Next PHL President can take oath before village chief — DOJ

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is not seeing any legal impediment in the proposed bills in the House of Representatives and the Senate authorizing the barangay chairmen to swear into office any government officials, including the next Philippine President.
In the legal opinion of the DOJ sent to Deputy Executive Secretary Mildred Yovela Umali-Hermogenes, DOJ Undersecretary Zabedin Azis said that the Department does not pose any objection if House Bill No. 2729 and Senate Bill No. 2693 are passed into law.
The two proposed bills are amending Section 41 of Executive Order No. 292, more popularly known as the “Administrative Code of 1987”, or Republic Act No. 6733.
Both the House and the Senate have proposed to allow the barangay chairmen to swear into office the government officials, including the President.
The DOJ legal opinion added that is not a “mandatory legal requirement” but was only “traditional” that the oathtaking of the new Philippine President is taken before the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (SC). (PNA)