of Labor due to certain acts
allegedly performed by petitioner which BSU claims, in effect, to be union busting and unfair labor practices.
Refusing to recognize the BSU, the Bulletin Publishing Corporation filed a petition dated April 25, 1986, seeking
cancellation of the registration of the BSU on the ground that Article 246 of the Labor Code and Section 11 of Rule
II, Book V of the Implementing Rules thereof, prohibit supervisors from forming labor organizations.
As the supervisors threatened to strike on May 12, 1986, following the expiration of the fifteen-day cooling-off
period, petitioner was prompted to file a petition with the Ministry of Labor, urging therein that said office assume
jurisdiction in the matter of the impending strike. When the Minister of Labor failed to exercise his jurisdiction or
act on the matter, petitioner then felt that the remedy it seeks should be sought from this Court because, further
resort to the Ministry of Labor may be construed as a tacit recognition by petitioner of the supervisors union (BSU)
which would be inconsistent with petitioner's challenge to the assertion of BSU to exist as a legitimate labor union.
Petitioner invokes the equity jurisdiction of this Court, claiming that a strike by the BSU which it considers a bogus
union and whose registration and operation is challenged as against public policy and legal prohibitions, will cause
untold harm on herein petitioner which is engaged in publishing daily periodicals.
In accordance with our Resolution dated May 12, 1986, a hearing of petitioner's motion for preliminary injunction
was scheduled for May 14, 1986, with a temporary restraining order being then issued. This Court enjoined the
private respondents from proceeding with their contemplated strike. Respondents were likewise required to
comment on the petition. The corresponding separate Comment of the public and private respondents were later
timely submitted to the Court.
Considering the allegations contained in the petition, the issues raised, and the arguments adduced by the parties, the
Court resolves to give due course to the petition, and to consider the separate Comment of both private and public
respondents as their Answer to the petition.
In the light of the factual background of this case, We are constrained to hold that the supervisory employees of
petitioner firm may not, under the law, form a supervisors union, separate and distinct from the existing bargaining
unit (BEU), composed of the rank-and-file employees of the Bulletin Publishing Corporation. It is evident that most
of the private respondents are considered managerial employees. Also it is distinctly stated in Section 11, Rule I I, of
the Ommibus Rules Implementing the Labor Code, that supervisory unions are presently no longer recognized nor
allowed to exist and operate as such.
Article 246 of the Labor Code explicitly excludes managerial employees from the right of self-organization, the
right to form, join and assist labor organizations. A perusal of the job descriptions corresponding to the private
respondents as outlined in the petition, clearly reveals the private respondents to be managers, purchasing officers,
personnel officers, property officers, supervisors, cashiers, heads of various sections and the like. The nature of their
duties gives rise to the irresistible conclusion that most of the herein private respondents are performing managerial
functions (Petition, pp. 5-6; Rollo, pp. 6-7). Their responsibilities inherently require the exercise' of discretion and
independent judgment as supervisors. They possess the power and authority to lay down or exercise management
policies. Managerial employees are those vested with powers or prerogatives to lay down and execute management
policies and/or to hire, transfer, suspend, lay-off, recall, discharge, assign or discipline employees, or to effectively
recommend such managerial actions. All employees not falling within this definition are considered rank-and file
employees (Article 212 (k), Labor Code). We further find very plainly stressed in Section 11, Rule II, Book V of the
Omnibus Rules implementing the same Labor Code, that "All existing supervisory unions and unions of security
guards shall, upon the effectivity of the Code, cease to operate as such and their registration certificates shall be
deemed automatically cancelled ... Members of supervisory unions who do not fall within the definition of
managerial employees shall become eligible to join or assist the rank-and- file labor organization and if none exists,
to form or assist in the forming of such rank-and-file organizations." (Emphasis supplied).

It is, therefore, evident that while mention is made of supervisors unions with reference to those existing before the
enactment of the Labor Code, greater significance must attach to the fact that under the present Labor Code all these
supervisory unions should, after the effectivity of the Labor Code on January 1, 1975, cease to operate and that the
registration certificate of any such supervisors union should even be deemed to be automatically cancelled. It is also
clear that such of those supervisory employees who do not assume any managerial function may join or assist an
existing rank-and-file union or if none exists, to join or assist in the formation of such rank-and-file organization.
It follows as a logical conclusion that the members of the Bulletin Supervisory Union, wholly composed of
supervisors employed by petitioner corporation, are not QUALIFIED to organize a Labor Union of their own. Aside
from this reason, is the fact that there is already an existing legitimate labor union, the BEU, which enjoys a current
collective bargaining agreement with the petitioner publishing company.
What is pointed out under the law, is that employees who discharge managerial functions, as well as the supervisory
employees who do not yet fall within the definition of managerial employees, are prohibited from organizing
themselves into a labor union constituted for the purpose of acting as a collective bargaining unit. To sanction the
recognition of the Supervisors Union of private respondents, which paradoxically or inadvertently received a
registration certificate from the Ministry of Labor, would be for this Court to accept and tolerate a manifest violation
of the Labor Code. The rationale for this inhibition has been stated to be, because if these managerial employees
would belong to or be affiliated with a Union, the latter might not be assured of their loyalty to the Union in view of
evident conflict of interests. The Union can also become company- dominated with the presence of managerial
employees in Union membership.
The submission of the private respondents that they do not actually perform duties which are managerial in character
is untenable. Firstly, the status of respondents as "managerial employees" is readily reflected by their long years of
acquiescence to their exclusion: (a) from the rank-and-file unit of employees and from membership in the Bulletin
Publishing Corporation Employees Union; and (b) from their coverage in the current and past Collective Bargaining
Agreements.
Acquiescence by private respondents to a classification and situation far different from the rank-and-file employees
for a long and unceasing period of time obviously indicates that their exclusion from the rank-and-file union was
upon their awareness that their duties place them in a category different from those to which the rank-and-file
employees pertain. It is significant that only 25 of the 48 employees who are said to be managers and/or supervisors,
belatedly insist in forming a new and separate union.
Petitioner surmises that the motivation behind this belated move is possibly because private respondents herein are
apprehensive that they might be adversely affected by policies which the new management of petitioner corporation
introduced to streamline its business operation and eliminates weaknesses in the corporate structure affecting
revenue and profitability. Understandably, the purpose behind the formation of the Union would be to gain leverage
to pressure Management to desist from the contemplated measures.
Private respondents are incorrect when they manifest in their comment to the petition that they "could be
appropriately classified as supervisory employees and, therefore, are eligible to organize their own union but are
ineligible to join the union of their subordinates", citing Adamson and Adamson versus CIR, L-35120, January 31,
1984, 127 SCRA 268 (Private Respondents' Comment to the Petition, p. 2, dated May 23, 1986, Rollo, p. 83).
The reference made by private respondents to said case of Adamson and Adamson versus CIR (supra), and the
pronouncements made therein that "supervisory employees of an employer cannot join any labor organization of
employees under their supervision but may validly form a separate organization of their own" no longer can be
invoked for the benefit of private respondents. As aptly countered by the petitioner in its manifestation dated June 2,
1986, submitted through its counsel:
2. Adamson & Adamson vs. CIR, 127 SCRA 268. In quoting from this decision of this Honorable
Court, private respondents intentionally deleted the phrase "under the Industrial Peace Act"
obviously to mislead this Honorable Court into believing that up to now supervisors still have the

