SUMALO HOMEOWNERS G.R. No. 146061
ASSOCIATION OF HERMOSA,
Petitioner, Present:
Panganiban, C.J. (Chairperson),
-
versus - Ynares-Santiago,
Austria-Martinez,
Callejo, Sr., and
Chico-Nazario, JJ.
JAMES
T. LITTON, EMMA L.
LAPERAL, GLORIA L. DEL RIO,
GEORGE
T. LITTON, JR., GRACE
L.
GALLEGO and the HEIRS OF Promulgated:
EDWARD
T. LITTON,
Respondents. August 31, 2006
x
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x
YNARES-SANTIAGO,
J.:
Assailed in this Petition for Review
on certiorari is the June 16, 2000 Decision[1]
of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. SP No. 52014 reversing the Resolution of the
Office of the President dated September 4, 1998 (Zamora Resolution) and
reinstating the Resolution dated June 16, 1997 (Torres Resolution), as well as the
October 23, 2000 Resolution[2]
denying the motion for reconsideration.
The factual antecedents are as
follows:
On
Notwithstanding receipt of the DAR’s
offer of purchase, respondent withdrew their VOS and applied for the conversion
of the property from agricultural use to industrial, commercial and residential
uses. Respondents opted for conversion due
to the enactment of Republic Act (R.A.) No. 7227 or The Bases Conversion and
Development Act of 1992,[5] providing for the
creation of a Special Economic and Free Port Zone in an area consisting of Olongapo City, Subic
in Zambales and parts of the municipalities of Morong and Hermosa in the
Province of Bataan, and the declaration by the Sangguniang Bayan of Hermosa and
the Sangguniang Panlalawigan of Bataan that the Hermosa Agro-Industrial Estate,
a property contiguous to the land of the respondents, is an industrial area.[6]
Likewise, the Department of Agriculture
(DA) has determined that respondents’ property is not economically suitable for
agricultural production[7]
and that there is no tenurial relationship between them and the occupants of
the property. The respondents further alleged that the construction of light
structures in the areas adjacent to their property, as well as the proposed
Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA)
On
On
WHEREFORE,
pursuant to the spirit and intent of RA No. 6557, the Orders dated
SO
ORDERED.[10]
Aggrieved by
the issuance of the Torres Resolution, the petitioners sought a reconsideration
of the same. The Office of the
President, this time represented by Executive Secretary Ronaldo B. Zamora,
issued on September 4, 1998 a Resolution[11]
giving due course to the motion for reconsideration of the petitioners. The dispositive portion of the Zamora
Resolution reads:
WHEREFORE,
the instant motion for reconsideration is hereby given due course, and the
Resolution of this Office dated
SO
ORDERED.[12]
Respondents
appealed by way of a petition for review[13] under
Rule 43 of the Rules of Court with the Court of Appeals which rendered the
assailed decision which reads:
WHEREFORE,
the OP Resolution dated
SO
ORDERED.[14]
Petitioners’
motion for reconsideration was denied[15] hence
the present petition raising the following issues:
WHETHER THE COURT OF APPEALS CORRECTLY HELD THAT THE
PETITIONERS ARE NOT REAL PARTIES IN INTEREST TO THE CASE.
WHETHER THE COURT OF APPEALS CORRECTLY ANCHORED ITS
ASSAILED DECISION ON THE CASE OF FORTICH v.
