The Executive Branch

1. Prepared by: Allan W. Luartes &
Ma. Verde Sison

2.  It is a political organ of government charged
with carrying out the laws enacted by the
legislature. (in the Philippines, as the
repository of executive power, is the chief
executive officer of government & the
highest officer of the land). The President of
the Philippines is the Executive Branch of
Government and no other and that all
executive authority is thus vested in him.
“article VII section 1 of the constitution
provides that “The executive power shall be
vested in the President of the Philippines”

3.  Natural-born citizen.
 Registered voters.
 Able to read and write.
 40 years of age.
 10 years residency.

4.  The President cannot reappoint members of
the Constitutional Commissions. Appointment
to any vacancy shall only be for the
unexpired term of the Predecessor. In no
case shall any member be appointed or
designated in a temporary or acting capacity.
However, of those who were first appointed
by the President under the 1987
Constitution, the Chairman shall hold office
for seven years, a Commissioner for five
years, and another Commissioner for three
years, without reappointment.

5.  The President shall not be eligible for any
reelection. However, a person who has
succeeded as President and has served as such
for not more than four (4) years shall be
qualified for election to the same office at any
time.
 Query: Can Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo run at
the 2004 Presidential Election?
 Answer: Yes. Since Madam Gloria Macapagal
Arroyo, who succeeded former President Joseph
Estrada for more than (4) years, she is qualified
to run for President at the 2004 Election.

6.  Vice-President and Senators shall not serve for
more than two (2) succesive terms, and Members
of the House of Representatives for more than
three (3) succesive terms. Voluntary
renunciation of office for any length of time
shall not be considered as an interruption in the
continuity of his/her service for the full term for
which he/she was elected.
 Query: Raul S. Roco was elected senator in 1992
and re-elected in 1995. Prior to the end of his
term on June 30, 2001, he resigned as senator
and accepted his appointment by President
Arroyo as Education Secretary. Was he qualified
to run for senator at the 2001 election?

7.  Query: Raul S. Roco was elected senator in
1992 and re-elected in 1995. His second
consecutive term ended in 2001. Can he
again run in 2004 elections?
 Query: Yes. The Constitution prohibits a
senator from serving as such for more than
two succesive terms. Thus, a senator may
serve for more than two terms as long as it is
not succesive.

8.  The rules on presidential succession occurring before
or the beginning of the President’s term are as
follows:
 1. If the President-elect fails to qualify, the Vice-
President-elect shall act as President until the
President-elect shall have qualified.
 Congress sitting as board of canvassers proclaims a
candidate as elected President for having received
the highest number of votes, he will not
automatically become President. As President-elect
he must first assume his office by taking the oath of
office and entering into the discharge of his duties.
The term of the President shall begin at noon on the
thirtieth day of june next following day of the
election. If he fails to assume his office after that
date, the Vice-President shall temporarily act as
President

9. o 2. If a President shall not have been chosen, the
Vice-President-elect shall act as President until a
President shall have been chosen and qualified.
o If the congress sitting as a board of canvassers
fails to proclaim an elected President after
aforesaid date, the Vice-President-elect shall
temporarily act as President.
o 3. If at the beginning of the term of President,
the President-elect shall have died or shall have
become permanently disabled, the Vice-
President-elect shall become President.
o The Vice-President-elect under any of this
situation will not merely act as President in a
temporary capacity. He shall become a President

10.  4. Where no President and Vice-President
shall have been chosen or shall have
qualified, or where both shall have died or
become permanently disabled, the president
of the Senate or, in case of his inability, the
Speaker of the House of Representatives shall
act as President or a Vice-President shall
have been chosen and qualified.
 The Senate President or Speaker of the
House under any of the situation will not
become a President. He will merely act as
President in a temporary capacity.

11.  5. The Congress shall, by law, provide for the
manner in which one who is to act as
President shall be selected until a President
or a Vic-President shall have qualified, in
case of death, permanent disability, or
inability of the officials mention in the next
preceding paragraph.

12.  Vacancy in the office of the President- in the
case of death, permanent disablity, removal
from office, or resignation of the President, the
Vice-president shall become the President to
serve the unexpired term.
 Vacancy in the office of the Vice-President –
Whenever there is vacancy in the Office of the
Vice-President during the term for which he/she
was elected, the President shall nominate a
Vice-President from among the members of the
senate and the House of Representative who will
assume office upon confirmation by a majority
vote of all the members of both houses of
congress, voting separately.

