SIMEON B. MIGUEL, ET AL., PLAINTIFFS-APPELLANTS, VS. FLORENDO CATALINO DEFENDANT-APPELLEE.

Direct appeal from the judgment in Civil Case No. 1090 of the Court
of First Instance of Baguio, dismissing the
plaintiffs’ complaint for recovery of possession of a parcel of land,
registered under Act 496, in the name of one Bacaquio,^[1]
a long-deceased illiterate non-Christian resident of Mountain Province, and
declaring the defendant to be the true owner thereof.

On January 22, 1962, appellants Simeon, Emilia
and Marcelina Miguel, and appellant Grace Ventura
brought suit in the Court below against Florendo Catalino for the recovery of the land above-described,
plaintiffs claiming to be the children and heirs of the original registered
owner, and averred that defendant, without their, knowledge or consent, had
unlawfully taken possession of the land, gathered its produce and unlawfully
excluded plaintiffs therefrom.  Defendant answered pleading ownership and
adverse possession for 30 years, and counterclaimed for attorneys’ fees.  After trial the Court dismissed the
complaint, declared defendant to be the rightful owner, and ordered the Register
of Deeds to issue a transfer certificate in lieu of the original.  Plaintiffs appealed directly to this Court, assailing the trial Court’s
findings of fact and law.

As found by the trial Court, the land in dispute is situated in
the Barrio of San Pascual, Municipality of Tuba, Benguet, Mountain Province and contains an area of 39,446
square meters, more or less.  It is
covered by Original Certificate of Title No. 31, which was issued on 28
December 1927 in the name of Bacaquio (or Bakakew), a widower. 
No encumbrance or sale has ever been annotated in the certificate of
title.

The plaintiff-appellant Grace Ventura^[2]
is the only child of Bacaquio by his first wife, Debsay, and the other plaintiffs-appellants, Simeon, Emilia and Marcelina, all
surnamed “Miguel”, are his children by his third wife, Cosamang.  He begot
no issue with his second wife, Dobaney.  The three successive wives have all died.

Bacaquio, who died in 1943,
acquired the land when his second wife died and sold it to Catalino
Agyapao, father of the defendant Florendo
Catalino, for P300.00 in 1928.  Of the purchase price, P100.00 was paid and
receipted for when the land was surveyed, but the receipt was lost; the balance
was paid after the certificate of title was issued.  No formal deed of sale was executed, but since
the sale in 1928, or for more than 30 years, vendee Catalina Agyapao and his son, defendant-appellee
Florendo Catalino, had been
in possession of the land, in the concept of owner, paying the taxes thereon
and introducing improvements.

On 1 February 1949, Grace Ventura, by herself alone,
“sold” (as per her Transferor’s Affidavit, Exhibit “6”)
anew the same land far P300.00 to defendant Florendo Catalino,

In 1961, Catalino Agyapao in turn sold the
land to his son, the defendant Florendo Catalino.

This being a direct appeal from the trial court, where the value
of the property involved does not exceed P200,000.00, only the issues of law
are reviewable by the Supreme Court, the findings of
fact of the court a quo
being deemed concededly the appellant (Jacinto v. Jacinto, 105 Phil.
218; Del Castillo v. Guerro, L-11994, 25 July 1960; Abuyo, et al. v.
De Suave, L-21202, 29 Oct. 1966; 18 SCRA 600, 601).  We are thus constrained to discard
appellant’s second and third assignments of error.

In
their first assignment, appellants assail the admission in evidence over
the objection of the appellant of Exhibit “3”.  This exhibit
is a decision in favor of the defendant-appellee against herein plaintiff-appellant Grace Ventura,
by the council of Barrio of San Pascual, Tuba, Benguet, in
its Administrative Case No. 4, for the settle­ment of ownership and possession
of the land.  The decision is ultra vires because barrio
councils, which are not courts, have no judicial powers (Sec. 1, Art. VIII,
Constitution; see Sec. 12, Rep. Act 2370, otherwise known as the Barrio
Charter).  Therefore, as contended by
appellants, the exhibit is not admissible in a judicial proceeding as evidence
for ascertaining the truth respecting the fact of ownership and possession
(Sec. 1, Rule 128; Rules of Court).

Appellants are likewise correct in claiming that the sale of the
land in 1928 by Bacaquio to Catalino
Agyapao, defendant’s father, is null and void ab initio, for lack
of executive approval (Mangayao, et al. vs. Lasud, et al., L-19252, 29 May 1964).  However, it is not the provisions of the
Public Land Act (particularly Section 118 of Act 2874 and Section 120 of
Commonwealth Act 141) that nullify the transaction, for the reason that there
is no finding, and the contending parties have not shown, that the land titled
in the name of Bacaquio was acquired from the public
domain (Palad vs. Saito, 55 Phil. 831).  The laws applicable to the said sale
are:  Section 145(b) of the
Administrative Code of Mindanao and Sulu, providing
that no conveyance or encumbrance of real property shall be made in that
department by any non-christian inhabitant of the
same, unless, among other requirements, the deed shall bear indorsed upon it
the approval of the provincial governor or his representative duly authorized
in writing for the purpose; Section 146 of the same Code, declaring that every
contract or agreement made in violation of Section 145 “shall be null and
void”; and Act 2798, as amended by Act 2913, extend­ing the application of
the above provisions to Mountain Province and Nueva Vizcaya.

Since the 1928 sale is technically invalid, Bacaquio
remained, in law, the owner of the land until his death in 1943, when his title
passed on, by the law on succession, to his heirs, the plaintiffs-appellants.