In the case of
Fortich v. Corona,[16]
the Office of the President issued on
Aggrieved by
the issuance of the “Win-Win” Resolution, the petitioners are now before us in
a special civil action for certiorari and prohibition. Finding merit in the contentions raised by
the petitioners, we ruled that the “Win-Win” Resolution which substantially
modified the March 29, 1996 Decision after it has attained finality, is void.[17]
As regards the
standing of the purported farmer-beneficiaries who sought to intervene in the
said case the recognized rule in this jurisdiction is that a real party in
interest is a party who would be benefited or injured by the judgment or is the
party entitled to the avails of the suit.[18] Interest within the meaning of the rule means
material interest, an interest in issue and to be affected by the decree, as
distinguished from mere interest in the question involved, or a more incidental
interest.[19] Real Interest means a present
substantial interest, as distinguished from a mere expectancy or a future,
contingent, subordinate or consequential interest.[20]
The
petitioners in the instant case claim that they have been identified as
qualified beneficiaries of the Litton property under the Comprehensive Agrarian
Reform Program (CARP) citing Section 22 of R.A. No. 6657 or the Comprehensive
Agrarian Reform Law of 1988 (CARL):[21]
SEC. 22. Qualified
Beneficiaries. – The lands covered by the CARP shall be distributed as much as
possible to landless residents of the same barangay, or in the absence thereof,
landless residents of the same municipality in the following order of priority:
(a) agricultural lessees and share
tenants;
(b) regular farm workers;
(c) seasonal farm workers;
(d) other farm workers;
(e) actual tillers or occupants of public
lands;
(f) collective or cooperatives of the above
beneficiaries; and
(g) others directly working on the land.
Petitioners
claim that while they may not qualify either as agricultural lessees, share
tenants, regular farm workers, seasonal farm workers, or as actual tillers or
occupants of public lands, they allegedly fall within the ambit of the
definition of “other farm workers”, “collective or cooperative of the above
beneficiaries”, and “others directly working on the land”. They claim that in the absence of lessees,
tenants, farm workers or actual tillers, those directly working on the land
become qualified as beneficiaries. They also
allege that they have been working on the Litton property for a long time.
The
petition lacks merit.
The
claim that they have been working on the Litton property as farm workers is
contradicted by the Ocular Inspection Report[22]
prepared by the DA Region III Office. The
report not only recommended that the Litton property is best suited for
purposes other than agricultural production, it also observed that the only
notable developments on the property are residential houses, roads and
recreational facilities. The ocular
inspection report did not mention any agricultural developments to support the
contention of the petitioners that they have been actually working on the land.
If petitioners have indeed worked on
Litton property for some time, the fruits of such endeavor should have been
manifest and easily noticed by the DA representatives who conducted the ocular
inspection. Moreover, the
Petitioners
also failed to substantiate the claim that they have been identified as
qualified beneficiaries of the Litton property under the CARP. The CARL is specific in its requirements for registering
qualified beneficiaries:
SEC. 15. Registration
of Beneficiaries. – The DAR in coordination with the Barangay Agrarian
Reform Committee (BARC) as organized in this Act, shall register all
agricultural lessees, tenants and farm workers who are qualified to be
beneficiaries with the assistance of the BARC and the DAR shall provide the
following data:
a) Names and members of their
immediate farm household;
b) Location
and area of the land they work;
c) Crops
planted; and
d) Their
share in the harvest or amount of rental paid or wages received.
A copy of the registry or list of all potential CARP beneficiaries in the
barangay shall be posted in the barangay hall, school or other public buildings
in the barangay where it shall be open to inspection by the public at all
reasonable hours.
Aside
from their self-serving assertions, the records is devoid of proof that the
petitioners have been identified and registered as qualified beneficiaries. The findings of the Torres Resolution are
quite revealing:
The
thriving farming community adverted to by the
Honorable DAR Secretary in his
Order is in reality not composed of tenants of the Littons but mere
occupants of homelots without their consent, who use the property primarily for residential purposes and commercial activities and who have been
subject of ejectment suits by the Littons.
We
find the opposition raised by the Sumalo Homeowners Association to the
application for conversion to be bereft of substance. It appears that the
oppositors are not farmers-tillers but occupants of homelots and are the same
defendants in the ejectment suit. x x x.[26]
From the
foregoing, it is clear that petitioners, whose claim of being qualified
beneficiaries is self-serving and bereft of basis, are not real parties in
interest in this case. As held in Fortich
v.
With
respect to the motion for reconsideration filed by the applicants for
intervention, we likewise find the same unmeritorious. The issue of the
applicant’s right to intervene in this proceedings should be laid to rest. The
rule in this jurisdiction is that a party who wishes to intervene must have a
“certain right” or “legal interest” in the subject matter of the litigation.
Such interest must be “actual, substantial, material, direct and immediate, and
not simply contingent and expectant.”
