G.R. No. 116025 ; February 22, 1996
Sunshine Transportation, Incorporated, petitioner, vs. National Labor Relations Commission and Realucio R. Santos, respondents.

FACTS

Petitioner Sunshine Transportation hired respondent Realucio Santos as a probationary bus driver in August 1989, later regularizing him in March 1990. On January 7, 1992, Santos received a memorandum directing him to explain his failure to report for a scheduled trip on December 28, 1991. Santos claimed that on January 2, 1992, his leave application was torn by the Operations Manager, who verbally terminated him and forced him off the premises. He subsequently received a formal termination letter dated January 22, 1992, citing insubordination for failing to submit the required written explanation. Santos filed a complaint for illegal dismissal and various money claims.
The Labor Arbiter dismissed Santos’s complaint, finding the dismissal was for cause and with due process. On appeal, the NLRC upheld the legality of the dismissal but modified the decision by granting Santos’s monetary claims amounting to P158,000.00, citing the petitioner’s failure to refute the claim of underpayment. Unsatisfied, Sunshine Transportation filed this special civil action for certiorari, alleging the NLRC committed grave abuse of discretion.

ISSUE

Whether the Supreme Court can properly entertain the petition for certiorari under Rule 65, given the petitioner’s failure to exhaust administrative remedies by not filing a motion for reconsideration with the NLRC.

RULING

The Supreme Court dismissed the petition. The legal logic is anchored on the doctrine of exhaustion of administrative remedies and the specific requirements for a special civil action for certiorari under Rule 65. For such a petition to be viable, it must be demonstrated that there is no appeal nor any plain, speedy, and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law. The Court emphasized that Section 14, Rule VII of the New Rules of Procedure of the NLRC provides an aggrieved party with the remedy of filing a motion for reconsideration of any NLRC order, resolution, or decision. This constitutes a plain, speedy, and adequate administrative remedy that must be availed of first before resorting to certiorari.
In this case, the records did not show, and the petitioner did not claim, that it filed a motion for reconsideration of the NLRC’s challenged decision prior to coming to the Supreme Court. The petitioner also failed to suggest any plausible reason justifying a direct recourse. Consequently, the petitioner did not fulfill the jurisdictional prerequisite for a petition for certiorari. The Court, therefore, found no merit in the petition and dismissed it for failure to exhaust the available administrative remedy.