right to form unions. This right has been disallowed, disauthorized and discontinued under Article
246 of the New Labor Code and Section 11, Rule II. Book Five of the Implementing Rules.
(Rollo, p. 106)
Indeed, the Industrial Peace Act or Republic Act 875, referred to in said Adamson, et al. vs. CIR case, became
effective on January 17, 1953. It has, however, been superseded and supplanted by the present Labor Code which
took effect on January 1, 1975. What should be applied now are the specific provisi ns of the Omnibus Rules
Implementing the Labor Code which have been already above-quoted (supra). In fact, no less than the public
respondents herein, represented by the present Solicitor General, in this regard, even state in their Comment to the
Petition, the following:
The only issue determinative of the present controversy is whether or not the supervisors in
petitioner company may form a union for purposes of collective bargaining separate and distinct
from that of the rank-and-file unit.
It is our submission that they may not. The New Labor Code recognizes two principal groups of
employees, namely, managerial and the rank-and- file group. Thus, Art. 212 (k) provides:
Managerial employee' is one who is vested with powers or prerogatives to lay down and execute
management policies and/or to hire, transfer, suspend, lay-off, recall,, discharge, assign or
discipline employees, or to effectively recommend such managerial actions. All employees not
falling within this definition are considered rank and file employees for purposes of this Book.
(Emphasis supplied)
In amplification of the aforequoted provisions of the law, Sec. 11 of Rule II, Book V of the
Omnibus Rules Implementing the Labor Code did away with existing Supervisors Union,
classifying the members thereof as neither managerial or rank-and-file employees depending on
the work they perform. If they discharge managerial functions they are prohibited from forming or
joining any labor organization. If they do not perform managerial work, they may join or assist the
rank- and-file union and, if none exists, they may form one such rank-and-file organization. From
these, one can readily infer that the law no longer recognizes supervisory Unions.
A perusal of the job descriptions of private respondents as outlined in the petition shows that most
of them do not perform managerial work. Hence, although not qualified to organize a labor union
of their own, they may join the certified rank-and-file organization in the Company, which has a
current collective bargaining agreement to expire on July 15, 1987.
On the query of this Honorable Court regarding the new policy of the MOLE, if any, with respect
to Supervisory Unions, the BLR Director in his reply letter dated May 21, 1986 to our letter of
May 14, 1986 (copy of said letter is hereto attached as Annex "A") supports the view that under
the Labor Code and its implementing rules, supervisory unions cannot organize as a labor unit
separate from that of the rank-and-file organization. (Emphasis supplied)
However, he points out that on a number of occasions, the Bureau has allowed the registration of
certain categories of non-managerial employees which include supervisors who are not performing
managerial functions similar to that of the non-managerial members of the Bulletin Publishing
Corporation Supervisors Union (BPCSU) At any rate, he states that "there is as yet no decree,
executive order or issuance, whether draft or in force, which expressly modified the provision of
the Labor Code on supervisory unions. (Rollo, pp. 89-91)
The foregoing discussion of public respondents will reflect and emphasize the lack of any legal basis of the
assumption made by private respondents that they may organize a supervisory union of their own, distinct and
separate from the existing union of the rank-and-file employees of the Bulletin Publishing Corporation.

In view of these premises, and considering the stand taken no less by respondent director Cresenciano B. Trajano, in
his aforestated reply-letter to Assistant Solicitor General Amado D. Aquino, dated May 21, 1986 (Rollo, pp. 93-'
95), as disclosed to this Court, the petition for cancellation of Certificate No. 10547, issued on March 26, 1986 by
the Ministry of Labor and Employment, said to be still pending in that office, ought therefore to be now acted upon
thereat.
Finally, it is averred by petitioner that the resort to strike by private respondents is untimely and premature because
of the pendency of a case with the Ministry of Labor docketed as NCR-LRD-4-166-88 which private respondents
themselves filed and which is for direct certification of said supervisors union as the bargaining representative of the
supervisors. This assertion of petitioner should be up held. Article 265, paragraph 2 of the Labor Code expressly
provides that "no stake or lock-out shall be declared ... during the pendency of cases involving the same grounds for
the strike or lock-out." (Emphasis supplied).
Private respondents declare that the primary reasons which prompted their filing of a notice of strike on April 8,
1986, are the arbitrary and discriminatory retirement of four (4) members of the supervisors union effective April
17, 1986, namely: Jose B. Bernal, Ramiro A. Nebres, Alcantara S. de la Paz and Luis F. Garcia, who were among
those who initiated the formation of their union; as well as the immediate promotion of some members of the union
to executive positions in order to remove the said persons promoted from the coverage of, or membership from the
supervisory union. Private respondents charge that these acts are tantamount to union busting tactics and constitute
unfair labor practices that warrant a strike.
Furthermore, private respondents claim that petitioner does not have any definite policy governing the retirement
of supervisory employees as distinguished from rank-and-file employees. Under the Collective Bargaining
Agreement currently in effect, rank-and- file employees may be retired upon reaching 25 years of service or 60 years
of age, at the management's option. It is claimed that this policy cannot or has never been applied to supervisors who
are not members of the rank-and-file Bulletin Employees union.
We are not persuaded by private respondents' submissions. The main issues in this case are the legality of a
supervisory union and the certificate of registration issued therefor, and the validity of a threatened strike by
members of such union. The matter of the retirement of the four retirees is only an incident to the case. It may not be
used to skirt the real question of the legality of the organization of a supervisors union. Parenthetically, it is said that
three out of the retirees, Messrs. Garcia, de la Paz and Bernal collected their retirement benefits (Rollo, p. 65),
rendering the alleged ill-motives behind their retirement untenable. This matter cannot be invoked by private
respondents herein as an indication of union busting practice of petitioner, absent any showing of protest by the said
retirees themselves.
Respondents make much ado that petitioner does not have a definite policy regarding the retirement of supervisory
employees. Petitioner has satisfactorily shown to this Court that it has been management policy to likewise apply the
provisions of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) between petitioner and the rank-and-file union (BEU),
also to supervisors. According to the uncontroverted submission of petitioner, the provisions of Section 4 in relation
to Section 1 of Article X of the said CBA, have been repeatedly applied to supervisory personnel even if they are not
included in the scope of the CBA. The pertinent. provisions on retirement are as follows:
Section 4. The COMPANY, at its option retire an employee or worker who has rendered 25
years of service or who has reached the age of 60 years in his last birthday by paying him full
benefits provided in Section 1 of this Article.
Section 1. Any employee in the active service of the COMPANY as of the date of signing of
this Agreement whose service with the COMPANY is terminated for any reason other than those
enumerated in A article 283 of Presidential Decree No. 442 as amended, shall be entitled to
gratuity pay in an amount equivalent to one month's pay for every year of continuous service
based on the salary as of the date of termination. Such gratuity shall not be in addition to, but shall
be in lieu of, the termination pay benefits to which the employee or worker is entitled under the
Labor Code of the Philippines, or any similar legislation, provided that if the benefits to which the