Here,
the applicants for intervention categorically admitted that they were not
tenants x x x but were merely seasonal farmworkers in a pineapple plantation on
the subject land which was under lease for ten (10) years to the Philippine
Packing Corporation. Respondent, then DAR Secretary Ernesto Garilao, also admitted
in his Order of June 7, 1995 that “the subject land is neither tenanted nor
validly covered for compulsory acquisition x x x.”
Under
Section 4, Article XIII of the 1987 Constitution, the right to own directly or
collectively the land they till belongs to the farmers and regular farmworkers
who are landless, and in the case of other farmworkers, the latter are entitled
to receive a just share of the fruits” of the land. The pertinent portion of
the aforecited constitutional provision mandates:
Sec.
4. The State shall, by law, undertake an agrarian
reform program founded on the right of farmers and regular farmworkers, who
are landless, to own directly or collectively the lands they till or in the
case of other farmworkers, to receive a just share of the fruits thereof. x x x. (Emphasis supplied)
Commenting
on the above-quoted provision, the eminent constitutionalist, Fr. Joaquin G.
Bernas, S.J., one of the framers of the 1987 Constitution, declares that under
the agrarian reform program the equitable distribution of the land is a right
given to landless farmers and regular farmworkers to own the land they till,
while the other or seasonal farmworkers are only entitled to a
just share of the fruits of the land.
Thus,
the Court of Appeals correctly found that petitioners in the instant case are
not real parties in interest, to wit:
In
the case at bench, the members of
respondent Sumalo make no pretense that they are agricultural lessees or tenants or employees or laborers
in an agricultural enterprise or farm of the petitioners, for the latter have
none, much less are they (Sumalo members) the owners of the subject property.
In their protest to the petitioner’s application for conversion they merely
averred “clearing, tilling and planting the land under claim of ownership.” But the fact is that the parcels of land are
titled in the names of the petitioners.
Accordingly,
the members of Sumalo can never be considered as farmers or farmworkers, much
less regular farmworkers, under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law as
conceived in the Constitution. Then DAR Secretary Ernesto P. Garilao, in his
Order denying the [respondents’] conversion application, described the members
of Sumalo as mere “occupants of the subject area” and never as farmers or farmworkers.
They are, therefore completely wanting of the actual, substantial, material,
direct and immediate and not simply contingent and expectant,” interest that
would qualify them as a real party in interest under the standard set forth in
the Fortich case. x x x.[28]
Since petitioners
failed to establish their standing as real parties in interest, they have no
personality to assail the Torres Resolution. As earlier stated, the Torres Resolution allowing
the conversion of the Litton property was rendered on June 16, 1997. DAR Secretary Garilao received a copy of the
Torres Resolution on June 18, 1997. He
did not file a motion for reconsideration nor did he appeal. Thereafter, on September 17, 1997, petitioners
interposed a motion for reconsideration. On October 28, 1997, the DAR Secretary
manifested that it was adopting the motion for reconsideration interposed by
the petitioners.[29]
Administrative Order No. 18, Series of 1987, prescribes the
rules and regulations governing appeals to the Office of the President. Section
7 of the said issuance provides:
SEC. 7.
Decisions/resolutions/orders of the Office of the President shall, except as
otherwise provided for by special laws, become final after the lapse of fifteen
(15) days from receipt of a copy thereof by the parties, unless a motion for
reconsideration thereof is filed within such period.[30]
Under
Executive Order No. 292, The Administrative Code of 1987, the decision of an agency
shall become final and executory 15 days after the receipt of a copy thereof by
the party adversely affected unless within that period an administrative appeal
or judicial review, if proper, has been perfected. One motion for
reconsideration may be filed, which shall suspend the running of the period.[31]
The
Torres Resolution was received by DAR Secretary Garilao on
We
examined the records of this case and we found no evidence to support the
contention that petitioners were belatedly served a copy of the Torres
Resolution. No document in the records
exists to prove that petitioners received a copy of the Torres Resolution 15
days prior to the filing of their motion for reconsideration on
Since
the motion for reconsideration of the petitioners cannot be considered to have
been timely filed by a real party in interest, it never tolled the running of
the 15-day period within which to file a motion for reconsideration or an
appeal. As such, the Torres Resolution
had attained finality when petitioners filed their motion for reconsideration. Thus, the Zamora Resolution which reversed the
Torres Resolution which is already final and executory was issued in disregard of
the rules and basic legal precept that accord finality to administrative
determinations.
