GR 149743; (February, 2005) (Digest)
G.R. No. 149743; February 18, 2005
LEONARDO TAN, ROBERT UY and LAMBERTO TE, petitioners, vs. SOCORRO Y. PEREÑA, Respondent.
FACTS
Presidential Decree No. 449 (1974) limited cockpit operations to one per municipality, or two for populations over 100,000. Respondent Socorro Pereña held the sole franchise in Daanbantayan, Cebu. The 1991 Local Government Code empowered municipal sanggunians to license and regulate cockpits. In 1993, Daanbantayan’s Sangguniang Bayan enacted Ordinance No. 6, referencing PD 449’s population-based limits, and later Ordinance No. 7, amending it to allow up to three cockpits. Acting under this ordinance, Municipal Mayor Lamberto Te issued a permit to petitioner Leonardo Tan to operate a second cockpit. Pereña sued for damages and injunction, arguing the ordinance and permit violated PD 449’s numerical limit.
ISSUE
Whether Municipal Ordinance No. 7, Series of 1993, which authorized up to three cockpits in Daanbantayan, is valid despite the contrary limit in PD 449.
RULING
The Supreme Court ruled the ordinance INVALID. The legal logic rests on the hierarchy of laws and the specific grant of authority under the Local Government Code (LGC). While Section 447(a)(3)(v) of the LGC grants municipalities the power to “authorize and license the establishment, operation and maintenance of cockpits,” this grant is not absolute. The Court held this power is subject to “existing laws,” which include PD 449. The Code’s phrase “any law to the contrary notwithstanding” refers only to laws vesting such regulatory power in national agencies, not to substantive police power measures like PD 449 that set a national policy limit. PD 449, as a special law governing cockfighting, establishes a specific numerical ceiling—a police power measure for public order and morals. The municipal ordinance, in allowing three cockpits, directly contravened this ceiling. The LGC devolved regulatory power but did not repeal PD 449’s substantive limit. Therefore, the municipality could not, under its general grant of authority, override the specific national law. The permit issued to Tan, based on an ultra vires ordinance, was consequently void.