GR 222810; (July, 2023) (Digest)
G.R. No. 222810 , July 11, 2023
Former Municipal Mayor Clarito A. Poblete, Municipal Budget Officer Ma. Dolores Jeaneth Bawalan, and Municipal Accountant Nephtali V. Salazar, Petitioners, vs. Commission on Audit, Respondent.
FACTS
Petitioners, former officials of the Municipality of Silang, Cavite, assail the Commission on Audit (COA) Decision and Resolution which dismissed their Petition for Review for being filed out of time. On June 2, 2011, COA issued twelve (12) Notices of Disallowance (NDs) totaling ₱2,891,558.31 against various projects undertaken in 2004, 2006, and 2007, finding the payments appropriated in the 2010 budget violated Section 350 of the Local Government Code. Petitioners appealed to the COA Regional Office, which affirmed the NDs in a Decision dated August 1, 2013. Petitioners filed a Petition for Review with the COA Proper on August 23, 2013. In a Letter dated August 29, 2013, the COA Commission Secretariat directed payment of the filing fee. Petitioners paid the fee on October 14, 2013. The COA Proper dismissed the petition in its Decision dated February 23, 2015, ruling it was filed out of time because the filing fee was paid 212 days from receipt of the NDs, exceeding the 180-day reglementary period. A Motion for Reconsideration was denied.
ISSUE
Whether the COA committed grave abuse of discretion in dismissing the Petition for Review on the ground that it was filed out of time due to the belated payment of the filing fee.
RULING
No, the COA did not commit grave abuse of discretion. The Petition is dismissed and the COA Decision is affirmed.
The 2009 Revised Rules of Procedure of the COA (RRPC) and COA Resolution No. 2008-005 require that the payment of the prescribed filing fee is a mandatory and jurisdictional requirement for the perfection of an appeal. The rules state that the fee “shall be paid at the same time the pleading is filed” and that a copy of the official receipt must be attached, otherwise the adjudicating office “shall not take action.” While the RRPC provides that a petition without the fee “will be returned to the party concerned for compliance,” this does not negate the mandatory nature of the payment as a component of a timely filing. The COA Secretariat’s act of directing payment on August 29, 2013, did not cure the belated payment made on October 14, 2013, which was already beyond the 180-day period from the petitioners’ receipt of the NDs on June 6, 2011. The reglementary period for appeal is jurisdictional, and strict compliance is required. The Court found no grave abuse of discretion in the COA’s dismissal of the appeal for being filed out of time. The Court did not delve into the substantive merits of the disallowances, as the procedural dismissal was upheld.