Court of Appeals upholds grant of P139-M retirement benefits to retired PAO lawyers

The Court of Appeals has affirmed a Quezon City trial court's decision granting retirement benefits worth about P139.9 million to retired lawyers of the Public Attorney's Office (PAO) last year.

In an October 5 decision obtained Wednesday, the CA's 12th Division denied a petition by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) questioning a 2017 ruling by Quezon City Judge Maria Gilda Loja-Pangilinan for being moot.

The DBM, represented by Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno and Legal Service chief Rowena Candice Ruiz, had assailed Pangilinan's ruling, which voided a DBM legal opinion that said PAO lawyers are not entitled to the same retirement package as that of prosecutors under the National Prosecution Service.

Pangilinan, who found that the legal opinion was issued with grave abuse of discretion, also ordered the DBM to release the retirement benefits to the concerned PAO retirees.

The DBM's defeat before the local court prompted it to bring its case before the appellate court. 

The appeals court said DBM's petition was "dismissible" for being rendered moot and academic by the finality of the lower court's judgment and the disbursement of the retirement benefits.

The May 25, 2017 entry of judgment made Pangilinan's decision final, immutable, and unalterable, the CA said.

"The subsequent compliance with the directive therein made through the release and payment of the gratuity differentials of private respondents rendered said Decision also fully executed," it added.

The petition also no longer constitutes actual cases and controversies, the court said, and has "no judicial bearing anymore," since the retired PAO lawyers "no longer stand to benefit or be prejudiced" by any ruling it may hand down.

Even if it could rule on the propriety of the challenged DBM legal opinion, the circumstances would "reduce the Court's judgment to a mere advisory opinion which does not have factual consequence," it said.

"Without the requisite actual case or controversy over which the Court may exercise its judicial power, this Court can do nothing further in this case than to dismiss it for want of jurisdiction," the CA ruled.

The 14-page decision was penned by Associate Justice Gabriel Robeniol and concurred with by Associate Justices Ricardo Rosario and Ramon Paul Hernando.

Hernando is now a justice of the Supreme Court. — LDF, GMA News