4/20/2021 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly acts to become a citizen. As expressed in the Dissent of Justice Jose C. Vitug[7] in the instant case, concurred in by Justice Jose A.R. Melo:[8] "Repatriation is the resumption or recovery of the original nationality upon the fulfillment of certain conditions. While an applicant need not have to undergo the tedious and time consuming process required by the Revised Naturalization Law (CA 473, as amended), he, nevertheless, would still have to make an express and unequivocal act of formally rejecting his adopted state and reaffirming his total and exclusive allegiance and loyalty to the Republic of the Philippines. It bears emphasis that, to be considered a natural-born citizen under the first part of Section 2, Article IV, of the 1987 Constitution, one should not have to perform any act at all or go through any process, judicial or administrative, to enable him to reacquire his citizenship. Willoughby opines that a natural-born citizen is one who is able to claim citizenship without any prior declaration on his part of a desire to obtain such status. Under this view, the term 'natural born' citizens could also cover those who have been collectively deemed citizens by reason of the Treaty of Paris and the Philippine Bill of 1902 and those who have been accorded by the 1935 Constitution to be Filipino citizens (those born in the Philippines of alien parents who, before the adoption of the 1935 Constitution had been elected to public office.)" The two dissenting Justices correctly stated that the "stringent requirement of the Constitution is so placed as to insure that only Filipino citizens with an absolute and permanent degree of allegiance and loyalty shall be eligible for membership in Congress, the branch of the government directly involved and given the delicate task of legislation." The dissenting opinion further states: "The term 'natural-born' Filipino citizen, first constitutionally defined in the 1973 Charter, later adopted by the 1987 Constitution, particularly in Section 2, Article IV thereof, is meant to refer to those 'who are citizens of the Philippines from birth without having to perform any act to acquire or perfect their citizenship,' and to those 'who elect Philippine citizenship.' Time and again, the Supreme Court has declared that where the law speaks in clear and categorical language, there is no room for interpretation, vacillation or equivocation – there is only room for application. The phrase 'from birth' indicates that there is a starting point of his citizenship and this citizenship should be continuous, constant and without interruption." Thus, respondent is not eligible for election to Congress as the Constitution requires that a member of the House of Representatives must be a "natural-born citizen of the Philippines." For sure, the framers of our Constitution intended to provide a more stringent citizenship requirement for higher elective offices, including that of the office of a Congressman. Otherwise, the Constitution should have simply provided that a https://elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/58613 22/25