This case has been cited 1 times or more.
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2005-03-29 |
QUISUMBING, J. |
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| Rule 3, Section 16 is the rule on substitution in the Rules of Court.[8] This rule allows substitution by a legal representative. It can be gleaned from the citation of this rule that movant/intervenor seeks to appear before this Tribunal as the legal representative/substitute of the late protestant prescribed by said Section 16. However, in our application of this rule to an election contest, we have every time ruled that a public office is personal to the public officer and not a property transmissible to the heirs upon death.[9] Thus, we consistently rejected substitution by the widow or the heirs in election contests where the protestant dies during the pendency of the protest. In Vda. de De Mesa v. Mencias,[10] we recognized substitution upon the death of the protestee but denied substitution by the widow or heirs since they are not the real parties in interest. Similarly, in the later case of De la Victoria v. Commission on Elections,[11] we struck down the claim of the surviving spouse and children of the protestee to the contested office for the same reason. Even in analogous cases before other electoral tribunals,[12] involving substitution by the widow of a deceased protestant, in cases where the widow is not a real party in interest, we denied substitution by the wife or heirs. | |||||