Conflict of interest?

CHEERS TO the Philippine Daily Inquirer for a story on a  possible Constitutional violation in the re-election of Vice President Jejomar Binay as  Boy Scout of the Philippines (BSP) President.

As a follow-up to the story it published on June 22, 2015 on the re-election of Binay as the BSP President (“Binay reelected BSP president unopposed“), the Inquirer published both in its print and online platforms an article on the following day titled, “By serving as BSP head, did Binay violate law?“.

The report used interviews from lawyers with opposing views on the issue who cited past cases to discuss how the vice president may or may not have violated Article VII, Sec. 13 of the Philippine Constitution which prohibits the “president, vice president, the members of the Cabinet, and their deputies or assistants” to “hold any other office or employment during their tenure.”

Lawyer Martin Loon, citing Funa vs. Ermita (GR No. 184740, Feb. 11, 2010) and Civil Liberties Union vs. the Executive Secretary (GR No. 83896, Feb. 22, 1991), said that the vice president may have violated the Constitution because “being BSP President is not an ex-officio function of the vice president.”

The report also mentioned that in June 2011, the Supreme Court had ruled that “the BSP was a GOCC (government owned and controlled corporations) subject to state auditing and an agency attached to the Department of Education, and thus not stripped of its public character.”

However, despite the BSP’s being a GOCC, Pacifico Agabin,  former University of the Philippines College of Law dean, said that BSP is a “different GOCC” because it is “not a financial or profit-making corporation like an ordinary GOCC.”

In the report, Agabin added that “there is no conflict of interest (between his post as Vice President and) Binay’s affiliation with the BSP.”

Aside from the Inquirer, Rappler used “How long will Binay keep his post?” as a subhead to its article, “Binay still Boy Scouts national president”. The report cited the same section in the Constitution and discussed how Binay “will then have to give up his position as BSP national president, if he files for candidacy this October.” Rappler also tried to get Binay’s side on the issue but the Vice President declined, saying “he was in a hurry to get to his next appointment.”