employee or worker may be entitled under such statute are greater than that provided in the
Article, the employee or worker shall receive the greater amount. (Emphasis ours).
The aforestated sections explicitly declare, in no uncertain terms, that retirement of an employee may be done upon
initiative and option of the management. And where there are cases of voluntary retirement, the same is effective
only upon the approval of management. The fact that there are some supervisory employees who have not yet been
retired after 25 years with the company or have reached the age of sixty merely confirms that it is the singular
prerogative of management, at its option, to retired supervisors or rank-and-file members when it deems fit. There
should be no unfair labor practice committed by management if the retirement of private respondents were made in
accord with the agreed option. That there were numerous instances wherein management exercised its option to
retire employees pursuant to the aforementioned provisions, appears to be a fact which private respondents have not
controverted. It seems only now when the question of the legality of a supervisors union has arisen that private
respondents attempt to inject the dubious theory that the private respondents are entitled to form a union or go on
strike because there is allegedly no retirement policy provided for their benefit. As above noted, this assertion does
not appear to have any factual basis.
It is even more untenable for private respondents to suggest that the "sudden promotion" of the supervisors union
members to executive positions was intended to remove them from the coverage of or from membership in the
supervisory union. The promotion of employees to managerial or executive positions rests upon the discretion of
management. Managerial positions are offices which can only be held by persons who have the trust of the
corporation and its officers. It is the prerogative of management to promote any individual working within the
company to a higher position. It should not be inhibited or prevented from doing so. A promotion which is
manifestely beneficial to an employee should not give rise to a gratuitous speculation that such a promotion was
made simply to deprive the union of the membership of the promoted employee, who after all appears to have
accepted his promotion.
We find nothing improper in the promotions made by the petitioner company. These were but in implementation of
petitioner's well-considered policy on retirement and promotions intended to improve the morale of lower and
middle management ranks by promoting those specially deserving before they are eventually retired. This then
would allow subsequent promotions of their replacements from lower ranks. As petitioner explains, these
retirements and promotions were but in accord with a carefully studied and pre-established policy which had been
implemented during the past years and unrelated to and without connection with the organization of private
respondents' Union, BSU.
In sum, where concerted activities are aimed at compelling an employer to ignore the clear mandate of the Labor
Code, as in the instant case, grounds based on equity may be invoked from the courts in order to restrain the
questioned activities. We cannot remain oblivious to the fact that a strike, as that contemplated by the supervisors
union against petitioner can cause irreparable injury to its publications, diminish goodwill and seriously affect its
continuity with its regular readers.
Trade unionism and strikes are legitimate weapons of labor granted by our statutes. But when these instruments are
utilized by managerial/supervisory employees in violation of existing labor laws, the misuse of these tactics can be
the subject of judicial intervention to forestall grave injury to a business enterprise.
WHEREFORE, the temporary restraining order issued by this Court, dated May 12, 1986, enjoining the private
respondents from declaring or staging a strike against the petitioner herein, in all its forms, including walk-out, mass
leave, or any kind of activity that will lead to a work stoppage, is hereby made permanent. The public respondents
are also directed to act upon and resolve, at the earliest possible time and in the light of the discussion and
pronouncements made by the Court in this case, the petition dated April 25, 1986, submitted by the petitioner herein
for the cancellation of Bulletin Publishing Corporation Supervisors Union Registration Certificate No. 105-47-LC.
SO ORDERED.

[G.R. No. 128632. August 5, 1999]

MSF TIRE AND RUBBER, INC., petitioner, vs. COURT OF APPEALS and PHILTREAD TIRE
WORKERS UNION, respondents.
DECISION
MENDOZA, J.:
Petitioner seeks a review of the decision[1] of the Court of Appeals, dated March 20, 1997, which set aside the
order of the Regional Trial Court of Makati, dated July 2, 1996, in Civil Case No. 95-770, granting petitioners
application for a writ of preliminary injunction.
The facts are as follows:
A labor dispute arose between Philtread Tire and Rubber Corporation (Philtread) and private respondent,
Philtread Tire Workers Union (Union), as a result of which the Union filed on May 27, 1994 a notice of strike in
the National Conciliation and Mediation Board-National Capital Region charging Philtread with unfair labor
practices for allegedly engaging in union-busting for violation of the provisions of the collective bargaining
agreement. This was followed by picketing and the holding of assemblies by the Union outside the gate of
Philtreads plant at Km. 21, East Service Road, South Superhighway, Muntinlupa, Metro Manila. Philtread, on the
other hand, filed a notice of lock-out on May 30, 1994 which it carried out on June 15, 1994.
In an order, dated September 4, 1994,[2] then Secretary of Labor Nieves Confesor assumed jurisdiction over the
labor dispute and certified it for compulsory arbitration. She enjoined the Union from striking and Philtread from
locking out members of the Union.
On December 9, 1994, during the pendency of the labor dispute, Philtread entered into a Memorandum of
Agreement with Siam Tyre Public Company Limited (Siam Tyre), a subsidiary of Siam Cement. Under the
Memorandum of Agreement, Philtreads plant and equipment would be sold to a new company (petitioner MSF Tire
and Rubber, Inc.), 80% of which would be owned by Siam Tyre and 20% by Philtread, while the land on which the
plant was located would be sold to another company (Sucat Land Corporation), 60% of which would be owned by
Philtread and 40% by Siam Tyre.
This was done and the Union was informed of the purchase of the plant by petitioner. Petitioner then asked the
Union to desist from picketing outside its plant and to remove the banners, streamers, and tent which it had placed
outside the plants fence.
As the Union refused petitioners request, petitioner filed on May 25, 1995 a complaint for injunction with
damages against the Union and the latters officers and directors before the Regional Trial Court of Makati, Branch
59 where the case was docketed as Civil Case No. 95-770.
On June 13, 1995, the Union moved to dismiss the complaint alleging lack of jurisdiction on the part of the
trial court. It insisted that the parties were involved in a labor dispute and that petitioner, being a mere alter ego of
Philtread, was not an innocent bystander.
After petitioner made its offer of evidence as well as the submission of the parties respective memoranda, the
trial court, in an order, dated March 25, 1996, denied petitioners application for injunction and dismissed the
complaint. However, on petitioners motion, the trial court, on July 2, 1996, reconsidered its order, and granted an
injunction. Its order read:[3]
Considering all that has been stated, the motion for reconsideration is granted. The Order dated March 25, 1996 is
reconsidered and set aside. Plaintiffs complaint is reinstated and defendants motion to dismiss is DENIED.
As regards plaintiffs application for the issuance of a writ of preliminary injunction, the Court finds that the
plaintiff has established a clear and subsisting right to the injunctive relief, hence, the same is GRANTED. Upon

