Dapat si-ak! Bar Exam Answer must be brief, logical and complete: An advice by Judge Doctor, and Atty. Amora which I can share to the aspiring lawyers

In case you did not know, the bar exams will be taken by thousands of examinees. More or less, 6800 aspiring lawyers take the bar examinations every year. This number is very big when you are talking about the Bar. Why? The examination is written essay and only one examiner for each subject checks the examination notebooks of examinees. Hence, there is a necessity to write a brief, logical and complete bar exam answers.

What does “brief” answer mean?

It does not mean one sentence, nor three sentences only.

“Brief” answers in the bar does not mean that you need to write only a one-sentence answer. According to Judge Doctor, our Professor in the College of Law for Political Law Review class:

“Brief” answer does not mean that your answer must be so short that in doing so, it is as though you have no answers at all. “Brief” answer means that you write direct to the point answers. Whenever you are confronted with a question, the answer must be responsive in order to be direct to the point. Hence, any answer which is not direct to the point can never be brief because it will always go around the bush.”

According to Atty. Amora, our Professor also in the College of Law for Civil Law Review class, exam answer must not be too long. Answers must always be kept short. “Dapat si-ak”, said by Atty. Amora. In my own understanding of his statement,  “dapat si-ak” – referring to the Boholano context of chopping wood using an axe where every blow must cause the firewood to break - which if connected to the study in law means that every time you throw[write] a statement in the examination notebook, ALL MUST BE SIGNIFICANT AND MUST REVOLVE ON THE APPLICABLE LAWS in relation to the issues of the case. Therefore, every statement must not be useless. Any statement which solicits doctrines and laws or solicits ideas which are not applicable to the case are therefore garbage.

For example:

==========================================================================

Question: Is there rape committed by a man having sexual intercourse through force with a gay who underwent sexual reassignment?

Answer:

None. Under the law,  rape, in first form, is committed by a man who shall have carnal knowledge of a WOMAN either by force, threat, or intimidation as among others.

It is crystal clear that a gay (man) cannot be a victim  under the first form of rape which requires sexual commerce with a WOMAN even if attended by force, threat, or intimidation.

 Even assuming that a person had sexual transplant to have that genital of a woman, the law cannot admit of extended application for those persons.  Penal laws are ought to be interpreted strictly against the state and liberally in favor of the accused.  Thus, a person's act should not be brought into the hands of the law when it is not clearly within them. Where the law requires gender as an element of the crime, it must be so established for the crime to be committed.

However, the person who had sexual intercourse with a gay(man) can be held liable for rape thru sexual assault, the second form of rape. Under the law, sexual assault is committed by any person inserting his penis into another person's mouth or anal orifice or any instrument into the genital or anal orifice of another person attended by force, threat, or intimidation as among others.

In here, the man who inserted his penis into the genital of the gay can be said to have inserted an instrument or object which is his very organ. In one case, SC ruled that finger is an object. There is no cogent reason to rule that penis is not an object when the SC has held that object does not necessarily purport to be an inanimate object but can also be part of the body of a person.

Moreover, whenever a person is charged of rape thru sexual intercourse, he cannot be convicted of rape in the second form if the same is established instead of the crime charged.

Rape thru sexual assault is not inherent in the first form. At most, the accused can only be convicted of acts of lasciviousness, a crime inherent in both cases.

=========================================================================

Notice that the above suggested answer is quite long. The question calls only for the discussion of the first form of rape, yet the answer discusses further about the rape in the second form. This in a way solicits further a law or idea which is no longer required by the examiner.

Solicitation of doctrines, laws, or ideas which are not part of the questions nor the issues of the case violate the basic instructions in the Bar Examination. It is not allowed in the actual bar exam.

How to write logical answer?

Follow simple rules in logic –

Position

Major premise

Minor premise

Conclusion

 Responsive Answer

 Legal Basis

 Analysis to the facts

 Conclusion

Answers which follows the above logic are usually the ones which are complete.

Should answers be written in paragraphs or can it be written in a single paragraph?

There are those who passed the bar using the three-paragraph rule and there are those who used single paragraph in writing their examination answers.

