The 10-year residency rule: What law experts say 

When Rep. Toby Tiangco raised the issue of Sen. Grace Poe's alleged lack of residency to run for higher office, GMA News Online asked top legal luminaries to weigh in. Here are the opinions of some of the country's legal experts about the issue. 

Fr. Ranhilio Aquino, dean of San Beda Graduate School of Law 

When one leaves his domicile with the intention to return, no matter how long the absence, domicile will not be lost. Intentions are tricky business, but there are verifiable facts consistent with an intention to remain, as well as facts evincing a lack of such an intention.  

 

Tony La Vina, dean of the Ateneo School of Government

Intent to return above all is established by your links to a place. As long as those links are real and subsisting - birthplaces, parents who are alive, ancestral hikes subsists, friendships and relations - all of these taken together are evidence of intent to return. (via FB)

 

Christian Monsod, former chairman, Commission on Elections

What is more important is intent. The facts appear to establish that she intended to return permanently to the Philippines by April 2006 when she sold her house in the US.  And she meets the 10-year residence requirement.

 

Sixto Brillantes,  former chairman, Commission on Elections 

The Constitution asks not for the actual period of residence but for legal residence or domicile. Parang ang interpretasyon nila ay iyong tinatawag na actual residency. As far as residency is concerned, qualified si Grace Poe, based on the issue on domicile.

 

Vicente Joyas, Integrated Bar of the Philippines national president 

Should she decide to run for either president or vice president, the issue of residency must be settled. Grace Poe's intention to return to the Philippines is negated by her acquisition of US citizenship. Her renunciation of US citizenship was made only so she can be appointed to government position. What about if she was not offered any government position, will she renounce?

 

Pacifico Agabin, former dean, University of the Philippines College of Law

Article VII, Section 2 of the Philippine Constitution explicitly states that a presidential candidate needs to be a resident of the Philippines for at least ten years immediately preceding such election. Animus revertendi doctrine is a "legal fiction" when applied in Poe's residency issue. Grace Poe's case is different (from Imelda Marcos') because she (Poe) wrote in her 2013 certificate of candidacy that she had been a resident of the Philippines for six years and six month before the May 2013 elections.

 

Amado Valdez, former dean, University of the East College of Law

Grace Poe's residency should not be downplayed because the 10-year rule is a mandatory requirement. The SC ruling on Marcos is not applicable in Poe's case because Imelda never lost her domicile in the Philippines.