posting by the plaintiff and approval by the Court of a bond in the amount of One Million (P1,000,000.00) Pesos
which shall answer for any damage that the defendants may suffer by reason of the injunction in the event that the
Court may finally adjudge that the plaintiff is not entitled thereto, let a writ of preliminary injunction issue ordering
the defendants and any other persons acting with them and/or on their behalf to desist immediately from conducting
their assembly in the area immediately outside the plaintiffs plant at Km. 21 East Service Road, South
Superhighway, Muntinlupa, Metro Manila, and from placing and/or constructing banners, streamers, posters and
placards, and/or tents/shanties or any other structure, on the fence of, and/or along the sidewalk outside, the said
plant premises until further orders from this Court.
SO ORDERED.[4]
Without filing a motion for reconsideration, the Union filed on August 5, 1996 a petition for certiorari and
prohibition before the Court of Appeals.
On March 20, 1997, the appellate court rendered a decision granting the Unions petition and ordering the trial
court to dismiss the civil case for lack of jurisdiction. Hence, this petition for review. Petitioner makes the
following arguments in support of its petition:
a. The Court of Appeals erred in not summarily dismissing the Unions petition for its false certification of nonforum shopping and the Unions failure to file a motion for reconsideration before going up to the Court of Appeals
on a petition for certiorari.
b. The Court of Appeals gravely erred in dismissing Civil Case No. 95-770 for lack of jurisdiction and merit on the
alleged ground that MSF did not have a clear and unmistakable right to entitle it to a writ of preliminary injunction.
c. The Court of Appeals pronouncement that it has not touched upon the issue of whether or not private respondent
is a mere innocent bystander to the labor dispute between Philtread and the Union or upon the issue of whether or
not private respondent is a mere dummy or continuity of Philtread is contrary to its own conclusions in the body of
the decision, which conclusions are erroneous.
d. The Court of Appeals gravely abused its discretion when it disallowed the injunction based on Philtreads
remaining operations in the country and allowed the Union to exercise its right to communicate the facts of its labor
dispute within MSFs premises, given the percentage of interest Philtread has in both MSF and the corporation
which owns the land bearing said plant.
The issues are (1) whether the Unions failure to disclose the pendency of NCMB-NCR-NS-05-167-96 in its
certification of non-forum shopping and its failure to file a motion for reconsideration of the order, dated July 2,
1996, of the trial court were fatal to its petition for review before the Court of Appeals; and (2) whether petitioner
has shown a clear legal right to the issuance of a writ of injunction under the innocent bystander rule.
First. Forum shopping is the institution of two (2) or more actions or proceedings grounded on the same cause
on the supposition that one or the other court would make a favorable disposition. [5] It is an act of malpractice and is
prohibited and condemned as trifling with courts and abusing their processes. [6] As held in Executive Secretary v.
Gordon:[7]
Forum-shopping consists of filing multiple suits involving the same parties for the same cause of action, either
simultaneously or successively, for the purpose of obtaining a favorable judgment. Thus, it has been held that there
is forum-shopping (1) whenever as a result of an adverse decision in one forum, a party seeks a favorable decision (other than by
appeal or certiorari) in another, or

(2) if, after he has filed a petition before the Supreme Court, a party files another before the Court of Appeals since
in such case he deliberately splits appeals in the hope that even as one case in which a particular remedy is sought
is dismissed, another case (offering a similar remedy) would still be open, or
(3) where a party attempts to obtain a preliminary injunction in another court after failing to obtain the same from
the original court.
In determining whether or not there is forum-shopping, what is important is the vexation caused the courts and
parties-litigant by a party who asks different courts and/or administrative agencies to rule on the same or related
causes and/or grant the same or substantially the same reliefs and in the process creating the possibility of
conflicting decisions being rendered by the different fora upon the same issues.[8]
Petitioner asserts that the Court of Appeals should have dismissed the Unions petition for review on the
ground that the certification of non-forum shopping was false and perjurious as a result of the Unions failure to
mention the existence of NCMB-NCR-NS-05-167-96, a proceeding involving the same parties and pending before
the National Conciliation and Mediation Board.
The argument is without merit. Petitioner was a party to the proceedings before the National Conciliation and
Mediation Board in which an order, dated September 8, 1994, was issued by then Secretary of Labor Nieves
Confesor, enjoining any strike or lock-out by the parties.[9] It was petitioner which initiated the action for injunction
before the trial court. Aggrieved by the injunctive order issued by the lower court, the Union was forced to file a
petition for review before the Court of Appeals. We cannot understand why petitioner should complain that no
mention of the pendency of the arbitration case before the labor department was made in the certificate of non-forum
shopping attached to the Unions petition in the Court of Appeals. The petition of the Union in the Court of Appeals
was provoked by petitioners action in seeking injunction from the trial court when it could have obtained the same
relief from the Secretary of Labor.
Indeed, by focusing on the Unions certification before the appellate court, petitioner failed to notice that its
own certification before the lower court suffered from the same omission for which it faults the Union. Although
the body of petitioners complaint mentions NCMB-NCR-NS-05-167-96, its own certification is silent concerning
this matter.[10] It is not in keeping with the requirements of fairness for petitioner to demand strict application of the
prohibition against forum-shopping, when it, too, is guilty of the same omission.
Second. Petitioner asserts that its status as an innocent bystander with respect to the labor dispute between
Philtread and the Union entitles it to a writ of injunction from the civil courts and that the appellate court erred in not
upholding its corporate personality as independent of Philtreads.
In Philippine Association of Free Labor Unions (PAFLU) v. Cloribel,[11] this Court, through Justice J.B.L.
Reyes, stated the innocent bystander rule as follows:
The right to picket as a means of communicating the facts of a labor dispute is a phase of the freedom of speech
guaranteed by the constitution. If peacefully carried out, it can not be curtailed even in the absence of employeremployee relationship.
The right is, however, not an absolute one. While peaceful picketing is entitled to protection as an exercise of
free speech, we believe the courts are not without power to confine or localize the sphere of communication or
the demonstration to the parties to the labor dispute, including those with related interest, and to insulate
establishments or persons with no industrial connection or having interest totally foreign to the context of the
dispute. Thus the right may be regulated at the instance of third parties or innocent bystanders if it
appears that the inevitable result of its exercise is to create an impression that a labor dispute with which they
have no connection or interest exists between them and the picketing union or constitute an invasion of their
rights. In one case decided by this Court, we upheld a trial courts injunction prohibiting the union from blocking
the entrance to a feed mill located within the compound of a flour mill with which the union had a
dispute. Although sustained on a different ground, no connection was found between the two mills owned by two
different corporations other than their being situated in the same premises. It is to be noted that in the instances
cited, peaceful picketing has not been totally banned but merely regulated. And in one American case, a picket by a
labor union in front of a motion picture theater with which the union had a labor dispute was enjoined by the court

