This case has been cited 3 times or more.
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2010-03-22 |
PERALTA, J. |
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| It appears, however, that after the issuance of the Court of Appeals' decision, only Ople's personal representation signed the motion for reconsideration. There is no showing that the municipal legal officer made the same manifestation, as he previously did upon the filing of the petition.[45] From this, the Court of Appeals concluded that it was as if petitioner municipality and petitioner Ople, in his official capacity, had never moved for reconsideration of the assailed decision, and adverts to the ruling in Ramos v. Court of Appeals[46] and Municipality of Pililla, Rizal v. Court of Appeals[47] that only under well-defined exceptions may a private counsel be engaged in lawsuits involving a municipality, none of which exceptions obtains in this case.[48] | |||||
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2008-09-23 |
QUISUMBING, J. |
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| Section 481(a)[29] of the Local Government Code (LGC) of 1991[30] mandates the appointment of a city legal officer. Under Section 481(b)(3)(i)[31] of the LGC, the city legal officer is supposed to represent the city in all civil actions, as in this case, and special proceedings wherein the city or any of its officials is a party. In Ramos v. Court of Appeals,[32] we cited that under Section 19[33] of Republic Act No. 5185,[34] city governments may already create the position of city legal officer to whom the function of the city fiscal (now prosecutor) as legal adviser and officer for civil cases of the city shall be transferred.[35] In the case of Urdaneta City, however, the position of city legal officer is still vacant, although its charter[36] was enacted way back in 1998. | |||||
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2002-07-11 |
BELLOSILLO, J. |
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| petitioner executed the purported directive. Clearly, this is irregular since under Sec. 4, par. 10, in relation to par. 7,[13] RA 1161 as amended by RA 8282 (The Social Security Act of 1997, which was already effective[14] when the instant petition was filed), it is the SSC as a collegiate body which has the power to approve, confirm, pass upon or review the action of the SSS to sue in court. Moreover, the appearance of the internal legal staff of the SSS as counsel in the present proceedings is similarly questionable because under both RA 1161 and RA 8282 it is the Department of Justice (DoJ) that has the authority to act as counsel of the SSS.[15] It is well settled that the legality of the representation of an unauthorized counsel may be raised at any stage of the proceedings[16] and that such illicit representation produces no legal effect.[17] Since nothing in the case at bar shows that the approval or ratification of the SSC has been undertaken in the manner prescribed by law and that the DoJ has not delegated the authority to act as counsel and appear herein, the instant petition must necessarily fail. These procedural deficiencies are serious matters which this Court cannot take lightly and simply ignore since the SSS is in reality confessing judgment to charge expenditure against the trust fund under its custodianship. In Premium Marble Resources v. Court of Appeals[18] we held that no person, not even its officers, could validly sue in behalf of a corporation in the absence of any resolution from the governing body | |||||