GO OH, HELEN GOOH, JAMES GOOH, WILLIAM GOOH, HENRY GOOH, THE LAST FOUR AS REPRESENTED BY GO OH, PETITIONERS-APPELLEES, VS. MARTINIANO VIVO, VIRGILIO GASTON AND MARCIAL RAÑOLA, I…

Appeal by respondents Martiniano Vivo, Virgilio Gaston and Marcial Rañola, in their capacity as Commissioner and Associate
Commissioners of Immigration, respectively, from a decision of the Court of
First Instance of Manila, the dispositive part of
which reads:

“x x x in
view of the foregoing considerations, the petition is hereby granted and judgment
is ren­dered –

“(1) Declaring
the decisions of the Board of Special Inquiry dated September 8, 1962 and of
the Board of Commissioners dated December 20, 1962 null and void;

“(2)
Prohibiting permanently the respondents and their subordinates from arresting
and excluding the petitioners Go Oh and her minor children Helen, James, William and Henry all surnamed Gooh from the Philippines, and making permanent the writ of
preliminary injunction heretofore issued.

“Without pronouncement as to costs.”

It is not disputed that on January 1, 1962, herein petitioners Go
Oh and Helen, James, William and Henry, all surnamed Go Oh, arrived in the
Philippines from Hongkong with certificates of regis­tration
and identity Nos. 1061 to 1065 issued by the Philippine Con­sulate in Hongkong.  On August 2, 1962, a Board of Special
Inquiry of the Bureau of Immigration conducted an investigation to deter­mine
petitioners’ political status.  After
such investigation, the Board rendered, on September 8, 1962, a decision excluding the petitioners
from the Philippines.  Pertinent parts of said decision are of the
following tenor:

“So it is that Go Oh and her children rely for their admission
on the Philippine citizenship of Go Oh’s alleged
father, Paulino Roon, but
it is a funda­mental concept of our immigration laws and regula­tions that the
burden of proof lies with an applicant to prove her right to be admitted into
the Philippines on whatever ground such laws and regulations permit.  In the instant case, the herein applicants are
forced to lean upon the citizenship of a supposed father whose very status
himself as it now stands has toppled over into grave doubt. Go Oh and her
children cannot be expected to have a stronger claim than their very
predecessor.

“It has been argued, and as a matter of fact it has been made
the basis of an urgent motion to post­pone the present case indefinitely, that
the decision of this case should be held in abeyance pending the final
adjudication on the issue of Paulino Roon’s citi­zenship. 
The Board cannot sustain such an argument precisely for the reason
stated in the next preceding paragraph that Go Oh and her children have the onus
probandi of proving their right to
admission.  Further­more, what if the Paulino Roon case should drag on
from agency to agency and from court to court for ten years or more? Should the
Bureau of Immigration in the meantime sanction the questionable stay of the
herein applicants when the fact is they have never been legally admitted
before? The questions beg the answers.

“It should also be mentioned that the cancellation of the
alien registry of Go Len Sing, Go Chong Chiu and Go
Song Hiap^[1]
have likewise been set aside.  For the
time being, therefore, they hold no probative value in this case.  As for the certificates of registration and
identity issued by the Philippine Consulate General in Hongkong,
the events and circumstances of the last few months of 1961, the mad scramble
of alleged Phil­ippine citizens into the country duly equipped with similar
certificates, the scandal and the investigations now being conducted by police
and other agencies of the government, all these militate against giving
evidentiary credit to these highly unsound certificates.

