ANTONIO NARITO, PETITIONER, VS. JOSE CARRIDO, RESPONDENT.

Before us is a petition brought by Antonio Narito
to set aside the resolutions of the Court of Appeals of February 6, 1967,^[1]
March 2, 1967,^[2]
and May 31, 1967.^[3]
In a separate petition Narito prayed that he be
allowed to litigate as pauper before this Court, which we granted in our
resolution of July 18, 1967.

The petitioner was the defendant in civil case L-25 of Branch V
of the Court of First Instance of Camarines Sur, entitled “Jose Carrido,
Plaintiff vs. Antonio Narito, Defendant.”
Judgment was rendered against Narito in the said
case; he then appealed to the Court of Appeals where the case
was docketed as CA-G.R. 38782-R.  He received a
notice from the clerk of the said court requiring him, within the specified
time, to pay the appellate docket fee and to file forty copies of the printed
record on appeal.  He paid the docket fee
of P53, but claiming to be old and a very poor man, he prayed that the Court of
Appeals allow him to file a typewritten or mimeographed record on appeal, which
request was denied in the resolution of February
6, 1967.  His subsequent
motions to have the Court of Appeals reconsider its action were likewise
denied, the court reiterating its order that he file a printed record on
appeal.

In support of his petition to be granted the privilege to liti­gate
before the Court of Appeals as a pauper, the petitioner alleges he is already
67 years old and is a very poor man with a family to support; that his property
consists of a very small parcel of land planted to coconuts containing an area
of about two hectares and assessed at P200, from which he can gather only
“very few nuts” due to recent typhoons in the province of Camarines Sur which destroyed
about 100 fruit-bearing coconut trees on his land; that he would find it
difficult, if not impossible, to raise the amount of P250 to cover the cost of
printing a record on appeal, as he can hardly afford to buy rice to feed his
family, substituting therefor root crops like camote and banana; and that our Constitution provides that
a man should not be deprived of the right to free access to the courts by
reason of poverty.

On July 18, 1967
this Court allowed the petitioner to litigate as a pauper before it,^[4]
and required the respondent Court of Appeals to file an answer to the petition.^[5]

On August 3, 1967 the Court of Appeals filed its answer, denying
the statements made in the petition that there were “several typhoons”
that swept the Bicol region which destroyed coconut
trees on the two-hectare land possessed by the petitioner, and that the latter
has obtained the services of his lawyer for free, the truth being that the
petitioner paid his lawyer P400 in attorney’s fees as found by the lower
court.  As special defenses, the
respondent court averred that the petitioner is not as impecunious as he claims
to be, as he is the owner and is in possession of a two-hectare co­conut land;
that he is likewise in possession of the two parcels of land subject of the
litigation below with a total area of more than 2-1/2 hectares planted to
coconuts and bananas, whose products he has been appropriating, including the
plaintiff-appellee’s share therein; that the harvest
of coconuts takes place three to four times a year; that the petitioner not
being really poor, the constitutional provision that no person shall be denied
access to courts due to poverty may not be invoked by him; that granting, arguendo, that the petitioner is a poor man, his
motion to appeal as pauper should have been filed with the lower court.

It is noteworthy that the petitioner made no attempt to controvert
the special defenses set forth by the respondent Court, particularly those
alleging his ownership and possession of the 2-1/2 hectares of land from which
he allegedly derives three or four harvests of coconuts a year; and that he had
paid his lawyer the amount of P400
in attorney’s fees.  The respondent
court’s defense tending as it does to destroy the petitioner’s claim to
poverty, the latter should have incurred no delay in disputing its allegations,
nor overlooked his duty to make immediate reply thereto if he is to convince
this Court of the merit of his claim.

However, without going into the merits of the petitioner’s prayer
that he be considered a pauper for the reasons
advanced by him, it is our considered view that his present petition does not
merit serious consideration.  For the
Rules provide in no uncertain terms that the trial court, not the appellate
court, is the proper forum to ventilate one’s claim to be allowed to litigate
as a pauper.  Thus section 16, Rule 41,
provides:

“Where a party desiring to appeal shall establish to the
satisfaction of the trial court that he is a pauper and unable to pay the
expenses of prosecuting the appeal, and that the case is of such importance, by
reason of the amount involved, or the nature of the question raised, that it
ought to be reviewed by the appellate court, the trial judge may enter an order
entitling the party to appeal as pauper. 
The clerk shall transmit to the appellate court the entire record of the
case, including the evidence taken on trial and the record on appeal, and the
case shall be heard in the appellate court upon the original record so
transmitted without printing the same.

“A petition to be allowed to appeal as pauper shall not be
entertained by the appellate court.”

Even before the adoption of the Revised Rules, this Court had
uniformly frowned upon appellate courts entertaining petitions to appeal as
pauper, holding that the task of determining the merits of such petitions
properly devolves upon the trial court, even though the old Rules contained no
provision, as does the present one, expressly withholding from an appellate
court the right to entertain petitions to appeal as pauper.  The reason behind the policy is that whether
a party-litigant is so poor as to qualify him to litigate as a pauper, is a question of fact which can best be determined
by a trial court.  This was explicitly
explained in this Court’s resolution of September
4, 1951, dismissing a motion for reconsidera­tion filed by the
plaintiffs-appellants in G.R. L-4998, Jose Alcan­tara,
et al. v. Mariano Tuazon y de
la Paz, et al., thus:

“A petition to be allowed to appeal as pauper cannot be
entertained by this Court as appellate court. 
Such petition must be filed with the trial court under section 16, Rule
41, of the Rules of Court.  The reason is that the
trial court is the court which may properly decide or pass upon the question of
fact, which may require presentation of evidence, whether the appellant is
pauper and may appeal as such, and whether the case is of such importance that,
by reason not only of the amount involved but of the nature of the question raised
in the court below, it ought to be reviewed by the appellate court.  It is not for this Court to examine the facts
and law of the case for the first time in order to pass upon this last
requirement.”

There is not even the least pretense that the petitioner had
asked, much less was allowed by, the
trial court to prosecute his defense therein as a pauper, and that the
permission stood unrevoked when he interposed his
appeal to the Court of Appeals, so as to entitle him to continue litigating as
a pauper, on the strength of Comia vs.
Judge Castillo, 75 Phil. 526.

ACCORDINGLY, the present petition is denied.  No costs.

Concepcion, C.J., Reyes, J.B.L., Dizon, Makalintal, Sanchez,
Fernando, Capistrano, Teehankee, and Barredo, JJ., concur.

Zaldivar, J., is on official leave.

^[1]
Denying petitioner’s motion to file only typewritten record
on appeal and brief, and requiring him to file printed copies thereof.

^[2]
Denying motion to reconsider resolution of February 6, 1967.

^[3]
Denying motion to reconsider resolution of March 2, 1967, to admit 15
mimeographed copies of appellant’s record on appeal, and to give due course to
his appeal.

^[4]
Permission was given on the basis of petitioner’s verified petition supported
by an affidavit executed by the Assistant Provincial Assessor of Camarines Sur (annex A).

^[5]
This Court treats the petition, considering its allegations, as an original
action brought before it.  See Acar v. Hon. Rosal,
L-21707, March 18, 1967, for authority of this Court to issue writs of certiorari and mandamus to compel a trial court to allow a party to
litigate as pauper.