JOSE VILLAREAL, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLEE, VS. RAFAEL CORPUS, DIRECTOR OF LANDS, DEFENDANT AND APPELLANT.

This is an appeal from an order entered in mandamus proceedings requiring the
defendant, the Director of the Bureau of Lands, to sell to the plaintiff a part
of the San Lazaro Estate under the terms and conditions prescribed in Act No.
2360 as amended by Act No. 2478.

The following agreed statement of facts was submitted in the court below:

“1. That the defendant admits that the plaintiff has been in possession of
the land described in the attached plan and marked Exhibit A, for about twelve
years until the year 1911, according to the record in the archives of the Bureau
of Lands and that during said period of time the said plaintiff has always paid
to the administrator of the San Lazaro Estate the annual rent corresponding to
the parcel of land described in said plan.

“2. That on or about the year 1911, the Bureau of Lands made a subdivision by
lots of the lands situated in the San Lazaro Estate and since then has collected
from the defendant (plaintiff) only the amount of the annual rent corresponding
to lot 12, block 2 of the said San Lazaro Estate. That the subdivision above
mentioned was necessary to the due administration of said estate.

“3. That during the period covered by the 28th day of February and the 28th
day of November, 1914, the plaintiff has made several and repeated requests to
the Director of Lands asking that the land described in the attached plan marked
Exhibit A, be sold and conveyed to him, but in spite of this fact, the said
Director of Lands has refused to do so for the reason that the land described in
the complaint did not conform to that, for which the plaintiff paid rents to the
Bureau of Lands.

“4. That the plaintiff admits that on the * * * day of November, 1914, in
order not to lose his right to buy lot 12, block 2, he executed a contract with
the Bureau of Lands, in which the latter party obliged itself to sell to the
former, only the land known as lot 12, block 2. (Act No. 2360 [sec. 2].)

“5. That the defendant likewise admits that the plaintiff has been until now
in the actual possession of the whole lot fenced and surrounded by a wall of
rock, as appears in the plan marked Exhibit A.

“6. That should the plaintiff testify, he would affirm that he has been in
possession of the lot in question for about twenty-five years up to this
date.”

This agreed statement of facts read together with the pleadings and the
evidence which was adduced in addition thereto, clearly discloses that plaintiff
is, and for twenty-five years has been, in exclusive possession and occupation
of about 950.25 square meters of land lying within the boundaries of San Lazaro
Estates; that this land was formerly wild, uncultivated, and swampy; that since
taking possession, plaintiff has filled it in, enclosed it with a stone fence,
and erected two houses on the lands thus reclaimed; that in or about the year
1911, the surveyors of the Bureau of Lands prepared a plan of the San Lazaro
Estate upon which the tract occupied by the plaintiff appears to be subdivided
into two lots, one containing some 700 square meters which has been sold to the
plaintiff under the provisions of section 2 of Act No. 2360, and the other
containing some 250.25 square meters which the defendant Director of Lands
declined to sell to the plaintiff; that during the period included between the
28th day of February and the 28th day of November, 1914, that is to say, during
a period of nine months from the date of the passage of Act No. 2360, the
plaintiff made repeated requests of the Director of Lands for permission to
purchase, and stood ready at all times to comply with the terms upon which
authority to purchase was conferred upon him by section 2 of that Act; and that
plaintiff continued in the possession and occupation of this lot, on which one
of the houses erected by him is located, down to the date of the institution of
these proceedings.

Section 2 of Act No. 2360 which was enacted on the 28th day of February,
1914, is as follows:

“Within nine months from the date of the passage of this Act each of the
present occupants or tenants shall be entitled to purchase a lot, or any of the
lots of land occupied by him, the area whereof shall not be in excess of fifteen
hundred square meters if it is for a residence or six thousand square meters if
for other purposes at a price to be fixed by the Director of Lands, not more
than the valuation at which they are now assessed by the Collector of Internal
Revenue, payable in semiannual installments within a period of not more than
fifteen years if for a residence, and not more than five years if for other
purposes: Provided, That the purchaser who shall have selected the
period of fifteen years in which to pay for the lot purchased by him for
residence purposes shall, after the first ten years, be compelled to pay the
land tax on said lot, the provisions of section five of this Act to the contrary
not- withstanding.”

