FIRST DIVISION
[G.R. No. 140359. June 19, 2000]
HERMAN
CANIETE and WILFREDO ROSARIO, petitioners, vs. THE SECRETARY OF
EDUCATION, CULTURE AND SPORTS, respondent.
D E C I S I O N
KAPUNAN, J.:
Petitioners Herman Caniete and Wilfredo
Rosario seek the reversal of the Decision, dated 17 June 1999, of the Court of
Appeals in CA-G.R. SP No. 46835 and its Resolution, dated 6 October 1999,
denying petitioners’ motion for reconsideration.
Petitioners are public school teachers at
the Juan Sumulong High School in Quezon City. For being absent on 20 and 21
September 1990, they were charged by Secretary Isidro Cariño, then Secretary of
the Department of Education, Culture and Sports, with alleged participation in
the mass actions/strikes on said dates. Petitioners were placed under
preventive suspension on 21 September 1990. In his decisions, dated 28 May 1991
and 9 July 1992, Secretary Cariño found petitioners "guilty as
charged" and dismissed them from the service "effective
immediately." The said decisions of Secretary Cariño, however, were set
aside by the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) when the case was brought to
it on appeal. The MSPB found that petitioners were guilty only of Gross Violation
of Existing Civil Service Law and Rules and suspended them for three (3) months
without pay.
In its Resolution No. 94-4670, dated 30
August 1994, the Civil Service Commission (CSC) modified the decision of the
MSPB. The CSC found that petitioners were only guilty of being absent on 20 and
21 September 1990 without the necessary leave of absence, and not as charged by
Secretary Cariño of participating in the mass actions/strikes on said dates.
Accordingly, petitioners were meted out the penalty of reprimand. The
dispositive portion of the CSC resolution reads:
WHEREFORE,
foregoing premises considered, the Commission resolves to find Herman P.
Caniete and Wilfredo A. Rosario guilty of Violation of Reasonable Office Rules
and Regulations. The assailed decision is thus modified as they are hereby
meted out the penalty of reprimand. They are automatically reinstated in the
service without payment of back salaries.[1]
Petitioners moved for a reconsideration of
the CSC resolution insofar as it disallowed the payment of their back salaries.
The CSC denied their motion for reconsideration. Petitioners then elevated the
case to the CA but the latter affirmed the decision of the CSC. In denying
petitioners claim for back salaries, the CA cited City Mayor of Zamboanga
vs. CA,[2] where this Court held:
x x x back
salaries may be ordered paid to an officer or employee only if he is exonerated
of the charge against him and his suspension or dismissal is found and declared
to be illegal. In Sales vs. Mathay, Sr., 129 SCRA 321, this Court
held that a postal clerk suspended for six months for gross neglect of duty is
not entitled to back salary if he cannot show that his suspension was
unjustified or that he is innocent of the charge.
Thus, the order of
payment of full backwages in this case is without lawful basis. Indeed, to
allow private respondent to receive full back salaries would amount to
rewarding him for his misdeeds and compensating him for services that were
never rendered.[3]
Petitioners filed a motion for
reconsideration of the above decision but the CA denied the same in its
Resolution, dated 6 October 1999. Hence, this appeal.
The singular issue that needs to be resolved
in this case is whether petitioners, who were earlier dismissed for allegedly
participating in mass actions/strikes, are entitled to their back salaries upon
their reinstatement after they were found guilty only of violating reasonable
office rules and regulations and penalized only with reprimand.
The Court finds for the petitioners.
As correctly pointed out by petitioners, the
ruling in Gloria vs. Court of Appeals[4] is squarely applicable in this case as the facts are
substantially the same. In Gloria, the public school teachers therein
were either suspended or dismissed for allegedly participating in the strikes
sometime in September and October 1990. They were eventually exonerated of said
charge and found guilty only of violation of reasonable office rules and
regulations by failing to file applications for leave of absence. Thus, the
penalty of dismissal earlier imposed on them was reduced to reprimand and their
reinstatement was ordered. Moreover, this Court affirmed the payment of back
salaries of said teachers explaining that although "employees who are
preventively suspended pending investigation are not entitled to the
payment of their salaries even if they are exonerated, we do not agree with the
government that they are not entitled to compensation for the period of their
suspension pending appeal if eventually they are found innocent."[5]
The pertinent provisions of the Civil
Service Law (Book V, Title I, Subtitle A of the Administrative Code) on
preventive suspension are as follows:
SEC. 47. Disciplinary
Jurisdiction.
xxx
(2) The
Secretaries and heads of agencies and instrumentalities, provinces, cities and
municipalities shall have jurisdiction to investigate and decide matters
involving disciplinary action against officers and employees under their
jurisdiction. Their decisions shall be final in case the penalty imposed is
suspension for not more than thirty days or fine in an amount not exceeding
thirty days’ salary. In case the decision rendered by a bureau or office head
is appealable to the Commission, the same may be initially appealed to the
department and finally to the Commission and pending appeal, the same shall be
executory except when the penalty is removal, in which case the same shall be
executory only after confirmation by the Secretary concerned.
xxx
(4) An appeal
shall not stop the decision from being executory, and in case the penalty is
suspension or removal, the respondent shall be considered as having been under
preventive suspension during the pendency of the appeal in the event he wins
an appeal.