The beauty, may be, in using paragraphs in writing answers is that it becomes easy for the examiners to read the exam notebooks and easy for him to identify your responsive answer, discussion of the law, analysis to the facts, and conclusion.

Above anything else, you must understand that the Supreme Court does not require nor provide for the exact form as to how bar exam answers should be written. Hence, it is all up to the examinees how to approach the Bar Examinations.

RevGov to pave way to federal state?

“Will this shift to a Federal state be nothing more than a mere change of skin which will not have any substantial effect  in the distribution of economic resources and in the basis of state power and will only limelight the strengths of the few clans pestering each provinces?”

If federal system will come, will the politicians change?  Will they stay the same? If federal system will come, will people ever change during elections or will they stay the same?

Recently, election for ABC President has been done. The vote-buying has reached its top. Change?

Not so much will change by changing from unitary form to federal form of government. Only the concentration of power will be different. Feudalism will come back in the end making the strongest clans rise up in every district.

Let us be humble and honest enough, there is no magic which will cure all the myriad ills of our nation. There is no medicine which is a "cure-all".

If there is cure,  then that is when we truly realize that the corruption is within each one of us.

See for yourself during elections. We have become hungry ghost waiting for "uwan-uwan".

 If we demand for change, then let us start not by pointing finger towards public officials or other people.

Let us wake up. That is the cure.

Quick guide on how to make a bar exam answer that is direct to the point, brief, logical and complete

There are really a lot of ways on how to answer bar examinations. But exploring these different versions in the actual bar exams may not be so good given the short period of time. Given only a short period of four hours in the actual bar exams for each subject, there is no time for you to think on how to formulate your answers that is direct to the point, brief, logical and complete.

What we usually suggest is to follow a system and practice this as much as possible to frame up the mind to think the way it should be for the actual bar exams.
We follow a very simple system in the exam answers:

Responsive Answer, + a very short recall of material fact (Yes/no, ____________);
Legal basis (Under the law, _________);
Application (In this case, ___________);
Conclusion (Therefore, ____________);

For example, you are confronted with a possible question in the Bar Exams for criminal law like:

B is an aspiring Lawyer taking now his formal bar review class in ABC Law Review Center. B, having a problem catching up with the review lectures, recorded the discussion of A, a bar reviewer for Criminal Law, without the latter’s consent. Can B be held liable for violating the Anti-wire Tapping Law?

Responsive answer

The question is a simple Yes/No Question. In order to give a responsive answer, you must give a yes/no response, with an additional recall of material fact in the given problem which leads you to your position. So why bother giving a short recall of some material facts? The reason is simple. This gives the examiner the hint as to which problem you are and to which he is checking. In checking the exam notebooks, the examiner will have no time in reading again the problem for each number the fact that he will be checking 6000+ notebooks. Be sure to give the shortest statement in recall of your material fact. We always want to keep our answers brief and concise.

Next is legal basis. In giving the legal basis, we usually start with a phrase like:

Under the law;
The law substantially provides that;
The law in substance provides that;
The law states to the effect that;

(Note: The first four must be used in recalling a provision of law. We used “under the law” if we have memorized the law. If we have not memorized the provisions of law, we used the other opening phrases. In giving legal basis, we usually do not provide for the Article number. Why? Giving the article number can be a two-bladed weapon. It can either impress your examiner if you can perfectly recall the article number or either it can cause your flunking in the bar because unfortunately you have cited the wrong article number. Citing article number especially in Labor Law is very dangerous considering that the Labor Code has undergone so much amendments.
In addition, why bother giving the article number when it is not even the law itself?
However, there are some cases where it becomes inevitable to cite Article or Rule number like in 2017 Bar Examination for Remedial Law where the question calls for different modes of appeal.

In the case of;
In our jurisprudence;
In one case, the Supreme Court ruled that;

(Note: You do not have to cite GR nor SCRA numbers. It is very dangerous and would only waste your time in the actual bar examinations. Citing cases is also not advisable. When you cite like People vs. Santos, the examiner will think that you are only bluffing. Actually, there are hundreds of cases titled People vs. Santos. You can cite however celebrated cases.)