It is very clear that under the provisions of this section, the plaintiff was
entitled to purchase the entire tract of land occupied by him, and that the
action of the Director of Lands in declining to sell him more than 700 square
meters, for no other reason than that the surveyors of the Bureau of Lands had
divided the entire tract into two lots, was a mere arbitrary exercise of
power.

Section 2 of Act No. 2360 was amended by Act No. 2478 on February 5, 1915, so
as to read as follows:

“Prior to July first, nineteen hundred and fifteen, all bona-fide occupants
of the said estate shall be entitled to purchase all the lands occupied by them
or by their legal representatives as shown by the records of the Bureau of
Lands, not to exceed fifteen hundred square meters for residential and twelve
thousand square meters for charitable, religious, or any other purposes, at a
price to be fixed by the Director of Lands with the approval of the Secretary of
the Interior not to exceed the value at which said lands are now assessed by the
city assessor and collector of Manila, and the purchase price may be paid cash
down or in semiannual installments within a period of not more than fifteen
years, and the purchasers shall be compelled to pay the cost of the surveys
necessary to carry out the purposes of this Act, which shall be added to the
sale value of the lands surveyed. Land or lands purchased in accordance with the
provisions of this Act shall be subject to the payment of the land tax, like any
other property, from the date of the execution of the contract covering it or
them.”

The contentions of the Attorney-General at this time,would seem to be that
plaintiff is not entitled to purchase the lot in question under the terms of the
statute thus amended, because the Director of Lands having declined to receive
rent for the lot in question from and after the year 1911, when the surveyors
prepared their plan subdividing the entire tract into two parcels, the plaintiff
at the time of the institution of this action was not a tenant and therefore not
a “bona-fide occupant” of the lot in question. There can be no
question, however, that plaintiff was an occupant, as that term is used in
section 2 of Act No. 2360, and that under the terms of that Act, he acquired a
right to purchase the lot in question and did everything required of him to
enable him to exercise that right; so that without having recourse to the
amendment to this section contained in Act No. 2478, the plaintiff is manifestly
entitled to a peremptory order requiring the Director of Lands to comply with
its terms as originally enacted.

We are inclined to think, furthermore, that even under the provisions of that
section as amended by Act No. 2478, the plaintiff must be held to be a bona-fide
occupant, notwithstanding the fact that the Director of Lands has declined to
receive rent for the lot in question since 1911. The plaintiff did not lose
possession at the time when the land was subdivided, and has continued in
possession and occupation ever since, at all times insisting upon his right to
retain possession, and since the passage of Act No. 2360, to acquire title
thereunder. The benefits of the provisions of Act No. 2478 are not limited to
tenants of the estate as shown on the record of the Bureau of Lands,
but are secured to bona-fide occupants of the estate whether tenants or
not, provided their occupancy is shown on the records of the Bureau of Lands;
and it would appear that the fact that plaintiff is a bona-fide occupant, is
disclosed by the records of the Bureau notwithstanding the fact that this record
further discloses that the Bureau has arbitrarily declined, since 1911, to
permit him to occupy as tenant. But, how- ever this may be, we have no doubt
that the plaintiff has the right to enforce, in this action, the privilege
accorded him under section 2 of Act No. 2360, which has never been lost by any
act of the plaintiff himself, or by the failure on his part to comply with the
terms of the Act or of any lawful regulation made under authority of that
Act.

The facts in this case are very similar to those upon which we adjudicated
the rights of another occupant of the San Lazaro Estate in the recently decided
case of the Government of the Philippine Islands vs. Memije (p. 271,
ante) and much of what was said in the opinion filed in that case is
equally applicable to the case at bar and need not be repeated at this time.

We conclude that the order entered in the court below should be affirmed,
with the costs of this instance against the appellant. So ordered.

Torres, Trent, and Araullo, JJ., concur.
Moreland,
J., did not sign.