GANZON VS CA

FACTS:
Ganzon, after having been issued three successive 60-day of suspension order by Secretary of
Local Government, filed a petition for prohibition with the CA to bar Secretary Santos from
implementing the said orders. Ganzon was faced with 10 administrative complaints on various
charges on abuse of authority and grave misconduct.

ISSUE:
Whether or not the Secretary of Local Government (as the alter ego of the President) has the
authority to suspend and remove local officials.

RULING:
The Constitution did nothing more, and insofar as existing legislation authorizes the President
(through the Secretary of Local Government) to proceed against local officials administratively,
the Constitution contains no prohibition. The Chief Executive is not banned from exercising acts
of disciplinary authority because she did not exercise control powers, but because no law
allowed her to exercise disciplinary authority.

In those case that this Court denied the President the power (to suspend/remove) it was not
because that the President cannot exercise it on account of his limited power, but because the law
lodged the power elsewhere. But in those cases in which the law gave him the power, the Court,
as in Ganzon v. Kayanan, found little difficulty in sustaining him.

We reiterate that we are not precluding the President, through the Secretary of Interior from
exercising a legal power, yet we are of the opinion that the Secretary of interior is exercising that
power oppressively, and needless to say, with a grave abuse of discretion.
As we observed earlier, imposing 600 days of suspension which is not a remote possibility
Mayor Ganzon is to all intents and purposes, to make him spend the rest of his term in inactivity.
It is also to make, to all intents and purposes, his suspension permanent.