The orderly administration of justice requires that the judgments/resolutions of a court or quasi judicial body must reach a point of finality set by the law, rules and regulations. The noble purpose is to write
finis to disputes once and for all. This is a fundamental principle in our
justice system, without which there could be no end to litigations. Utmost respect and adherence to this principle
must always be maintained by those who wield the power of adjudication. Any act which violates such principle must be
struck down.[32]
Procedural rules should be treated with utmost respect and due regard since they are designed to facilitate the adjudication of cases to remedy the worsening problem of delay in the resolution of rival claims and in the administration of justice. The requirement is in pursuance to the bill of rights inscribed in the Constitution which guarantees that “all person shall have a right to the speedy disposition of their cases before all judicial, quasi-judicial and administrative bodies” The adjudicatory bodies and the parties to a case are thus enjoined to abide strictly by the rules.[33]
In
fine, the Court of Appeals correctly reversed the Zamora Resolution because it
was issued in excess of jurisdiction and in violation of the fundamental and
time-honored principle of finality to administrative determinations.[34] The Torres Resolution has become final and
executory hence can no longer be altered or modified.
WHEREFORE, the petition is DENIED. The
June 16, 2000 Decision of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. SP No. 52014 reversing
the Resolution of the Office of the President dated September 4, 1998 (Zamora Resolution) and reinstating
the Resolution dated June 16, 1997 (Torres Resolution) and its October 23, 2000
Resolution denying the motion for reconsideration, are AFFIRMED.
No
pronouncement as to costs.
SO ORDERED.
CONSUELO YNARES-SANTIAGO
Associate Justice
WE
CONCUR:
ARTEMIO V. PANGANIBAN
Chief Justice
Chairperson
MA. ALICIA AUSTRIA-MARTINEZ
ROMEO J. CALLEJO, SR.
Associate Justice Associate Justice
MINITA V. CHICO-NAZARIO
Associate Justice
CERTIFICATION
Pursuant to Section 13, Article VIII
of the Constitution, it is hereby certified that the conclusions in the above
Decision were reached in consultation before the case was assigned to the
writer of the opinion of the Court’s Division.
ARTEMIO
V. PANGANIBAN
Chief Justice
[1] Rollo, pp. 55-69. Penned by Associate Justice Salvador J.
Valdez, Jr. and concurred in by Associate Justices Renato C. Dacudao and Andres
B. Reyes Jr.
[2]
[3]
See DAR (VOF) Form No. 1, CA rollo,
pp. 113-114.
[4]
See Annex 8, CA rollo, p. 111.
[5]
Approved
[6] Rollo, pp. 56-57.
[7]
See Re-Ocular Inspection Report dated
[8]
[9]
[10]
[11]
[12]
[13]
CA rollo, pp. 2-23.
[14] Rollo, p. 69.
[15]
[16]
G.R. No. 131457,
[17]
[18]
RULES OF COURT, Rule 3, Sec. 2.
[19] VSC Commercial Enterprises v. Court of
Appeals, G.R. No. 121159, December 16, 2002, 394 SCRA 74, 79.
[20]
[21]
Signed into law on
[22]
CA rollo, p. 305.
[23]
[24]
[25]
RULES OF COURT, Rule 131, Sec. 3(m).
[26] CA rollo,
p. 27.
[27] G.R. No. 131457, November 17, 1998, 298
SCRA 678, 694-695.
[28] Rollo, p. 66.
[29]
[30] See Amadore v. Romulo, G.R. No. 161608,
[31]
ADMINISTRATIVE CODE, Book VII, Chapter III, Section 15.
[32] Fortich v. Corona, supra note 16 at 651.
[33] Fortich v. Corona, supra note 28 at 690-691.
[34]