13.  Vacancy in the Office of the President and the Vice-
President – In case of death, permanent disability,
removal from office, or resignation of both the
President and Vice-President, Congress shall
immediately enact a law calling for a special election
to elect a President and a Vice-President. However,
no special election shall be called if the vacancy
occurs within eighteen (18) months before the date
of the next presidential election.
 Until the President or Vice-President shall have been
elected in a special or regular election and qualified,
the Senate President or, in case of his inability, the
Speaker of the House of Representatives, shall then
act as President. Congress shall, by law, provide who
shall srve as President in case of death, permanent
disability, or resignation of the acting President.

14.  Executive Power- is vested in the President of
the Philippines. In addition to the power of the
President to execute laws, the Constitution vests
in him/her specific and express powers. He/She
may also exercise those necessarily implied and
included in these express powers. The president,
upon whom executive power is vested, has
unstated residual powers which are implied from
the grant of executive power and which are
necessary for him/her to comply with his/her
duties under the Constitution. The powers of the
President are not limited to what are expressly
enumerated in the article on the Executive
Department and in scattered provisions of the
Constitution.

15. Section 16, Article VII provides: “The
President shall nominate and, with the consent
of the Commission on Appointments, appoint
the heads of the executive departments,
ambassadors, other public ministers and
consuls, or officers of the armed forces from
the rank of colonel or naval captain, and other
officers whose appointments are vested in him
in this Constitutions. He shall also appoint all
other officers of the Government whose
appointed are not otherwise provided by law
to appoint.

16.  The Congress may, by law, vest the
appointment of other officers lower in rank
in the President alone, in the courts, or in
the heads of the departments, agencies,
commissions, or boards. The President shall
have the power to make appointments during
the recess of the Congress, whether
voluntary or compulsory, but such
appointments shall be effective only until
disapproval by the Commission on
Appointments or until the next adjournment
of the Congress.”

17. power of removal is implied from the express
power of appointment conferred to the
President. The President is accountable to the
people with regard to irregularities and abuses
of his/her appointees in the discharge of their
executive duties. On the other hand,
presidential appointees are accountable
directly to the President. Because of the
responsibility of the President for acts not
done by him/her personally, it is only
appropriate for him/her men. Executive
appointees serve at the pleasure of the
President.

18.  Their term is co-terminus with the President.
With or without cause, the President may
remove them. The President fixes the term
of his/her appointees as he/she may see fit.
Technically speaking, if the President sacks
an appointee the latter will cease to hold
office not due to removal but by reason of
expiration of term. The President, in axing
an appointee simply decides to fix the end of
his/her term on the day of the termination
of his/her service.

19.  Section 17, Article VII provides: “The
President shall have control of all executive
departments, bureaus, and offices,” Due to
the President’s multifarious administrative
and executive functions, executive officials
discharge executive duty in behalf of the
President. Since the President is accountable
to the people with respect to the
performance of executive and other powers,
it is only proper for the President to have the
power to control over acts of his/her men.

20.  The power of control is the power of an
officer to alter, modify, nullify or set aside
what a subordinate officer had done in the
performance of his duties and to substitute
the judgement of the former for that of the
latter. In one case, the Supreme Court held
that a statue making decisions of the
department secretaries final and
unappealable would nevertheless not prevent
the President from reviewing and if
necessary reversing such decisions by virtue
of his/her constitutional power of control
over the members of his Cabinet.

21.  Section 4, Article X provides: “The President
shall exercise general supervision over local
governments.” The control power of the
President is limited to executive
departments, bureaus and offices, and does
not extend to local governments. In sum, the
Presidents cannot alter or modify or set aside
what a local officer had done in the
performance of his/her duties and to
substitute the judgement of the former for
the latter.

22.  As an implement of the doctrine of civilian
supremacy over the military, the Constitution
grants military power to the President. Section
18, Article VII provides: “The President shall be
the Commander in Chief of all armed forces of
the Philippines.” As Commander in Chief, the
President has power to regulate the movements
of the army and their stationing at various posts.
He may direct the movements of the navy,
sending them whenever in his judgement it is
expedient. In theory, he plans all campaigns,
establishes all blockades and sieges, directs all
marches, and fights all battles. The President
usually exercises military power through the
Department of National Defense.