Under the doctrine of;
It is well-settled rule in our jurisdiction that;
It is well-settled rule;
It is well-entrenched rule;
Elementary is the rule which states that;
It is well-entrenched in the legal maxim which states that;

(Note: Above are heroes. If you cannot remember the law nor the jurisprudence, resort with a doctrine, or a legal  maxim in law.)

In our jurisdiction;
(Use it if you cannot remember anything at all.)

Application and analysis to the facts

Examiners are not only interested in your knowledge of the laws but also in your ability to use such knowledge to the applicable issues of the problem. Bar examination is composed of 60% to 70% of analytical problems. Mere knowledge of law is not sufficient.

To give hint to your examiners of your analysis to the issues of the case, you may use:

In the case at hand;
In the case at bar;
In this case;
The facts showed that;
It the case, it can be gleaned that;

Conclusion.

Concluding statements become important to show your examiners that your logic is well-crafted. Concluding statements must always conform to your responsive answer.

Concluding words:
Hence,
Therefore;
Thus;
So.

We hope that this system will guide you and would be able to help you in your journey to the bar. God bless you.

Note however, that we do not guarantee any correctness of this method. But this is how we made it in the bar and several others.

Common carriers?

#Uber
#Grab

Why grow interest upon the issues below?  Well,  this will help us enlighten our minds on how the modern world has grown so much that our own laws have been left behind - sleeping cold in the memories of our congressmen. This will help urge each one of us to study the vanishing gap of the cyber and physical life and some of its effects in our existing laws so that we can be prepared for all possible modernization measures to cope up with the changing times.

To start:

LTFRB faces  true difficulties with how to regulate the Grab and Uber Companies. Surely, there is no question that LTFRB is clothed with the power to regulate common carriers in our country. However, there is this cloud of doubt on how to classify the earlier mentioned companies -whether they are embraced in our ancient definition of common carriers or not.
 So we have now the following questions:
Can we classify Uber and Grab as common carriers?
 Does LTFRB have jurisdiction to regulate these companies in the first place?
If these companies cannot be regulated by LTFRB,  is there any way to regulate these comapnies.

I guess most of you have already answered the question. And I bet you have classified the comapnies as common carriers just as how the LTFRB contended.

I humbly submit that such contention is unfounded and without legal leg with which to stand on.

Who are common carriers? Art. 1732 of the New Civil Code which took effect on August 30, 1950 or roughly 67 years from now provides: Common carriers are persons,  corporations, firms, or associations engaged in the business of carrying or transporting passengers or goods or both,  by land, water,  or air,  for compensation,  offering their services to the public.

Our early definition of common carriers way back in early 50's has been confined to carriage of passengers or goods or both thru trains,  jeepnies, buses, boats and planes. That is the prevailing condition during those times. Come the case of Industrial Corp. Vs. Court of Appeals, we have accepted a way higher meaning of common carriers such it includes now those pipeline operators who are transporting oil and other petroleum products through its pipes. We have also considered the Electricity distributors as common carriers. The electricity has been considered as goods.  True enough, the law does not make any distinction whether the transportation of passengers or goods be by motor vehicle.

Having said that,  does the definition include now the services provided for by Grab and Uber companies to qualify them as common carriers?

Uber was launched in 2010 as an aggregator of “black car” services in San Francisco. It has quickly become one of the world’s most influential companies.  Startups pitch venture capitalists on “the Uber for x,” as they once talked of imitating Amazon.com or Google. Worth over $50 billion as of mid-2015, Uber is the world’s most highly-valued, venture-backed private company. It now operates in over 300 cities worldwide and has over one million drivers in its network. Uber’s revenues are already in the billions of dollars.(KEVIN WERBACH,  Associate Professor of Legal Studies and Business Ethics, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania., werbach@wharton.upenn.edu.)

Uber is the most prominent example of a deeply important trend. However, it is widely misunderstood. Descriptions of Uber and its competitors usually lump them as examples of “the Sharing Economy” or “Collaborative Consumption” because they encourage private drivers to share their cars with paying passengers on an on-demand basis, or the descriptions focus on the functionality of its smartphone-based, ride-hailing app. However,  at its core, Uber is an Internet-enabled network or simply a software.
There is a misconception.  The public actually believe that the Grab and Uber and the private-vehicle owners offering transport services are the same and one entity. They are not.

