By Benjamin Pulta | Philippine News Agency
MANILA — The Supreme Court (SC) upheld a Court of Appeals (CA) decision stopping the Air Materiel Wing Savings and Loan Association, Inc. (AMWSLAI) from amending its by-laws to expand its membership base to include 24 additional agencies of the executive department.
AMWSLAI members consist of personnel of military and police personnel and their dependents.
The SC’s Second Division said the appellate court did not commit any error in ruling that Regional Trial Court of Pasay City, Branch 119 (RTC) gravely abused its discretion when it granted AMWSLAI’s petition for certiorari on Sept. 11, 2015 and issued a writ of preliminary injunction, preventing the Monetary Board of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP-MB) from implementing its June 26, 2015 denying AMSWLAI appeal to allow its expansion.
“As correctly ruled by the CA, AMWSLAI should have filed an appeal before it under Rule 43 of the Rules of Court (Rules) – and not a petition for certiorari before the RTC under Rule 65 of the same Rules – considering that the CA has appellate jurisdiction over resolutions of public respondent which are issued in the exercise of its quasi-judicial functions,” the SC said.
“Accordingly, the RTC did not have jurisdiction to act on the above-mentioned certiorari petition, much more issue the ancillary writ of preliminary injunction against public respondent,” it added.
In its June 29, 2018 decision by Associate Justice Maria Filomena Singh, the CA’s Tenth Division granted the petition filed by the BSP-Monetary Board seeking the reversal of the Pasay RTC ruling in favor of AMWSLAI.
Under Republic Act No. 8367, otherwise known as the “Revised Non- Stock Savings and Loan Association Act of 1997,” membership in Savings and Loan Associations (SLA), such as AMWSLAI must be limited to a “well-defined group.”
The Monetary Board is vested with the authority to ensure that SLAs comply with this requirement.
However, in May 2014, AMWSLAI sent a letter-application to the Intergrated Supervision Department I (ISD) of the BSP for the approval of its proposed amendment to its by-laws to give way for the expansion of its membership to cover employees of 24 other agencies of the Executive Department, as well as their relatives by consanguinity and affinity.