SEC 51. Preventive
Suspension.- The proper disciplining authority may preventively suspend any
subordinate officer or employee under his authority pending an investigation,
if the charge against such officer or employee involves dishonesty, oppression
or grave misconduct, or neglect in the performance of duty, or if there are
reasons to believe that the respondent is guilty of charges which would warrant
his removal from the service.
SEC. 52. Lifting
of Preventive Suspension Pending Administrative Investigation.- When the
administrative case against the officer or employee under preventive suspension
is not finally decided by the disciplining authority within the period of
ninety (90) days after the date of suspension of the respondent who is not a
presidential appointee, the respondent shall be automatically reinstated in the
service: Provided, That when the delay in the disposition of the case is
due to the fault, negligence or petition of the respondent, the period of delay
shall not be counted in computing the period of suspension herein provided.
Thus, there are two kinds of preventive suspension
of civil service employees who are charged with offenses punishable by removal
or suspension: (1) preventive suspension pending investigation (§51) and (2)
preventive suspension pending appeal if the penalty imposed by the disciplining
authority is suspension or dismissal and, after review, the respondent is
exonerated (§47[4]).[6]
We held in Gloria that the employee
who is placed under preventive suspension pending investigation is not
entitled to compensation because such suspension "is not a penalty but
only a means of enabling the disciplining authority to conduct an unhampered
investigation."[7] Upon the other hand, there is right to compensation
for preventive suspension pending appeal if the employee is eventually
exonerated. This is because "preventive suspension pending appeal
is actually punitive although it is in effect subsequently considered illegal
if respondent is exonerated and the administrative decision finding him guilty
is reversed. Hence, he should be reinstated with full pay for the period of the
suspension."[8]
The public school teachers in Gloria who
were exonerated of the charge against them, i.e., participating in the strike,
and found guilty only of violating reasonable office rules and regulations and
reprimanded, were held to be entitled to back salaries. We ruled:
Private
respondents were exonerated of all charges against them for acts connected with
the teachers’ strike of September and October 1990. Although they were absent
from work, it was not because of the strike. For being absent without leave,
they were held liable for violation of reasonable office rules and regulations
for which the penalty is a reprimand. Their case thus falls squarely within
ruling in Bangalisan, which likewise involved a teacher found guilty of
having violated reasonable office rules and regulations. Explaining the grant
of salaries during their suspension despite the fact that they were meted out
reprimand, this Court stated:
"With respect
to petitioner Rodolfo Mariano, payment of his backwages is in order. A reading
of the resolution of the Civil Service Commission will show that he was
exonerated of the charges which formed the basis for his suspension. The
Secretary of the DECS charged him with and he was later found guilty of grave
misconduct, gross neglect of duty, gross violation of the Civil Service Law,
rules and regulations and reasonable office regulations, refusal to perform
official duty, gross insubordination, conduct prejudicial to the best interest
of the service, and absence without official leave, for his participation in
the mass actions on September 18, 20 and 21, 1990. It was his alleged
participation in the mass actions that was the basis of his preventive
suspension and, later, his dismissal from the service.
However, the Civil
Service Commission, in the questioned resolution, made a finding that Mariano
was not involved in the "mass actions" but was absent because he was
in Ilocos Sur to attend the wake and interment of his grandmother. Although the
CSC imposed upon him the penalty of reprimand, the same was for his violation
of reasonable office rules and regulations because he failed to inform the
school of his intended absence and neither did he file an application for leave
covering such absences.
Under Section 23
of the Rules Implementing Book V of Executive Order No. 292 and other pertinent
civil service laws, in violations of reasonable office rules and regulations,
the first offense is punishable by reprimand. To deny petitioner Mariano his
back wages during his suspension would be tantamount to punishing him after his
exoneration from the charges which caused his dismissal from the service."
In Jacinto v.
Court of Appeals, a public school teacher who was found guilty of violation
of reasonable office rules and regulations for having been absent without leave
and reprimanded was given back salaries after she was exonerated of the charge
of having taken part in the strikes.[9]
Given the substantial factual similarities
of this case to Gloria, there is clearly no reason for this Court to
rule against the payment of back salaries to herein petitioners.
WHEREFORE, the petition is given DUE COURSE. The Decision,
dated 7 June 1999, and Resolution, dated 6 October 1999, of the Court of
Appeals are REVERSED and SET ASIDE. Respondent DECS is ORDERED to
pay petitioners Herman Caniete and Wilfredo Rosario their salaries from the
time of their dismissal by the Department of Education, Culture and Sports
until their actual reinstatement, for a period not exceeding five years.
SO ORDERED.
Davide, Jr., C.J., (Chairman), Puno,
Pardo, and Ynares-Santiago, JJ., concur.