Hiding behind the "cloud" or "internet" as layman understood it, Uber operates as a software business allowing exchange of information of its users - the private car owners who utilizes the app and the riding public.

The service provided by Grab and Uber can hardly be considered, as yet, as public utility under our existing laws because it supplies merely a venue in the cyber-world of exchange of information. It does not transport itself passengers or goods. Being a software company,  it merely offers no more less than data which people can use.  Nothing in our jurisprudence has yet defined "data" as a form of goods.  To hold "data" as a form of goods would surely hold out many other companies such as Facebook, Google, Wordpress, OLX, Twitter, and Youtube, as common carriers, because they also carry data, which is totally absurd.

However, LTFRB has all the powers to regulate the private-car owners who are in the actual engagement of transporting the passengers.  One that holds itself out as ready to engage in the transportation of goods for hire as public employment and not a casual occupation has been used as among the determinative elements of common carrier. Art. 1732 avoids any distinction between person or enterprise offering transportation service on occassional,  episodic,  and unscheduled basis.  Neither does the law distinguish between a carrier offering its services for the general public, that is the community or population and one who offers business only from narrow segment of the general population.

Now to say that private car owners who uses the Grab and Uber app as not common carriers because they only offer in private contract to those who uses the app and not to the general public is clearly not tenable. The fact that it holds out to the segment of population who are app-user public for transportation means they are cyrstal clear embraced in the definition of the law.

The power of the state,  exercised by the LTFRB, to regulate public utilties engaged in transport services hinges on tbe police power in order to promote common good. When private property is used for public purpose and is affected with public interest,  it ceases to be "juris privati" only and becomes subject to regulation.  The regulation is to promote the common good. For example,  with the regulation, state can make sure that these people engaged in transport services will comply with the prescribed requirements for the accomodation of PWD, the standard fares,  and privileges for students.

Submission to regulation maybe withdrawn by the owner by discontinuing use; but as long as use of the property is continued,  the same is subject to public regulation. (RP vs.  Manila Elec. Com. Nov. 15, 2002)

Now. LTFRB, in order to remove the gap as between Uber or Grab and the private car owners, opined that the companies are actually the operators of these transport services and so the employers of the drivers. That is the reason why we hear a lot of news compelling Uber and Grab to comply with labor laws like the prescribed working hours.

This leads us to a way far. The Labor laws  basically define the relation of the employers to their employees and not to the public as users of the services of the employers. To apply labor laws in the main issue is simply absurd. 

Granting arguendo that the comapnies and the drivers are one such that the former holds out as the operator of public convenience, this is where LTFRB is confronted of much larger problem of closing down the whole operation of the companies in our country for failure to comply with the Constitutional requirement for operators of public utility which requires full beneficial ownerahip of 60% of outstanding capital stock and 60% of the voting shares. (Gamboa vs. Teves,  June 28, 2011) Uber and Grab are 100% not owned by Filipinos. They are foreign companies.

The Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) is the agency created by virtue of Exec. Order No. 202, series of 1987, under the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC), which handles the issuance of authority to any entity (corporate or individual) wishing to engage in public land-based transportation service.SEC. 5. provides for the Powers and Functions of the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board.   Nowhere can we find any power which the agency over regulation of information-sharing.

The goals of LTFRB, which are really noble by themselves, are unimpeachable and certainly fall within the ambits of police powers of the state. Yet the desirability of these ends do not sanctify any and all means for their achievement. There is really a need to update our laws and cloth the right agencies with authority to the emerging needs of police regulations for activities which by far have rendered inutile our ancient and unupdated laws.

If at all,  the best solution to address the existing condition using the available laws and jurisprudence that we have is to directly regulate the private-car owners. To regulate the Grab and Uber company,  we can use the existing taxation laws in order to tax these foreign companies for income derived from sources within the country.

Let us know your own view. Comment down.

Auza Law Reviewers

We are ever greatful that we have made it in the Bar, thanks to the people who have shared their knowledge in the laws specially the faculty in the College of Law of BIT International College.

 As a form of gratitude, we are giving these reviewers for free to all the College of Law students, and anybody who is interested.

We hope that these materials will be helpful in your own journey to the Bar.

