ARTHUR BARANDA, CESAR BARANDA, GERONIMO APURA, NARITO ARANETA, ROGELIO SORIOSO, GREGORIO ARANO, WILFREDO DONASCO AND ERNESTO AUSMOLO, PETITIONERS, VS. NORBERTO PADIOS, IGNACIO P…

The issue litigated in this case is whether the municipal court has jurisdiction over a forcible entry and detainer case involving agricultural tenants.

A complaint for ejectment, with prayer
for temporary, restraining order, dated June
5, 1982, was filed by
private respondents Roberto Padios, et al., as
plaintiffs, and petitioners Rogelio Sorioso, et al.,
as defendants, before the municipal court of Barotac
Viejo, Iloilo, docketed as Civil
Case No. 37.  The complaint alleged that
plaintiffs were among nine (9) tenants of a 33-hectare parcel of land belonging
to the Philippine National Bank situated Barrio Vista Alegre, Anilao,
Iloilo, each of whom occupying and cultivating portions of the land ranging
from 4.5 hectares to 3/4 hectares in area, aggregating a total of 20 hectares,
more or less, devoted to rice and corn; that their possession of the area
claimed by them were recognized and sanctioned by an order of the Court of
Agrarian Relations of Iloilo in CAR Cases Nos. 4046, 4107-4117; that sometime
in April 1982, the defendants by means of force and intimidation forcibly
dispossessed plaintiffs of the areas cultivated by them.  On June, 1982, the municipal court issued an
ex-parte temporary restraining order, enjoining the defendants from interfering and
disturbing the peaceful possession of their respective areas.  On June 17, 1982, the defendants filed a
motion to dismiss on the ground that the case involved agricultural tenancy and
therefore not within the jurisdiction of the municipal court, and that a case
was pending before the Court of Agrarian Relations involving the same subject
matter, the same parties and issues, the very case cited by plaintiffs in their
complaint; defendants further prayed for the dissolution of the temporary
restraining order.  On July 29, 1982, the
municipal court ordered the complaint
temporarily dismissed a lifted the temporary restraining order, but on motion of the plaintiffs
the court on August 2, 1982
reconsidered said order and reinstated
the complaint together with the temporary restraining order.  Hence, the defendants filed the instant
petition for certiorari, mandamus, prohibition and injunction with
prayer for temporary restraining order. 
On December 6, 1982, the petition was given due course and the
parties required to submit simultaneous memoranda.

We find the petition meritorious. 
The fact that the parties are agricultural tenants is not disputed.  As a matter of fact, private respondents are
the plaintiffs in a case pending before the Court of Agrarian Relations of
Iloilo, docketed as CAR Cases Nos. 4046,
4107-4117, Iloilo-1979, entitled “Roberto Padios,
et al. vs. Philippine National Bank,” in which the petitioners herein were
allowed to intervene as parties intervenors, having been adjudged bona fide tenants of the same land in CAR Case No. 4048.  This being so, the Court of Agrarian
Relations has exclusive and original jurisdiction to take cognizance of and to
try the case.  Moreover, as correctly
pointed out by petitioners, Section 1 of Rule 70 of the Rules of Court
explicitly provides that said rule shall not apply to cases covered by the
Agricultural Tenancy Act.

Accordingly, we grant the petition and set aside the
questioned Order of the respondent municipal court and order said court to
desist from entertaining the complaint filed by private respondents,
docketed as Civil Case No. 37.  Costs against private respondents.

SO ORDERED.

Melencio-Herrera, Paras,
Padilla, and Sarmiento,
JJ., concur.