from being extended in front of the main entrance of the building housing the theater wherein other stores operated
by third persons were located.[12] (Emphasis added)
Thus, an innocent bystander, who seeks to enjoin a labor strike, must satisfy the court that aside from the
grounds specified in Rule 58 of the Rules of Court, it is entirely different from, without any connection whatsoever
to, either party to the dispute and, therefore, its interests are totally foreign to the context thereof. For instance,
in PAFLU v. Cloribel, supra, this Court held that Wellington and Galang were entirely separate entities,
different from, and without any connection whatsoever to, the Metropolitan Bank and Trust Company, against
whom the strike was directed, other than the incidental fact that they are the banks landlord and co-lessee housed in
the same building, respectively. Similarly, in Liwayway Publications, Inc. v. Permanent Concrete Workers
Union,[13] this Court ruled that Liwayway was an innocent bystander and thus entitled to enjoin the unions strike
because Liwayways only connection with the employer company was the fact that both were situated in the same
premises.
In the case at bar, petitioner cannot be said not to have such connection to the dispute. As correctly observed
by the appellate court:
Coming now to the case before us, we find that the negotiation, contract of sale, and the post transaction between
Philtread, as vendor, and Siam Tyre, as vendee, reveals a legal relation between them which, in the interest of
petitioner, we cannot ignore. To be sure, the transaction between Philtread and Siam Tyre, was not a simple sale
whereby Philtread ceased to have any proprietary rights over its sold assets. On the contrary, Philtread remains as
20% owner of private respondent and 60% owner of Sucat Land Corporation which was likewise incorporated in
accordance with the terms of the Memorandum of Agreement with Siam Tyre, and which now owns the land were
subject plant is located. This, together with the fact that private respondent uses the same plant or factory; similar or
substantially the same working conditions; same machinery, tools, and equipment; and manufacture the same
products as Philtread, lead us to safely conclude that private respondents personality is so closely linked to
Philtread as to bar its entitlement to an injunctive writ. Stated differently, given its close links with Philtread as to
bar its entitlement to an injunctive writ. Stated differently, given its close links with Philtread, we find no clear and
unmistakable right on the part of private respondent to entitle it to the writ of preliminary injunction it prayed for
below.
.
We stress that that in so ruling, we have not touched on the issue of . . . whether or not private respondent is a mere
dummy or continuation of Philtread. . . . [14]
Although, as petitioner contends, the corporate fiction may be disregarded where it is used to defeat public
convenience, justify wrong, protect fraud, defend crime, or where the corporation is used as a mere alter-ego or
business conduit,[15] it is not these standards but those of the innocent bystander rule which govern whether or not
petitioner is entitled to an injunctive writ. Since petitioner is not an innocent bystander, the trial courts order,
dated July 2, 1996, is a patent nullity, the trial court having no jurisdiction to issue the writ of injunction. No motion
for reconsideration need be filed where the order is null and void. [16]
WHEREFORE, petition is hereby DENIED and the decision of the Court of Appeals is AFFIRMED.
SO ORDERED.
G.R. No. 89920 October 18, 1990
UNIVERSITY
OF
STO.
TOMAS, petitioner,
vs.
NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION, UST FACULTY UNION, respondents.
Abad, Leao & Associates for petitioner.

Eduardo J. Mario, Jr. for private respondent.

GUTIERREZ, JR., J.:

May a university, pending resolution by the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) of its labor dispute with
its union, comply with a readmission order by granting substantially equivalent academic assignments, in lieu of
actual reinstatement, to dismissed faculty members?
On June 19, 1989, the University of Sto. Tomas (UST), through its Board of Trustees, terminated the employment of
all sixteen union officers and directors of respondent UST Faculty Union on the ground that "in publishing or
causing to be published in Strike Bulletin No. 5 dated August 4, 1987, the libelous and defamatory attacks against
the Father Rector, (each of them) has committed the offenses of grave misconduct, serious disrespect to a superior
and conduct unbecoming a faculty member." (Rollo p. 41)
As a result of the dismissal of said employees, some faculty members staged mass leaves of absence on June 28,
1989 and several days thereafter, disrupting classes in all levels at the University. (Rollo, pp. 53, 92)
On July 5, 1989, the faculty union filed a complaint for illegal dismissal and unfair labor practice with the
Department of Labor and Employment. (Rollo, p. 42)
On July 7, 1989, the labor arbiter, on a prima facie showing that the termination was causing a serious labor dispute,
certified the matter to the Secretary of Labor and Employment for a possible suspension of the effects of
termination. (Rollo, p. 51)
Secretary Franklin Drilon subsequently issued an order dated July 11, 1989, the decretal portion of which reads as
follows:
WHEREFORE, ABOVE PREMISES CONSIDERED, and in the interest of industrial peace and
pursuant to Section 33 (b) of RA 6715, the effects of the termination of Ma. Melvyn Alamis,
Eduardo Marino, Jr., Urbano Agalabia, Anthony Cura, Norma Collantes, Fulvio Guerrero, Corinta
Barranco, Porfirio Jose Guico, Lily Matias, Rene Sison, Henedino Brondial, Myrna Hilario,
Ronaldo Asuncion, Nilda Redoblado, Zenaida Burgos, and Milagros Nino are hereby suspended
and management is likewise ordered to accept them back to work under the same terms and
conditions prevailing prior to their dismissal.
In furtherance of this Order, all faculty members are directed to immediately report back for work
and for management to accept them back under the same terms and conditions prevailing prior to
the strike.
Labor Arbiter Nieves de Castro is hereby directed to proceed with the case pending before her and
to expedite the resolution of the same.
Pending resolution, the parties are directed to cease and desist, from committing any and all acts
that might exacerbate the situation. (Rollo, p. 54)
Petitioner UST filed a motion for reconsideration on July 12, 1989 asking the Secretary of Labor and Employment
to either assume jurisdiction over the present case or certify it to the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC)
for compulsory arbitration without suspending the effects of the termination of the 16 dismissed faculty members.
(Rollo, pp. 55-64)

