ILOILO City – The Office of the Solicitor General has asked the Supreme Court (SC) to dismiss the petition filed by residents and workers questioning Boracay Island’s closure.
In a 61-page comment, Solicitor General Jose Calida said the petition must be dismissed due to lack of merit.
The 29-page petition for prohibition and mandamus filed by Mark Anthony Zabal and Thiting Jacosalem represented by lawyer Angelo Karlo Guillen of the National Union of People’s Lawyers (NUPL) Panay chapter urged the high court to nullify President Rodrigo Duterte’s Proclamation No. 475 closing Boracay to tourists and non-residents from April 26 to Oct. 25, 2018.
Atty. Rene Estocapio, president of NUPL-Panay, said the petition challenges the constitutionality of the President’s decision to close Boracay as a way of addressing the need to clean-up the island.
There is no provision in the 1987 Constitution that allows the President to close the island and ban tourists and non-residents, said Estocapio.
The President’s order also derogates the people’s right to travel, he added.
The other points the petitioners raised were:
* closing Boracay to tourists and non-residents is a violation of the right to due process of persons earning a living in the island and deprives them of their livelihood
* imposing restrictions upon persons visiting Boracay or depriving persons earning a living therein, even though they have not been found guilty of violating environmental laws, is arbitrary, whimsical, an unreasonable intrusion into individual rights.
Calida said Boracay’s closure did not violate any provision of the 1987 Constitution. He added the President ordered the closure pursuant to his power as chief executive under sections 1 and 17, Article VII of the Constitution and declared Boracay under a state of calamity upon recommendation by the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.
“In this case, the situation in Boracay Island called for a strong and urgent measure to address the human-induced hazards that have caused the degradation of Boracay Island’s eco-system…Evidently, Proclamation No. 475 is nothing more that the President’s exercise of his power of control over the executive branch of government, especially in addressing the state of calamity in Boracay Island,” read Calida’s comment.
“Had the President failed to act on the recommendation of the National Council to address the environmental disaster in Boracay, he would have violated his bounden duty under existing laws and the Constitution,” Calida added.
The Solicitor General pointed out that there is no usurpation of power on the part of the President because he is only implementing pertinent laws such as the Philippine Clean Water Act, Solid Waste Management Act, and Philippine Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act.
“It cannot be overemphasized therefore that the issuance of Proclamation No. 475 is within the ambit of the powers of the President and not contrary to the doctrine of separation of powers and the mechanisms laid out by the people through the Constitution,” the Solicitor General argued.
On violating the constitutional right to travel, Calida said the right to travel is not absolute as it provides exceptions in cases of “national security, public safety or public health,” which apply to Boracay Island.
He also debunked the claim of petitioners that their right to due process was violated by the closure order, saying the government’s police power superseded Zabal and Jacosalem’s right to their freelance jobs as sandcastle maker and tricycle driver in the island, respectively.
“Petitioners are not vested with any permanent right within the purview of the due process clause of the Constitution, since the State, under its all-encompassing police power, may alter, modify or amend the same, in accordance with the demands of the general welfare,” he explained.
“With the proper exercise of police power, petitioners cannot just conveniently invoke the due process clause of the Constitution and insist that every government action should be to their liking. Private ends should yield to the reasonable prerogatives of the State for public good and welfare,” Calida said.
Calida added that the petition should have been dismissed outright because its sole purpose is “harassing, vexing, putting undue pressure, or stifling any legal recourse that the respondents have taken or will take in the enforcement of environmental laws (o)n Boracay Island.”
Calida filed the comment to represent the respondents namely Executive Secretary Salvador Medialdea and Department of the Interior and Local Government OIC-Secretary Eduardo Año. (With a report from the Philippine News Agency/PN)