Click the link below to download.
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=1aMxISiLH5r1CNsBuVphIMHe-q3jyGJP5

CHR cannot be removed without amending the 1987 Constitution

In the recent attempt of our congress to cripple the Commission on Human Rights by giving it an alarming hand-to-mouth budget is a blatant evasion and disregard of the intendments of the Constitution which created the Commission. The same should be struck down for being constitutionally offensive as it is a clear insidious act of annilation of an organ created by the basic law which cannot be done without amending the law itslef.

HUMAN RIGHTS, I suppose we all know that. But for the purpose of reminding us, allow me to quote - Human Rights is the basic set of moral rights that all human beings are entitled to receive such as the right to life, liberty, freedoms of speech and religion, the right of due process and equal protection of the laws. 

Respect to Human Rigths is a peremptory norm of International Law from which no derogation  is allowed thru law,  treaty or any form of agreement.

This is a norm accepted by every civilized State which has the status of a peremptory,  absolute,  mandatory,  uncompromising custom of International Law. 

Our 1987 Philippine Constituion, nothing less,  has created our independent office of the Commission on Human Rights under Section 17, Article XIII as a hallmark to our high regards on the respect to human rights. But how does it function? What are the mandates of this Commission? 

Sadly,  what we only see or hear from the traditional media is the Commission speaking in cases when there are alleged abuses made by persons in authority in the performance of their duties. 

This leads to the frustration of many of us Filipinos asking  are not these victims  of rape, murder, robbery and many other cases perpetrated by alleged drug addicts also victims of human rights violations. 

The answer is a plain yes. All these people who have been killed, raped,  robbed,  kidnapped, etc., are also victims of human rights violations regardless of who the offenders are. 

The reports in media have created a certain pattern as though the function of the Commission were only to monitor the Philippine Government's compliance with international treaty obligations on human rights. However,  the powers and functions of the Commission far exceed than what we hear or see from daily news shown to us by the media. 

The first mandate of the CHR is to investigate,  on its own or on complaint by any party,  all forms of human rights violations involving civil and political rights. In this, we can infer that the law makes no distinction as to who the offender is - whether it is a private or person in authority. Hence,  needless to say,  CHR can investigate all kinds of violations done against any individual committed by any other person. 

But do not get the CHR wrong if no one can be prosecuted or adjudged as violator of human rights or be punished for criminal offense. The CHR is only tasked to investigate and not to prosecute. It is not among the prosecution arms of the government.

The complete enumeration of the powers and functions of CHR are as follows:

Section 18. Art. XIII of the 1987 Constitution. The Commission on Human Rights shall have the following powers and functions:

 (1) Investigate, on its own or on complaint by any party, all forms of human rights violations involving civil and political rights;  

  (2) Adopt its operational guidelines and rules of procedure, and cite for contempt for violations thereof in accordance with the Rules of Court; 

(3) Provide appropriate legal measures for the protection of human rights of all persons within the Philippines, as well as Filipinos residing abroad, and provide for preventive measures and legal aid services to the under-privileged whose human rights have been violated or need protection;  

 (4) Exercise visitorial powers over jails, prisons, or detention facilities; 

(5) Establish a continuing program of research, education, and information to enhance respect for the primacy of human rights;

 (6) Recommend to Congress effective measures to promote human rights and to provide for compensation to victims of violations of human rights, or their families;

 (7) Monitor the Philippine Government's compliance with international treaty obligations on human rights;

 (8) Grant immunity from prosecution to any person whose testimony or whose possession of documents or other evidence is necessary or convenient to determine the truth in any investigation conducted by it or under its authority;

 (9) Request the assistance of any department, bureau, office, or agency in the performance of its functions; 

 (10) Appoint its officers and employees in accordance with law; and  

(11) Perform such other duties and functions as may be provided by law. 

Notice that there are so many powers of the CHR and they are by themselves unimpeachable and only serve for the better protection of human rights enshrined under the Bill of Rights.

However,  we only hear less of these being exercised. Maybe because they have been paid only to advertise to wrongs of the present administration? I don't know. 

The law is not by itself the one corrupt, nor is the Commission. If there is one, it is the people that could be running the office. And let us not turn a blind eye against the reality that this is happening in almost all instrumentalities and agencies of the government. 