On July 18, 1989, Secretary Drilon, acting on said motion for reconsideration, issued another order modifying his
previous order. The dispositive portion of the new order is quoted below:
WHEREFORE, ABOVE PREMISES CONSIDERED, the Order dated 11 July 1989 is hereby
modified. Accordingly, this Office hereby certifies the labor dispute to the National Labor
Relations Commission for compulsory arbitration pursuant to Article 263(g) of the Labor Code, as
amended by Section 27 of RA 6715.
In accordance with the above, the University of Santo Tomas is hereby ordered to readmit all its
faculty members, including the sixteen (16) union officials, under the same terms and conditions
prevailing prior to the present dispute.
The NLRC is hereby instructed to immediately call the parties and expedite the resolution of the
dispute.
The directive to the parties to cease and desist from committing any act that will aggravate the
situation is hereby reiterated. (Rollo, p. 81)
The petitioner filed a motion for clarification dated July 20, 1989 which was subsequently withdrawn. (Rollo, p. 94)
On July 27, 1989, Secretary Drilon issued another order that contained the following dispositive portion:
WHEREFORE, ABOVE PREMISES CONSIDERED, the Order dated 18 July 1989 directing the
readmission of all faculty members, including the 16 union officials, under the same terms and
conditions prevailing prior to the instant dispute is hereby affirmed.
The NLRC is hereby ordered to immediately call the parties and ensure the implementation of this
Order.
No further motion of this and any nature shall be entertained. (Rollo, p. 103)
The NLRC subsequently caned the parties to a conference on August 11, 1989 before its Labor Arbiter Romeo Go.
(Rollo, p. 9)
On August 14, 1989, the respondent union filed before the NLRC a motion to implement the orders of the
Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment dated July 11, 18 and 27, 1989 and to cite Atty. Joselito Guianan
Chan (the petitioner's in-house counsel) for contempt. (Rollo, p. 104) The petitioner, on August 25, 1989, filed its
opposition to the private respondent's motion. (Rollo, p. 112)
On September 6, 1989, the NLRC issued a resolution, which is the subject of this petition for certiorari, set forth
below:
Certified Case No. 0531 IN RE: LABOR DISPUTE at the University of Santo Tomas. Acting
on the Motion to Implement the Orders of the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment
dated July 11, 18, and 27, 1989 and to cite Joselito Guianan Chan for Contempt dated August 14,
1989 and the Urgent Ex-parte Motion to Implement Certification Orders of the Honorable
Secretary of Labor and Employment dated July 18 and 17, (Sic) 1989 and the subsequent
Manifestation dated September 4, 1989, all filed by the UST Faculty Union; and considering the
Opposition to Union's Motion to Cite Atty. Joselito Guianan Chan for Contempt and Comments
on its Motion to Implement the Orders of the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment
dated July 11, 18 and 27, 1989 filed on August 25, 1989 by UST through its counsel, the
Commission, after deliberation, resolved, to wit:

a) The University is hereby directed to comply and faithfully abide with the July 11, 18 and 27,
1989 Orders of the Secretary of Labor and Employment by immediately reinstating or readmitting
the following faculty members under the same terms and conditions prevailing prior to the present
dispute or merely reinstate them in the payroll:
a) Ronaldo Asuncion
b) Lily Matias
c) Nilda Redoblado
d) Zenaida Burgos
e) Eduardo Marino, Jr.
f) Milagros Nino
g) Porfirio Guico
b) To fully reinstate, by giving him additional units or through payroll reinstatement, Prof. Urbano
Agalabia who was assigned only six (6) units;
c) To fully reinstate or reinstate through payroll, Prof. Fulvio Guerrero, who was assigned only
three (3) units;
d) The University is directed to pay the above-mentioned faculty members full backwages starting
from July 13, 1989, the date the faculty members presented themselves for reinstatement up to the
date of actual reinstatement or payroll reinstatement.
e) The payroll reinstatement of the above-named faculty members is hereby allowed only up to the
end of the First semester 1989; Next semester, the University is directed to actually reinstate the
faculty members by giving them their normal teaching loads;
f) The University is directed to cease and desist from offering the aforementioned faculty members
substantially equivalent academic assignments as this is not compliance in good faith with the
Orders of the Secretary of Labor and Employment. (Rollo, pp. 30-31)
Acting on an urgent motion for the issuance of a writ of preliminary injunction and/or restraining order, the Court
resolved to issue a temporary restraining order dated October 25, 1989 enjoining respondents from enforcing or
executing the assailed NLRC resolution. (Rollo, p. 160)
The petitioner assigns the following errors:
I
THE HONORABLE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION (NLRC) GRAVELY ABUSED ITS
DISCRETION IN A MANNER AMOUNTING TO LACK OR EXCESS OF JURISDICTION WHEN IT ISSUED
THE ASSAILED RESOLUTION WHICH ORDERS THE ALTERNATIVE REMEDIES OF ACTUAL
REINSTATEMENT OR PAYROLL REINSTATEMENT OF THE DISMISSED FACULTY MEMBERS.
II

THE HONORABLE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION GRAVELY ABUSED ITS

DISCRETION AMOUNTING TO LACK OR EXCESS OF JURISDICTION WHEN IT DIRECTED THE
UNIVERSITY TO PAY SOME OF THE DISMISSED FACULTY MEMBERS ASSIGNED TO HANDLE
SUBSTANTIALLY EQUIVALENT ACADEMIC ASSIGNMENTS, 'FULL BACKWAGES STARTING FROM
JULY 13, 1989, THE DATE THE FACULTY MEMBERS PRESENTED THEMSELVES FOR
REINSTATEMENT UP TO THE DATE OF ACTUAL REINSTATEMENT OR PAYROLL REINSTATEMENT.
III
THE HONORABLE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION COMMITTED GRAVE ABUSE OF
DISCRETION AMOUNT ING TO LACK OR EXCESS OF JURISDICTION WHEN IT CONSIDERED AS 'NOT
COMPLIANCE IN GOOD FAITH WITH THE ORDERS OF THE SECRETARY OF LABOR AND
EMPLOYMENT' THE UNIVERSITY'S ACT OF GRANTING TO SOME OF THE DISMISSED FACULTY
MEMBERS, SUBSTANTIALLY EQUIVALENT ACADEMIC ASSIGNMENTS.
IV
THE HONORABLE NLRC GRAVELY ABUSED ITS DISCRETION WHEN IT ARROGATED UPON ITSELF
THE EXERCISE OF THE RIGHT AND PREROGATIVES REPOSED BY LAW TO THE PETITIONER
UNIVERSITY IN THE LATTER'S CAPACITY AS EMPLOYER. (Rollo, pp. 9-10)
We shall deal with the first and third assignment of errors jointly because they are interrelated.
The petitioner states in its petition that: a) It has already actually reinstated six of the dismissed faculty members,
namely: Professors Alamis, Collantes, Hilario, Barranco, Brondial and Cura; b) As to Professors Agalabia and
Guerrero, whose teaching assignments were partially taken over by new faculty members, they were given back
their remaining teaching loads (not taken by new faculty members) but were likewise given substantially equivalent
academic assignments corresponding to their teachings loads already taken over by new faculty members; c) The
remaining seven faculty members, to wit: Professors Asuncion, Marino Jr., Matias, Redoblado, Burgos, Nino and
Guico, were given substantially equivalent academic assignments in lieu of actual teaching loads because all of their
teaching loads originally assigned to them at the start of the first semester of school year 1989-1990 were already
taken over by new faculty members; d) One dismissed faculty member Rene Sison, had been "absent without
official leave" or AWOL as early as the start of the first semester. (Rollo, pp. 11-12).
The petitioner advances the argument that its grant of substantially equivalent academic assignments to some of the
dismissed faculty members, instead of actual reinstatement, is well-supported by just and valid reasons. It alleges
that actual reinstatement of the dismissed faculty members whose teaching assignments were previously taken over
by new faculty members is not feasible nor practicable since this would compel the petitioner university to violate
and terminate its contracts with the faculty members who were assigned to and had actually taken over the courses.
The petitioner submits that it was never the intention of the Secretary of Labor to force it to break employment
contracts considering that those ordered temporarily reinstated could very well be accommodated with substantially
equivalent academic assignments without loss in rank, pay or privilege. Likewise, it claims that to change the faculty
member when the semester is about to end would seriously impair and prejudice the welfare and interest of the
students because dislocation, confusion and loss in momentum, if not demoralization, will surely ensue once the
change in faculty is effected. (Rollo, pp. 13-14)
The petitioner also avers that the faculty members who were given substantially equivalent academic assignments
were told by their respective deans to report to the Office of Academic Affairs and Research for their academic
assignments but the said faculty members failed to comply with these instructions. (Rollo, p. 118) Thus, the
petitioner postulates, mere payroll reinstatement which would give rise to the obligation of the University to pay
these faculty members, even if the latter are not working, would squarely run counter to the principle of "No Work,
No Pay". (Rollo, p. 15)

