G.R. No. 148030 - EXECUTIVE LABOR ARBITER RICARDO N. OLAIREZ, VS. SANDIGANBAYAN (SECOND DIVISION), THE OFFICE OF THE OMBUDSMAN AND ALICIA ABAD TENORIA.D E C I S I O N - Supreme Court E-Library

Ruling

WHEREFORE, premises considered, the appealed decision of August 10, 1994 is hereby VACATED and SET ASIDE and another judgment entered as follows: 1. Declaring the dismissal of the complainant to be illegal and consequently, the respondents are directed to reinstate the complainant to her former position without loss of seniority right and with full backwages; 2. The money claims of the complainant are remanded to Labor Arbiter of origin for further appropriate proceedings with the instruction that the same should be acted upon with dispatch; and 3. Dismissing the claims for moral and exemplary damages for lack of merit. [1] Tenoria moved for the execution of the judgment. At the pre-execution hearing, it was manifested that a motion for reconsideration had been filed and still then pending with the NLRC and that, likewise, Mercury Drug, et al., were elevating the case to the Supreme Court. Further proceedings on the motion for execution were thereupon suspended. In a resolution, dated 05 February 1996, the Supreme Court dismissed the petition, docketed G.R. No. 123326, of Mercury Drug, et al., for the failure of petitioners to submit a certified true copy of the NLRC decision and on the further ground that the NLRC was yet to resolve the then pending motion for reconsideration. After the NLRC ultimately denied the motion for reconsideration, another case, docketed G.R. No. 124967, was filed before the Supreme Court. The new petition was denied by the Court in its resolution of 03 July 1996. A motion for its reconsideration was denied with finality in another resolution of 30 September 1996. In due time, a pre-execution conference was conducted; in an order, dated 15 May 1997, Executive Labor Arbiter Olairez ruled: WHEREFORE, premises considered, respondents are ordered to reinstate complainant immediately upon presentation of a medical certificate that she is physically fit to assume her former position and as regards her backwages there is nothing to execute because her earnings elsewhere which should be deducted from her backwages are computed to be much more than her supposed full backwages. [2] Feeling aggrieved, Tenoria filed a petition for preliminary mandatory injunction before the NLRC assailing the order. In a decision, promulgated on 24 February 1999, the NLRC granted the petition; it said: There is no doubt, however, that in our 25 May 1995 decision, petitioners entitlement to backwages, as well as, reinstatement is conditioned upon no uncertain terms, other than the punitive sanction provided by law to redress the wrong done against her as a legal consequence of her unauthorized dismissal from employment. Indubitably, the imposition of conditions sine qua non in the execution of our 25 May 1995 decision, by all barometrical standards, is absolutely an amendment thereto plain and simple. x x x. WHEREFORE, the instant petition is hereby GRANTED. Let the Writ of Execution in NLRC CASE NO. RAB-II-11-00300-92 issue in accordance