But honestly enough,  why should we cast the blame on others when  the very corruption we hate so much initially started from us.

VB code update all entries in datagridview row

   Dim dr As New DialogResult
        dr = MessageBox.Show("Are you sure you want to save?", "Deskware", MessageBoxButtons.OKCancel, MessageBoxIcon.Question)
        If dr = Windows.Forms.DialogResult.OK Then
            Dim zz As Double
            zz = DataGridView1.RowCount
            ToolStripProgressBar1.Visible = True
            ToolStripProgressBar1.Minimum = 0

            Dim currentrow As New DataGridViewRow

            For Each currentrow In DataGridView1.Rows
                ToolStripProgressBar1.Value = ToolStripProgressBar1.Value + 1

                Dim strs = "Select * from Individual_loan_ledger WHERE (acct_no = '" & currentrow.Cells(0).Value.ToString & "' and Loan_no = '" & currentrow.Cells(4).Value.ToString & "' and Sched = #" & DateTimePicker1.Value.ToShortDateString & "#)"
                Dim cmds As New OleDbCommand(strs, con)
                If con.State = ConnectionState.Closed Then con.Open()
                Dim drs As OleDbDataReader = cmds.ExecuteReader
                If drs.HasRows Then
                    'Update the individual_loan_ledger table if there is record found.
                    If con.State = ConnectionState.Closed Then con.Open()
                    Dim st As String = "UPDATE [Individual_loan_ledger]SET Date_paid = #" & DateTimePicker1.Value.ToShortDateString & "#, Principal = " & currentrow.Cells(11).Value & ", Interest = 0, Balance= " & currentrow.Cells(10).Value - currentrow.Cells(11).Value & ", Penalty = 0, discount = 0, savings = 0,cbu = 0, addon1 = 0, addon2 =0,addon3 = 0 WHERE(acct_no = '" & currentrow.Cells(0).Value.ToString & "' and Loan_no = '" & currentrow.Cells(4).Value.ToString & "' and Sched = #" & DateTimePicker1.Value.ToShortDateString & "#)"
                    Dim cmd As New OleDbCommand(st, con)
                    cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()
                Else
                    'Insert new row for individual_loan_ledger if no row to update about payment or sched is not found.
                    If con.State = ConnectionState.Closed Then con.Open()
                    Dim st As String = "INSERT INTO [Individual_loan_ledger](Loan_no, Loan_type, eName, Sched, Date_paid, principal, interest,Balance,penalty, acct_no, emo, eyr )VALUES ( '" & currentrow.Cells(4).Value.ToString & "', '" & currentrow.Cells(5).Value.ToString & "', '" & currentrow.Cells(2).Value.ToString & "', #" & DateTimePicker1.Value.ToShortDateString & "#, #" & DateTimePicker1.Value.ToShortDateString & "#, " & currentrow.Cells(11).Value & ", 0, " & currentrow.Cells(10).Value - currentrow.Cells(11).Value & ", 0, '" & currentrow.Cells(0).Value.ToString & "', " & DateTimePicker1.Value.Month & ", " & DateTimePicker1.Value.Year & ")"
                    Dim cmd As New OleDbCommand(st, con)
                    cmd.ExecuteNonQuery()
                End If
               
                'Update the balance in the loan_business table.
                If con.State = ConnectionState.Closed Then con.Open()
                Dim tempbalance As Double = currentrow.Cells(10).Value - currentrow.Cells(11).Value
                Dim st3 As String = "UPDATE [Loan_business]SET ebalance = " & tempbalance & ", epay = " & currentrow.Cells(11).Value & " WHERE(([acct_no] = '" & currentrow.Cells(0).Value.ToString & "' and [fno] = '" & currentrow.Cells(4).Value.ToString & "'))"
                Dim cmd3 As New OleDbCommand(st3, con)
                cmd3.ExecuteNonQuery()
                '=======================
            Next
            ToolStripProgressBar1.Visible = False
            ToolStripProgressBar1.Value = 0
            fill2()
            checkupdatesbalance()
            con.Close()
            MsgBox("Update successful. Transaction of the days has been saved.", MsgBoxStyle.Information)