The respondent UST Faculty Union, on the other hand, decries that the petitioner is using the supposed substantially
equivalent academic assignments as a vehicle to embarrass and degrade the union leaders and that the refusal of the
petitioner to comply with the return-to-work order is calculated to deter, impede and discourage the union leaders
from pursuing their union activities. (Rollo, pp. 246, 254)
It also claims that the dismissed faculty members were hired to perform teaching functions and, indeed, they have
rendered dedicated teaching service to the University students for periods ranging from 12 to 39 years. Hence, they
maintain, their qualifications are fitted for classroom activities and the assignment to them of non-teaching duties,
such as (a) book analysis; (b) syllabi-making or revising; (c) test questions construction; (d) writing of monographs
and modules for students' use in learning "hard to understand" topics on the lectures; (e) designing modules,
transparencies, charts, diagrams for students' use as learning aids; and (f) other related assignments, is oppressive.
(Rollo, pp. 243-244)
In resolving the contentions of both parties, this Court refers to Article 263 (g), first paragraph, of the Labor Code,
as amended by Section 27 of Republic Act No. 6715, which provides:
(g) When, in his opinion, there exists a labor dispute causing or likely to cause a strike or lockout
in an industry indispensable to the national interest, the Secretary of Labor and Employment may
assume jurisdiction over the dispute and decide it or certify the same to the Commission for
compulsory arbitration. Such assumption or certification shall have the effect of automatically
enjoining the intended or impending strike or lockout as specified in the assumption or
certification order. If one has already taken place at the time of assumption or certification, all
striking or locked out employees shall immediately return to work and the employer shall
immediately resume operations and readmit all workers under the same terms and conditions
prevailing before the strike or lockout. The Secretary of Labor and Employment or the
Commission may seek the assistance of law enforcement agencies to ensure compliance with this
provision as well as with such orders as he may issue to enforce the same. (Emphasis supplied.)
It was in compliance with the above provision that Secretary Drilon issued his July 18, 1989 order to "readmit all its
faculty members, including the sixteen (16) union officials, under the same terms and conditions prevailing prior to
the present dispute." (Rollo, p. 81) And rightly so, since the labor controversy which brought about a temporary
stoppage of classes in a university populated by approximately 40,000 students affected national interest.
After the petitioner filed a motion for clarification which, however, was subsequently withdrawn, Secretary Drilon
issued another order dated July 27, 1989 affirming his July 18 order and directing the NLRC to immediately call the
parties and "ensure the implementation of this order" (Rollo, p. 103)
The NLRC was thereby charged with the task of implementing a valid return-to-work order of the Secretary of
Labor. As the implementing body, its authority did not include the power to amend the Secretary's order. Since the
Secretary's July 18 order specifically provided that the dismissed faculty members shall be readmitted under the
same terms and conditions prevailing prior to the present dispute, the NLRC should have directed the actual
reinstatement of the concerned faculty members. It therefore erred in granting the alternative remedy of payroll
reinstatement which, as it turned, only resulted in confusion. The remedy of payroll reinstatement is nowhere to be
found in the orders of the Secretary of Labor and hence it should not have been imposed by the public respondent
NLRC. There is no showing that the facts called for this type of alternative remedy.
For the same reason, we rule that the grant of substantially equivalent academic assignments can not be sustained.
Clearly, the giving of substantially equivalent academic assignments, without actual teaching loads, cannot be
considered a reinstatement under the same terms and conditions prevailing before the strike. Within the context of
Article 263(g), the phrase "under the same terms and conditions" contemplates actual reinstatement or the return of
actual teaching loads to the dismissed faculty members. There are academic assignments such as the research and
writing of treatises for publication or full-time laboratory work leading to exciting discoveries which professors
yearn for as badges of honor and achievement. The assignments given to the reinstated faculty members do not fall
under such desirable categories.

Article 263(g) was devised to maintain the status quo between the workers and management in a labor dispute
causing or likely to cause a strike or lockout in an industry indispensable to the national interest, pending
adjudication of the controversy. This is precisely why the Secretary of Labor, in his July 11, 1989 order, stated that
"Pending resolution, the parties are directed to cease and desist from committing any and all acts that might
exacerbate the situation." (Rollo, p. 54) And in his order of July 18, he decreed that "The directive to the parties to
cease and desist from committing any act that will aggravate the situation is hereby reiterated." (Rollo, p. 81)
The grant of substantially equivalent academic assignments of the nature assigned by the petitioner would evidently
alter the existing status quo since the temporarily reinstated teachers will not be given their usual teaching loads. In
fact, the grant thereof aggravated the present dispute since the teachers who were assigned substantially equivalent
academic assignments refused to accept and handle what they felt were degrading or unbecoming assignments, in
turn prompting the petitioner University to withhold their salaries. (Rollo, p. 109)
We therefore hold that the public respondent NLRC did not commit grave abuse of discretion when it ruled that the
petitioner should "cease and desist from offering the aforementioned faculty members substantially equivalent
academic assignments as this is not compliance in good faith with the order of the Secretary of Labor and
Employment."
It was error for the NLRC to order the alternative remedies of payroll reinstatement or actual reinstatement.
However, the order did not amount to grave abuse of discretion. Such error is merely an error of judgment which is
not correctible by a special civil action for certiorari. The NLRC was only trying its best to work out a satisfactory
ad hoc solution to a festering and serious problem. In the light of our rulings on the impropriety of the substantially
equivalent academic assignments and the need to defer the changes of teachers until the end of the first semester, the
payroll reinstatement will actually minimize the petitioners problems in the payment of full backwages.
As to the second assignment of error, the petitioner contends that the NLRC committed grave abuse of discretion in
awarding backwages from July 13, 1989, the date the faculty members presented themselves for work, up to the date
of actual reinstatement, arguing that the motion for reconsideration seasonably filed by the petitioner had effectively
stayed the Secretary's order dated July 11, 1989.
The petitioner's stand is unmeritorious. A return-to-work order is immediately effective and executory despite the
filing of a motion for reconsideration by the petitioner. As pointed out by the Court in Philippine Air Lines
Employees Association (PALEA) v. Philippine Air Lines, Inc. (38 SCRA 372 [1971]):
The very nature of a return-to-work order issued in a certified case lends itself to no other
construction. The certification attests to the urgency of the matter affecting as it does an industry
indispensable to the national interest. The order is issued in the exercise of the court's compulsory
power of arbitration, and therefore must be obeyed until set aside. To say that its effectivity must
wait affirmance in a motion for reconsideration is not only to emasculate it but indeed to defeat its
import, for by then the deadline fixed for the return-to-work would, in the ordinary course, have
already passed and hence can no longer be affirmed insofar as the time element is concerned.
Additionally, although the Secretary's order of July 11 was modified by the July 18 order, the return-to-work portion
of the earlier order which states that "the faculty members should be admitted under the same terms and conditions
prevailing prior to the dispute" was affirmed.
We likewise affirm the NLRC's finding that the dismissed teachers presented themselves for reinstatement on July
13, 1989 since the factual findings of quasi-judicial agencies like the NLRC are generally accorded not only respect
but even finality if such findings are supported by substantial evidence. (Mamerto v. Inciong, 118 SCRA 265
[1982]; Baby Bus, Inc. v. Minister of Labor, 158 SCRA 221 [1988]; Packaging Products Corporation v. National
Labor Relations Commission, 152 SCRA 210 [1987]; Talisay Employees' and Laborers Association (TELA) v.
Court of Industrial Relations, 143 SCRA 213 [1986]). There is no showing that such substantial evidence is not
present.

