The Supreme Court on Tuesday affirmed the Philippines’ accession to an international agreement on intellectual property rights without the Senate’s concurrence.
Voting 13-0, the SC dismissed the petition questioning the validity of former President Benigno Aquino III’s ratification of the Protocol Relating to the Madrid Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Marks in 2012.
The SC junked for lack of merit the petition of Intellectual Property Association of the Philippines. It also directed IPAP to pay the costs of the suit.
The SC justices rejected the assertion of IPAP that the Madrid Protocol is a “treaty” that requires the concurrence of the Senate. It ruled the accession to the Madrid Protocol to be valid because Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert F. del Rosario deemed it to be an “executive agreement.”
The agreement “does not thus require Senate concurrence,” said SC spokesman Theodore O. Te told reporters.
The SC upheld the “exercise of discretion” of the Secretary of Foreign Affairs to determine whether an agreement should be considered an executive agreement or a treaty, as provided under Section 9 of Executive Order No. 459, series of 1997.
“The Court sustained respondent DFA secretary’s determination that the Madrid Protocol was an executive agreement not requiring Senate concurrence,” Court’s spokesperson Theodore Te said, in a media briefing.
The tribunal’s decision cited Article XVIII, Section 25 of the 1987 Constitution that allows the President to enter into an executive agreement and not necessarily a treaty.
The SC also cited this constitutional provision in upholding the legality of the controversial January ruling on the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement.
The SC stressed that an executive agreement rests solely within the powers of the president and does not require the Senate’s concurrence.
Besides the issue of Senate concurrence, the high court also disagreed with IPAP’s argument that the Madrid Protocol is unconstitutional for being in conflict with Republic Act No. 8293, or the International Property Code of the Philippines.
The supposed conflict concerns the possibility of foreign trademark applications with the International Property Office being automatically granted protection in the Philippines without the WIPO designating the resident agents required by Section 125 of the IP Code.
However, the SC said the “difficulty, which the IPAP illustrates, is minimal, if not altogether inexistent.”
The tribunal said the Madrid Protocol provides that such foreign applications are still examined according to the relevant national law.
This meant the country’s Intellectual Property Office “will only grant protection to a mark that meets the local registration requirements which includes the appointment of a resident agent,” Te said.
Aquino ratified the Madrid Protocol through an instrument of accession on March 27, 2012; this was deposited with the Director-General of the WIPO on Apr. 25, 2012. The Madrid Protocol entered into force on July 25, 2012.