Aquino-Sarmiento v. Morato

Aquino-Sarmiento v. Morato

G.R. No. 92541 November 13, 1991

Bidin, J.

Facts:

                In February 1989, petitioner, herself a member of respondent Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB), wrote its records officer requesting that she be allowed to examine the board’s records pertaining to the voting slips accomplished by the individual board members after a review of the movies and television productions. It is on the basis of said slips that films are either banned, cut or classified accordingly.

Acting on the said request, the records officer informed petitioner that she has to secure prior clearance from respondent Manuel Morato, as chairman of MTRCB, to gain access to the records sought to be examined.

Petitioner’s request was eventually denied by respondent Morato on the ground that whenever the members of the board sit in judgment over a film, their decisions as reflected in the individual voting slips partake the nature of conscience votes and as such, are purely and completely private and personal. It is the submission of respondents that the individual voting slips is the exclusive property of the member concerned and anybody who wants access thereto must first secure his (the member’s) consent, otherwise, a request therefor may be legally denied.

Petitioner argues, on the other hand, that the records she wishes to examine are public in character and other than providing for reasonable conditions regulating the manner and hours of examination, respondents Morato and the classification board have no authority to deny any citizen seeking examination of the board’s records.

On February 27, 1989, respondent Morato called an executive meeting of the MTRCB to discuss, among others, the issue raised by petitioner. In said meeting, seventeen (17) members of the board voted to declare their individual voting records as classified documents which rendered the same inaccessible to the public without clearance from the chairman. Thereafter, respondent Morato denied petitioner’s request to examine the voting slips. However, it was only much later, i.e., on July 27, 1989, that respondent Board issued Resolution No. 10-89 which declared as confidential, private and personal, the decision of the reviewing committee and the voting slips of the members.

Petitioner therefore seeks the nullification of 1) MTRCB Resolution No. 88-1-25 which allows the Chairman of the Board to unilaterally downgrade a film (already) reviewed especially those which are controversial and 2) MTRCB RESOLUTION No. 10-89 (dated July 27, 1989) declaring as strictly confidential, private and personal a) the decision of a reviewing committee which previously reviewed a certain film and b) the individual voting slips of the members of the committee that reviewed the film.

Issue:

                whether or not the assailed MTRCB Resolutions contravenes petitioner’s right of access to official records as guaranteed by the constitution

Held:

                Yes.  The term private has been defined as “belonging to or concerning, an individual person, company, or interest”; whereas, public means “pertaining to, or belonging to, or affecting a nation, state, or community at large”. May the decisions of respondent Board and the individual members concerned, arrived at in an official capacity, be considered private? Certainly not. As may be gleaned from the decree (PD 1986) creating the respondent classification board, there is no doubt that its very existence is public is character; it is an office created to serve public interest. It being the case, respondents can lay no valid claim to privacy. The right to privacy belongs to the individual acting in his private capacity and not to a governmental agency or officers tasked with, and acting in, the discharge of public duties. There can be no invasion of privacy in the case at bar since what is sought to be divulged is a product of action undertaken in the course of performing official functions. To declare otherwise would be to clothe every public official with an impregnable mantle of protection against public scrutiny for their official acts.

Further, the decisions of the Board and the individual voting slips accomplished by the members concerned are acts made pursuant to their official functions, and as such, are neither personal nor private in nature but rather public in character. They are, therefore, public records access to which is guaranteed to the citizenry by no less than the fundamental law of the land. Being a public right, the exercise thereof cannot be made contingent on the discretion, nay, whim and caprice, of the agency charged with the custody of the official records sought to be examined. The constitutional recognition of the citizen’s right of access to official records cannot be made dependent upon the consent of the members of the board concerned, otherwise, the said right would be rendered nugatory.