Province of North Cotabato v.
Government of the Republic of Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) on 4 August 2008, directing the
the Philippines (G.R. Nos. 183591, 183752, 183893, 183951, &
183962) (14 October 2008)
Facts:
On 8 August 2008, the Government of the Republic of the
Philippines (GRP), represented by the GRP Peace Panel and the
Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process (PAPP), and the Moro
Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) were scheduled to sign the
Memorandum of Agreement on the Ancestral Domain (MOA-AD)
Aspect of the previous GRP-MILF Tripoli Agreement on Peace of
2001 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
The MOA-AD included, among others, a stipulation that
creates the Bangsamoro Juridical Entity (BJE), to which the GRP
grants the authority and jurisdiction over the ancestral domain and
ancestral lands of the Bangsamoro—defined as the present
geographic area of the ARMM constituted by Lanao del Sur,
Maguindanao, Sulu, Tawi-Tawi, Basilan, and Marawi City, as well as
the municipalities of Lanao del Norte which voted for inclusion in
the ARMM in the 2001 plebiscite. The BJE is then granted the power
to build, develop, and maintain its own institutions. The MOA-AD
also described the relationship of the GRP and the BJE as
“associative,” characterized by shared authority and responsibility. It
further provides that its provisions requiring “amendments to the
existing legal framework” shall take effect upon signing of a
Comprehensive Compact.
Before the signing, however, the Province of North Cotabato
sought to compel the respondents to disclose and furnish it with
complete and official copies of the MOA-AD, as well as to hold a
public consultation thereon, invoking its right to information on
matters of public concern. A subsequent petition sought to have the
City of Zamboanga excluded from the BJE. The Court then issued a
public respondents and their agents to cease and desist from formally
signing the MOA-AD.
Issues and Ruling:
1. W/N the President has the power to pursue reforms that
would require new legislation and constitutional
amendments.
YES. However, the stipulation in the MOA-AD that virtually
guarantees that necessary changes shall be effected upon the legal
framework of the GRP must be struck down as unconstitutional as it
is inconsistent with the limits of the President’s authority to propose
constitutional amendments. Because although the President’s power
to conduct peace negotiations is implicitly included in her powers as
Chief Executive and Commander-in-Chief, and, in the course of
conducting peace negotiations, may validly consider implementing
even those policies that require changes to the Constitution, she may
not unilaterally implement them without the intervention of
Congress, or act in any way as if the assent of that body were
assumed as a certainty.
2. W/N there is a violation of the people’s right to information
on matters of public concern (1987 Constitution, Art. III,
Sec. 7) under a state policy of full disclosure of all its
transactions involving public interest (1987 Constitution, Art.
II, Sec. 28), including public consultation under RA No. 7160
(Local Government Code of 1991).
YES. At least three pertinent laws animate these constitutional
imperatives and justify the exercise of the people’s right to be
consulted on relevant matters relating to the peace agenda:
a. EO No. 3, which enumerates the functions and
responsibilities of the PAPP, is replete with mechanics for
 continuing consultations on both national and local levels
and for a principal forum for consensus-building. In fact, it is
the duty of the PAPP to conduct regular dialogues to seek
relevant information, comments, advice, and
recommendations from peace partners and concerned sectors
of society;
b. RA No. 7160 (LGC) requires all national offices to conduct
consultations before any project or program critical to the
environment and human ecology including those that may
call for the eviction of a particular group of people residing
in such locality, is implemented therein. The MOA-AD is
one peculiar program that unequivocally and unilaterally
vests ownership of a vast territory to the Bangsamoro
people, which could pervasively and drastically result to the
diaspora or displacement of a great number of inhabitants
from their total environment;
c. RA No. 8371 (IPRA) provides for clear-cut procedure for the
recognition and delineation of ancestral domain, which
entails, among other things, the observance of the free and
prior informed consent of the Indigenous Cultural
Communities/Indigenous Peoples (ICC/IP).
3. W/N the GRP Peace Panel and the PAPP committed grave
abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of
jurisdiction.
YES. The PAPP committed grave abuse of discretion when he failed
to carry out the pertinent consultation process, as mandated by EO
No. 3, RA No. 7160, and RA No. 8371. The furtive process by which
the MOA-AD was designed and crafted runs contrary to and in
excess of the legal authority, and amounts to a whimsical, capricious,
oppressive, arbitrary, and despotic exercise thereof. It illustrates a
gross evasion of positive duty and a virtual refusal to perform the
duty enjoined.
4. W/N the MOA-AD is constitutional.
NO. It cannot be reconciled with the present Constitution and laws.
Not only its specific provisions, but the very concept underlying
them, namely, the associative relationship envisioned between the
GRP and the BJE, are unconstitutional, for the concept presupposes
that the associated entity is a state and implies that the same is on its
way to independence. While there is a clause in the MOA-AD stating
that the provisions thereof inconsistent with the present legal
framework will not be effective until that framework is amended, the
same does not cure its defect. The inclusion of provisions in the
MOA-AD establishing an associative relationship between the BJE
and the Central Government is, itself, a violation of the
Memorandum of Instructions From The President addressed to the
government peace panel. Moreover, as the clause is worded, it
virtually guarantees that the necessary amendments to the
Constitution and the laws will eventually be put in place. Neither the
GRP Peace Panel nor the President herself is authorized to make
such a guarantee. Upholding such an act would amount to
authorizing a usurpation of the constituent powers vested only in
Congress, a Constitutional Convention, or the people themselves
through the process of initiative, for the only way that the Executive
can ensure the outcome of the amendment process is through an
undue influence or interference with that process.
5. W/N the GRP can invoke executive privilege.
NO. Respondents effectively waived such defense after it
unconditionally disclosed the official copies of the final draft of the
MOA-AD, for judicial compliance and public scrutiny.
Carpio-Morales, J.
The people’s right to information on matters of public concern under
Sec. 7, Art. III of the Constitution is in splendid symmetry with the
state policy of full public disclosure of all its transactions involving
public interest under Sec. 28, Art. II of the Constitution.
The right to information guarantees the right of the people to demand
information, while the policy of public disclosure recognizes the
duty of officialdom to give information even if nobody demands.
The IPRA does not grant the Executive Department or any
government agency the power to delineate and recognize an ancestral
domain claim by mere agreement or compromise.
An association is formed when two states of unequal power
voluntarily establish durable links. In the basic model, one state, the
associate, delegates certain responsibilities to the other, the principal,
while maintaining its international status as a state. Free associations
represent a middle ground between integration and independence.
she limits herself to recommending these changes and submits to the
proper procedure for constitutional amendments and revision, her
mere recommendation need not be construed as an unconstitutional
act.
Public statements of a state representative may be construed as a
unilateral declaration only when the following conditions are
present: the statements were clearly addressed to the international
community, the state intended to be bound to that community by its
statements, and that not to give legal effect to those statements would
be detrimental to the security of international intercourse. Plainly,
unilateral declarations arise only in peculiar circumstances.

The recognized sources of international law establish that the right to

self-determination of a people is normally fulfilled through internal
self-determination—a people’s pursuit of its political, economic,
social, and cultural development within the framework of an existing
state. A right to external self-determination (which in this case
potentially takes the form of the assertion of a right to unilateral
secession) arises only in the most extreme of cases and, even then,
under carefully defined circumstances.

That the authority of the President to conduct peace negotiations

with rebel groups is not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution does
not mean that she has no such authority.
The President has authority, as stated in her oath of office, only to
preserve and defend the Constitution. Such presidential power does
not, however, extend to allowing her to change the Constitution, but
simply to recommend proposed amendments or revision. As long as