23.  Section 19, Article VII provides: “Except in cases of
impeachment, or as otherwise provided in this
Constitution, the President may grant reprieves,
commutations, and pardons, and remit fines and
forfeitures, after conviction by final judgement. He
shall also have the power to grant amnesty with the
concurrence of a majority of all the Members of the
Congress. Every civilized country recognizes, and has
therefore provided for, the pardoning power to be
exercised as an act of grace and humanity in proper
cases. Without such power of clemency to be
exercised by some department or functionary of a
government, a country would be most imperfect and
deficient in its political morality and in that attribute
of Deity whose judgements are always tempered with
mercy.

24.  The President as head of state is the
representative of the Philippines in dealing
with other states. In sum, the Philippines
maintains foreign relations with other states
through the President.
 Power of Recognition.
 Power to Send and Receive Diplomatic
Missions.
 Power to Deport Aliens.
 Power to Enter Treaty or International
Agreement.

25.  Section 22, Article VII provides: “The
President shall submit to the Congress within
thirty days from the opening of every regular
sessions, as the basis of the general
appropriations bill, a budget of expenditures
and sources of financing including receipts
from existing and proposed revenue
measures.” Congress, in passing an
appropriation law, cannot increase the
budget submitted by the President to it.

26.  Is the collective organizational structure,
procedures, protocols, and set of regulations
in place to manage activity, usually in large
organizations and government. It is
represented by standardized procedure (rule-
following) that guides the execution of most
or all processes within the body; formal
division of powers; hierarchy; and
relationships, intended to anticipate needs
and improve efficiency.

27.  A bureaucracy traditionally does not create
policy but, rather, enacts it. Law, policy and
regulation normally originates from a
leadership, which creates the bureaucracy to
put them into practice. In reality, the
interpretation and execution of policy, etc.
can lead to informal influence.

28.  1. a well-defined division of administrative
labor among persons and offices.
 A personnel system with consistent patterns
of recruitment and stable linear careers.
 A hierarchy among offices, such that the
authority and status are differentially
distributed among actors, and
 Formal and informal networks that connect
organizational actors to one another through
flows of information and patterns of
cooperation.

29.  1. A formal hierarchical structure
 2. Management by rules
 3. Organization by functional specialty
 4. An “up-focused” or “in-focused” mission
 5. Purposely impersonal
 6. Employment based on technical
qualifications

30.  Governments
 Armed forces
 Corporations
 Non-government organizations (NGOs)
 Hospitals
 Courts
 Ministries
 Social clubs
 Sports leagues
 Professional associations
 Academic institutions

31.  Bureaucracy refers to administrative
instrument or organization which exists in
each modern political community for the
attainment of the community’s social
objective (public policies). Broadly viewed,
the bureaucracy is equivalent to the entire
governmental institution. More restrictively
interpreted, the following current usage, it
refers to the civil service.

32.  A.The Pre-Spanish period- a period of cultural
inadequacy, during which the social and economic
foundations for bureaucratic organization and
bureaucratic action had not been developed.
 B.The Spanish Regime- centralized the political life
of the numerous native communities in the
archipelago.
 C.The Philippine Revolution of 1896- an attempt by
the leaders of the Filipinos to practice the principles
of government which the Spanish regime consistently
professed but could not execute.
 D.The American Regime- continued what the
Philippine Revolution started. Thorough
reorganization of the bureaucracy was in fact easily
accomplished.

33.  E. Japanese Wartime Occupation- conditions during
this time disrupted and corrupted the bureaucracy.
 F. The Philippine Republic 1946-1972
 A strong president, a bicameral legislature and an
independent judiciary comprised the tripartite
democratic structure ordained by the Philippine
Constitution of 1935, and carried over into the new
Philippine Republic of 1946.
 The US continued to intervene in Philippine affairs.
The bureaucracy assumed the major responsibility for
these programs; the civil service continued to regard
itself as an arsenal of means and not the articulator
of values.
 The Philippine civil service could be characterized as
highly trained and professionalized even though it
continued to be inefficient and ineffective.

34.  Vulnerability to Nepotism
 Perpetuation of the Spoils System
 Apathetic Public Reaction to Bureaucratic
Misconduct
 Availability of External Peaceful Means of
Correcting Bureaucratic Weaknesses
 Survival of Historical Experience
 Non-special Typing of Bureaucracies
 Lack of Independence from Politics
 An Instrument of Social Change and
Innovation