G.R. No. 161418 ; April 28, 2004
NOEL Y. REPOL, petitioner, vs. COMMISSION ON ELECTIONS and VIOLETO CERACAS, respondents.

FACTS

Petitioner Noel Repol and respondent Violeto Ceracas were candidates for Municipal Mayor of Pagsanghan, Samar in the May 2001 elections. Ceracas was proclaimed winner. Repol filed an election protest. After initial dismissal, the COMELEC First Division reinstated the protest. On December 30, 2003, the Regional Trial Court, after revision, found massive fraud involving “shuttle” ballots and identical handwriting across multiple precincts. The trial court nullified Ceracas’s proclamation and declared Repol the duly elected mayor. Repol moved for execution pending appeal, which the trial court granted on January 5, 2004.
Ceracas then filed a petition with the COMELEC First Division (SPR Case No. 1-2004) assailing the execution order. Simultaneously, he had a pending omnibus motion on the same execution order before the trial court and an appeal on the main election case (EAC No. A-1-2004) pending before the COMELEC. On January 12, 2004, the COMELEC First Division issued an order directing the parties to maintain the status quo ante, effectively halting the execution. Repol filed this Petition for Certiorari.

ISSUE

Whether the COMELEC First Division committed grave abuse of discretion in issuing the status quo ante order in SPR Case No. 1-2004.

RULING

Yes. The Supreme Court granted the petition, annulled the COMELEC First Division’s order, and dismissed SPR Case No. 1-2004. The legal logic is twofold. First, the COMELEC First Division’s order constituted an unauthorized interference with a final and executory order of the trial court. The grant of execution pending appeal is addressed to the sound discretion of the trial court. Once granted, such an order is immediately executory. The COMELEC, in the exercise of its appellate jurisdiction over election contests, cannot stay such execution through a mere interlocutory order in a separate special relief case. To hold otherwise would allow the COMELEC to negate a final and implemented order of a co-equal court through a non-appellate process.
Second, and decisively, Ceracas was guilty of forum-shopping. At the time he filed SPR Case No. 1-2004, he had simultaneously sought relief from the trial court via an omnibus motion to quash the same writ of execution and had a pending appeal on the merits before the COMELEC. Forum-shopping exists when a party, against whom an adverse order has been issued, seeks a favorable opinion in another forum on the same matter. Ceracas’s multiple petitions grounded on the same cause of action aimed to get a favorable disposition from either the trial court or the COMELEC division. Given this clear forum-shopping, the COMELEC First Division should have dismissed Ceracas’s petition outright instead of giving it due course and issuing the restraining order.