Notwithstanding the errors aforementioned in the appealed decision, we are of the opinion that the
judgment in favor of defendant-appellee Florendo Catalino must be
sustained.  For despite the invalidity of
his sale to Catalino Agyapao,
father of defendant-appellee, the vendor Bacaquio suffered the latter to enter, possess and enjoy
the land in question without protest, from 1928 to 1943, when the seller died;
and the appellants, in turn, while succeeding the deceased, also remained
inactive, without taking any step to reivindicate the
lot from 1944 to 1962, when the present suit was commenced in court. 
Even granting appellants’ proposition that no prescription lies against
their father’s recorded title, their passivity and inaction for more than 34
years (1928-1962) justifies the
defendant-appellee in setting up the equit­able
defense of laches in his own behalf.  As a result, the action of plaintiffs-appellants
must be considered barred and the Court below correctly so held.  Courts can not look with favor at
parties who, by their silence, delay and inaction, knowingly induce another to
spend time, effort and expense in cultivating the land, paying taxes and making
improvements thereon for 30 long years, only to spring from ambush and claim
title when the possessor’s efforts and the rise of land values offer an
opportunity to make easy profit at his expense. 
In Mejia de Lucas vs. Gamponia, 100 Phil. 277,
281, this Court laid down a rule that is here squarely applicable:

“Upon a careful consideration of the facts and circumstances,
we are constrained to find, however, that while no legal defense to the action
lies, an equitable one lies in favor of the defendant and that is, the
equitable defense of laches.  We hold that the defense of prescription or
adverse possession in derogation of the title of the registered owner Domingo
Mejia does not lie, but that of the equitable defense of laches.  Otherwise
stated, we hold that while defendant may not be considered as having acquired
title by virtue of his and his predecessors’ long continued possession for 37
years, the original owner’s right to recover back the possession of the
property and title thereto from the defendant has, by the long period of 37
years and by patentee’s inaction and neglect, been converted into a stale
demand.”

As in the Gamponia case, the
faro elements of laches^[3]
are present in the case at bar, namely: 
(a) conduct on the part of the defendant, or of one under whom he
claims, giving rise to the situation of which complaint is made and for which the complaint seeks a remedy; (b) delay
in asserting the complainant’s rights, the complainant having had knowl­edge or
notice, of the defendant’s conduct and having been afforded an opportunity to
institute a suit; (c) lack of knowledge or notice on the part of the defendant
that the complainant would assert the right on which he bases his suit; and (d)
injury or prejudice to the defendant in the event relief is accorded to the
complainant, or the suit is not held to be barred.  In the case at bar, Bacaquio
sold the land in 1928 but the sale is void for lack of the governor’s
approval.  The vendor, and also his
heirs after him, could have instituted an action to annul the sale from that
tine, since they knew of the invalidity of the sale, which is a matter of law;
they did not have to wait for 34 years
to institute suit.  The defendant was
made to feel secure in the belief that no action would be filed against him by
such passivity, and also because he “bought” again the land in 1949
from Grace Ventura who alone tried to question his ownership; so that the
defendant will be plainly prejudiced in the event the present action is not
held to be barred.

The difference between prescription and lathes was elaborated in
Nielson & Co., Inc. vs. Lepanto Consolidated Mining
Co., L-21601, 17 December 1966, 18 SCRA p. 1040, as follows:

“Appellee is correct in its
contention that the defense of laches applies
independently of prescription.  Laches is different from the statute of limitations.  Prescription is concerned with the fact of
delay, whereas laches is concerned with the effect of
delay.  Prescription is a matter of time;
laches is principally a question of inequity of
permitting a claim to be enforced, this inequity being founded on some change
in the condition of the property or the relation of the parties.  Prescription is statutory; laches is
not.  Laches applies in equity, whereas
prescription applies at law. 
Prescription is based on fixed
time, laches is not. 
(30 C.J.S., p. 522; See
also Pomeroy’s Equity
Jurisprudence, Vol. 2, 5th ed., p. 177).” (18 SCRA
1053).

With reference to appellant Grace Ventura, it is well to remark
that her situation is even worse than that of her co-heirs and co-plaintiffs,
in view of her executing an affidavit of transfer (Exh.
6) attesting under oath to her having sold the land in controversy to herein
defendant-appellee, and the lower Court’s finding
that in 1949 she was paid P300.00 for it, because she, “being a smart
woman of enterprise, threatened to cause trouble if the defendant failed to
give her P300.00 more, because her stand (of being the owner of the land) was
buttressed by the fact that Original Certificate of Title No. 31 is still in
the name of her father, Bacaquio” (Decision, Record
on Appeal, p. 24).  This sale, that was
in fact a quitclaim, may not be contested as needing executive approval; for it
has not been shown that Grace Ventura is a non-Christian inhabitant like her
father, an essential fact that cannot be assumed (Sale de Porkan
vs. Yatco, 70 Phil, 161,175).

Since the plaintiffs-appellants are barred from recovery, their
divestiture of all the elements of ownership in the land is complete; and the
Court a quo was justified in ordering that Bacaquio’s, oiginal certificate
be cancelled, and a new transfer certificate in the name of Florendo
Catalino be issued in lieu thereof by the Register of Deeds.

FOR THE FOREGOING REASONS, the appealed decision is hereby
affirmed, with costs against the plaintiffs-appellants.

Concepcion, C.J., Dizon,
Makalintal, Zaldivar, Sanchez,
Fernando, and Capistrano, JJ., concur.

Castro, J., did not take part.

^[1]
No surname.

^[2]
Local custom in the place is for a person to adopt a surname of
his choice, even if it is not that of the father, if he has any.  (Decision, Record on Appeal, p. 17).

^[3]
See Go Chi Gun vs. Co Cho, 96 Phil. 622; Mejia
vs. Gamponia, ante.