110.

Valladolid v Inciong
121 SCRA 205
GR Nos. L-52364&L-53349. March 25, 1983

Nature of Action:
Petitions for Certiorari to review the order of the Deputy Minister of Labor.

Related Facts:
Ricardo Valladolid was employed by JRM in 1977 as a telephone switchboard operator. He was
subsequently transferred to the position of clerk-collector by the President of JRM. The transfer was
motivated by the interception of business and confidential matters to a competitor hotel by allegedly,
Valladolid who was then working as a switchboard operator and while serving in his capacity as a clerk-
collector, copies of accounts receivables reached the competitor hotel (Tropicana Apartment Hotel)
although said copies were not referred to them. That to finally and fully confirmed suspicions that
Valladolid was the person responsible for the aforementioned disclosures, a plan for the entrapment was
conceived by the Copacabana Apartment Hotel. After the entrapment scheme, Valladolid filed a written
request for a 5 day vacation leave which was extended to 30 days. When he went back to work, JRM
refused to admit him and instead asked him to resign. JRM maintains that Valladolid left the office that
same day and never returned because he was reprimanded for his unauthorized absences. Valladolid later
on filed a complaint for Illegal dismissal with vacation and sick pay leave.

The Ministry ruled that the application for clearance with preventive suspension is denied and
respondent JRM is hereby ordered to reinstate complainant Valladolid to his former position without
backwages and without loss of seniority rights. Valladolid appealed the foregoing order to the Minister of
Labor seeking modification of the same, praying for the award of backwages from the time he was illegally
dismissed but the Deputy Minister of Labor (Inciong) dismissed both appeals after finding “no sufficient
justification or valid reason to alter, modify, much less reverse the Order appealed from.”

Issues:
1. Whether the non-award of backwages raised by Valladolid claiming that the Orders of Deputy
Minister of Labor are contrary to law and evidence.

2. Whether JRM was denied due process when the DPM sustained the finding the respondent
Regional Director that there is no evidence to support the dismissal of the private respondent.

Ruling:
Wherefore, both petitions for certiorari are hereby denied. No costs. So ordered.

Ratio Decidendi:
1. JRM admits that Valladolid requested for leaver for 5 days and thereafter for 15 days., but
denies that he notified the company of his absences subsequent to this. The Regional Dir. ruled that the
absences of Valladolid were unauthorized but did not amount to gross neglect of duty or abandonment of
work. But as the latter had been AWOL, no error was committed by the respondent RD in ordering his
reinstatement without backwages.

2. JRM cannot claim that it was deprived of due process considering that applications for
clearance have to be summarily investigated and a decision required to be rendered within ten (10) days
from the filing of the opposition. As this Court had occasion to hold there is no violation of due process
where the RD merely required the submission of position papers and resolved the case summarily
thereafter.