6/8/2020 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly certiorari in the Court of Appeals. He thereby ignored that the People of the Philippines were indispensable parties due to his objective being to set aside the trial court's order dated May 23, 2001 that concerned the public aspect of Criminal Case No. 95-145703. The omission was fatal and already enough cause for the summary rejection of his petition for certiorari. The petitioner did not also obtain the consent of the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) to his petition for certiorari. At the very least, he should have furnished a copy of the petition for certiorari to the OSG prior to the filing thereof,[8] but even that he did not do. Thereby, he violated Section 35(l), Chapter 12, Title III of Book IV of Executive Order No. 292 (The Administrative Code of 1987), which mandates the OSG to represent "the Government in the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeals in all criminal proceedings; represent the Government and its officers in the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals, and all other courts or tribunals in all civil actions and special proceedings in which the Government or any officer thereof in his official capacity is a party." Although the petition for certiorari bore the conformity of the public prosecutor (i.e., Assistant City Prosecutor Danilo Formoso of Manila), that conformity alone did not suffice. The authority of the City Prosecutor or his assistant to appear for and represent the People of the Philippines was confined only to the proceedings in the trial court. II Even on the merits, the petition for review fails. The criminal case had been pending since 1995 and the petitioner as the complainant had presented only two witnesses as of the issuance of the assailed order. The trial court had not been wanting in giving warnings to the Prosecution on the dire consequences should the Prosecution continue to fail to complete its evidence. The Prosecution had retained the duty to ensure that its witnesses would be present during the trial, for its obligation to the administration of justice had been to prove its case sans vexatious and oppressive delays. Yet, the warnings of the trial court had gone unheeded. Instead, the Prosecution would deflect the responsibility for the delays to the failure of the trial court to issue the subpoena to its proposed witness and to cause the subpoena to be served. Such attitude of the Prosecution, which included the petitioner as the complainant, manifested a lack of the requisite diligence required of all litigants coming to the courts to seek redress. We find that the trial judge did not act capriciously, arbitrarily or whimsically in issuing the assailed order. Thus, the Court of Appeals properly dismissed the petition for certiorari. The petitioner now needs to be reminded that certiorari is an extraordinary remedy to correct a grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction when an appeal, or any plain, speedy and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law is not available. In this regard, grave abuse of discretion implies a capricious and whimsical exercise of judgment that is equivalent to lack of jurisdiction whenever the power is exercised in an arbitrary or despotic manner by reason of elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/49672 4/6