The term of Nixon T. Kua as General Manager of the Philippine Tourism Authority has expired as of October 2, 2002.

This was the assertion of the Office of the Presidential Legal Counsel today as it justified the appointment of Kua’s replacement.

Presidential Decree 564, as amended by Presidential Decree 1400, which created the Philippine Tourism Authority, provided:

Section 23-A. General Manager – Appointment and Tenure – The General Manager shall be appointed by the President of the Philippines and shall serve for a term of six (6) years unless sooner removed for cause; Provided, That upon the expiration of his term, he shall serve as such until his successor shall have been appointed and qualified.

The Presidential Legal Counsel opined that the reckoning date for the commencement of the term of office of the first PTA General Manager after the issuance of Presidential Decree 1400 shall be the date of effectivity of PD 1400 and not on the date of the first appointment.

In view thereof, the Presidential Legal Counsel explained that the appropriate starting point of the term of office for the PTA General Manager is October 3, 1978 and the terms of the person subsequently appointed to the said position shall be reckoned from said date, as follows:

First Term October 3, 1978 to October 2, 1984

Second Term October 3, 1984 to October 2, 1990

Third Term October 3, 1990 to October 2, 1996

Fourth Term October 3, 1996 to October 2, 2002

Fifth Term October 3, 2002 to October 2, 2008

The Presidential Legal Counsel explained that there is a difference between term and tenure. In a Supreme Court case, Republic vs. Imperial, the term of office was distinguished from the tenure of the incumbent.

The term means the time during which the officer may claim to hold office as of right and fixes the interval after which several incumbents shall succeed one another.

The tenure, on the other hand, represents the period during which the incumbent actually holds the office.

The tenure may be shorter than the term for reasons within or beyond the power of the incumbent.

The same ruling said that the tenure of the appointee may be shortened but not his term.

Since Kua was appointed on November 7, 2000, his term of office shall be for the fourth term in the table above or from October 3, 1996 to October 2, 2002.

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo today honored four wounded Army soldiers with medals, spot promotion and cash rewards for their bravery and courage in responding to a distress call from their comrades who were ambushed by New People’s Army rebels in the vicinity of Barangay Villaflor in Puerto Galera, Oriental Mindoro last Sunday.

The President visited the wounded soldiers – Staff Sgt. Elmer Arimando, Sgts. Romeo Bustarde and John Delizo, and Cpl. Anrico Almoguera – at the Fort Bonifacio Hospital in Taguig where they are recuperating from wounds they sustained in fighting the NPA ambush.

She pinned on each soldier the Wounded Personnel Medal, gave cash assistance of P50,000 to Sergeant Bustarde who sustained a major injury and P20,000 each to the three other troops who sustained minor injuries, and then promoted all four to the next higher rank.

The soldiers, from the 16^th Infantry Battalion, Second Division of the Philippine Army, were part of the reinforcement responding to a call for assistance from a group of about 30 soldiers on board two vehicles who were ambushed last Sunday by about 50 NPA rebels in the mountainous area of Puerto Galera.

The distressed soldiers were led by Col. Jovito Palaparan of the 204^th Infantry Brigade, who was also himself wounded in the encounter with the rebels.

Sergeant Arimando, the leader of the responding troops, said they were also met with a hail of bullets and explosions when they arrived at the ambush scene.