The petitioner, however, stresses that since the faculty members who were given substantially equivalent academic
assignments did not perform their assigned tasks, then they are not entitled to backwages. (Rollo, p. 19) The
petitioner is wrong. The reinstated faculty members' refusal to assume their substantially equivalent academic
assignments does not contravene the Secretary's return-to-work order. They were merely insisting on being given
actual teaching loads, on the return-to-work order being followed. We find their persistence justified as they are
rightfully and legally entitled to actual reinstatement. Since the petitioner University failed to comply with the
Secretary's order of actual reinstatement, we adjudge that the NLRC's award of backwages until actual reinstatement
is correct.
With respect to the fourth assignment of error, the petitioner expostulates that as employer, it has the sole and
exclusive right and prerogative to determine the nature and kind of work of its employees and to control and manage
its own operations. Thus, it objects to the NLRC's act of substituting its judgment for that of the petitioner in the
conduct of its affairs and operations. (Rollo, pp. 23-24)
Again, we cannot sustain the petitioner's contention. The hiring, firing, transfer, demotion and promotion of
employees are traditionally Identified as management prerogatives. However, these are not absolute prerogatives.
They are subject to limitations found in law, a collective bargaining agreement, or general principles of fair play and
justice. (Abbott Laboratories [Phil.] Inc. v. NLRC, 154 SCRA 713 [1987])
Article 263(g) is one such limitation provided by law. To the extent that Art. 263(g) calls for the admission of all
workers under the same terms and conditions prevailing before the strike, the petitioner University is restricted from
exercising its generally unbounded right to transfer or reassign its employees. The public respondent NLRC is not
substituting its own judgment for that of the petitioner in the conduct of its own affairs and operations; it is merely
complying with the mandate of the law.
The petitioner manifests the fear that if the temporarily reinstated faculty members will be allowed to handle actual
teaching assignments in the classroom, the latter would take advantage of the situation by making the classroom the
forum not for the purpose of imparting knowledge to the students but for the purpose of assailing and lambasting the
administration. (Rollo, p. 330) There may be a basis for such a fear. We can even state that such concern is not
entirely unfounded nor farfetched. However, such a fear is speculative and does not warrant a deviation from the
principle that the dismissed faculty members must be actually reinstated pending resolution of the labor dispute.
Unpleasant situations are sometimes aftermaths of bitter labor disputes. It is the function of Government to fairly
apply the law and thereby minimize the dispute's harmful effects. It is in this light that the return to work order
should be viewed and obeyed.
One thing has not escaped this Court's attention. Professors Alamis, Cura, Collantes, Barranco, Brondial and Hilario
were already reinstated by the petitioner in compliance with the Secretary's return-to-work order. Knowing this to be
a fact, the NLRC, in its assailed resolution, dealt only with the fate of the remaining faculty members who were
given substantially equivalent academic assignments. The names of the aforementioned faculty members appear
nowhere in the disputed NLRC order. Inasmuch as these faculty members actually reinstated were not covered by
the NLRC resolution, then it follows that they were likewise not covered by the Court's temporary restraining order
enjoining respondents from enforcing or executing the NLRC resolution. The effects of the temporary restraining
order did not extend to them. Yet, after the Court issued the temporary restraining order, the petitioner lost no time
in recalling their actual teaching assignments and giving them, together with the rest of the dismissed faculty
members, substantially equivalent academic assignments.
The petitioner's dogmatic insistence in issuing substantially equivalent academic assignments stems from the fact
that the teaching loads of the dismissed professors have already been assigned to other faculty members. It wants us
to accept this remedy as one resorted to in good faith. And yet, the petitioner's employment of the temporary
restraining order as a pretext to enable it to substitute substantially equivalent academic assignmentseven for those
who were earlier already reinstated to their actual teaching loads runs counter to the dictates of fair play.
With respect to the private respondent's allegation of union busting by the petitioner, we do not at this time pass
upon this issue. Its determination falls within the competence of the NLRC, as compulsory arbitrator, before whom

the labor dispute is under consideration. We are merely called upon to decide the propriety of the petitioner
University's grant of substantially equivalent academic assignments pending resolution of the complaint for unfair
labor pratice and illegal dismissal filed by the private respondent.
Although we pronounce that the dismissed faculty members must be actually reinstated while the labor dispute is
being resolved, we have to take into account the fact that at this time, the first semester for schoolyear 1990-1991 is
about to end. To change the faculty members around the time of final examinations would adversely affect and
prejudice the students whose welfare and interest we consider to be of primordial importance and for whom both the
University and the faculty union must subordinate their claims and desires. This Court therefore resolves that the
actual reinstatement of the non-reinstated faculty members, pending resolution of the labor controversy before the
NLRC, may take effect at the start of the second semester of the schoolyear 1990-1991 but not later. With this
arrangement, the petitioner's reasoning that it will be violating contracts with the faculty members who took over the
dismissed professors' teaching loads becomes moot considering that, as it alleges in its petition, it operates on a
semestral basis.
Under the principle that no appointments can be made to fill items which are not yet lawfully vacant, the contracts of
new professors cannot prevail over the right to reinstatement of the dismissed personnel. However, we apply
equitable principles for the sake of the students and order actual reinstatement at the start of the second semester.
WHEREFORE, the petition is hereby DISMISSED. However, the NLRC resolution dated September 6, 1989 is
MODIFIED and the petitioner University of Sto. Tomas is directed to temporarily reinstate, pending and without
prejudice to the outcome of the labor dispute before the National Labor Relations Commission, the sixteen (16)
dismissed faculty members to their actual teaching assignments, at the start of the second semester of the schoolyear
1990-1991. Prior to their temporary reinstatement to their actual teaching loads, the said faculty members shall be
entitled to fall wages, backwages, and other benefits. The Temporary Restraining Order dated October 25, 1989 is
hereby LIFTED.
SO ORDERED.