G.R. No. L-31352 July 29, 1983
JORGE DELECTOR, ET AL., petitioners-appellants, vs. ANTONIO M. OGAYAN, ET AL., respondents-appellees.

FACTS

The petitioners were all appointed as patrolmen in the Palo Police Department between 1964 and 1965, with their appointments approved by the Civil Service Commission. They were not civil service eligibles. On January 1, 1968, the municipal mayor dismissed them from the police force and, on the same date, appointed the other respondents as “special agents” in his office. These newly created positions of special agents were also filled by non-eligibles.
The petitioners filed a petition for quo warranto before the Court of First Instance of Leyte, seeking their reinstatement and the ouster of the respondents. They argued that their dismissal was illegal because they were replaced by another set of non-eligibles, contravening civil service rules. The trial court dismissed the petition, ruling that as non-eligibles, the petitioners held no legal right to their positions and thus their dismissal was not legally assailable.

ISSUE

Whether or not the petitioners, as non-civil service eligibles appointed to the police force, possess security of tenure such that they cannot be lawfully replaced by another set of non-eligibles.

RULING

The Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal of the petition. The Court clarified the nature of the petitioners’ appointments. Since they possessed no civil service eligibility whatsoever, their appointments were merely temporary, not provisional. A provisional appointment, under Section 24(c) of the Civil Service Act of 1959, requires that the appointee possesses some civil service eligibility, albeit not the appropriate one for the specific position, and that the appointment is made due to the lack of an appropriate register of eligibles.
The petitioners, having no eligibility at all, were temporary employees. The Court reiterated the settled doctrine that temporary appointees have no fixed tenure and may be terminated at any time, with or without cause, at the discretion of the appointing authority. Consequently, the mayor acted within his rights in terminating their services. The argument that they could not be replaced by other non-eligibles was rendered moot by their lack of a legal right to the positions in the first place. Having determined that the petitioners were temporary employees who could be legally separated at will, the Court found no need to rule on their other assignments of error regarding Civil Service Commission circulars.