“At most, Go Oh must now rely on her testimony to bolster her
right to admission.  And in this score
her declarations before the Board fail to satisfy the standards set up by the
rules on evidence and simple logic.  On
examination, she admitted that the minor applicants, her children allegedly,
have only come to use the names mentioned in the caption of this decision in
1961, the truth being that before then they have been using the names Tan Yan Hui, Tan Hong Yan, Tan Sui Lin and Tan Sit Lian, respectively. 
What does this ad­mission prove? 
Simply this:  that their names were
changed to make it appear that they are the natural or illegitimate children of
Go Oh in furtherance of an at­tempt to prove that Go Oh and her husband Tan Man
Eng were never legally married, and this on the in­formation that under
Philippine law illegitimate child­ren or natural ones follow the surname of
their putative mother.  This is exactly
the pattern followed in a mul­titude of cases that have come before the
official scru­tiny of this Board. 
Required to submit a record of birth of her children from the Hongkong Government, the suspicion noted above is further
corroborated by the entry in one such certificate that the minor now registered
as Henry Gooh was in fact registered at the time of
his birth in 1959 as Shek Lin, being the child of
Chan Man Loun and Ng Choi
Lam.  We note the idem sonans between Sit Lian
and Shek Lin. 
We also note with special attention that the same birth record makes
possible two or more conclusions, namely, that Go Oh’s
real name is Ng Choi Lam or that Henry Gooh, also known as Tan Sit Lian,
also known as Chan Shek Lin, is not the son of Go Oh!

“As we examine the true marital status of Go Oh and Tan Man
Eng, the Board finds that if we must be­lieve Go Oh’s
simple statement that she and the minor applicants’ father were not legally
married in the face of the above birth record, then we shall go
against fundamental presumptions in our civil law, among them that the
legitimacy of a child is presumed, and that all intendments of the law lean
toward the exist­ence and validity of a marriage.

“The Board is forced to observe at this juncture that there is
no civil registry of births, deaths and mar­riages in mainland China.  Neither, it seems, is there a distinct line
which separates common law marriage and ceremonial marriage. Under such a
system of civil intercourse and relationship dominated not by law but by
customs and practices outdating even Western civilization, a prober must perforce rely on testimony to ferret out such
matters as the existence or non­existence of a marriage.  By the evasive and general­ized answers of Go
Oh tending to parry the issue of whe­ther she married her co-applicants’ father or not,
the Board is not convinced that she is not actually married.  Thus, we must assume that Go Oh or Ng Choi Lam or by whatever other identity she is known was in
fact mar­ried to Tan Man Eng (Chan Man Loun), and in
the ab­sence of proof that her husband mentioned was a Filipino citizen, this
Board declares that Go Oh is likewise a Chinese subject thru marriage.

“FOR ALL THE FOREGOING REASONS, this Board of Special Inquiry
resolves to exclude Go Oh and her four co-applicants in view of her failure to
prove her claim to Philippine citizenship, and with Go Oh the failure of the
minors to prove any better right.”

On September 20, 1963,
petitioners received a letter of the Se­cretary of the Board of Commissioners,
Bureau of Immigration, dated December
20, 1962, enclosing therewith a copy of the decision of said Board,
dated December 20, 1962,
affirming that of the Board of Spe­cial Inquiry.  Said decision of the Board of Commissioners
was as follows:

“This case is now before this Board on review motu proprio
pursuant to the provision of Section 27(b) of the Philippine Immigration Act of
1940, as amended.

“The Board of Special Inquiry which heard the within
application for admission as Philippine citizens of GO OH, female, 29 years
old, and her alleged minor children, GO OH HELEN, 12 years old, GOOH JAMES, 8
years old, GOOH WILLIAM, 6 years old, and GOOH HENRY, 3 years old, in a decision,
dated September 8, 1962, decided to
exclude said subject-applicants for failure to prove their claim to Philippine
citizenship.  After a review of the
proceedings had on the applica­tion and the evidence presented in connection
there­with, this Board finds no basis to disturb the findings of the Board of
Special Inquiry for which reason, this Board hereby affirms the Decision of
said Board of Special Inquiry, dated September 8, 1962, and orders the
exclusion of subjects and their immediate removal to the port whence they came
on the first available transportation, in accordance with law.”

Together with said decision of the Board of Commissioners was a
“Warrant of Exclusion, ” likewise dated December 20, 1962, stating:

“WHEREAS, upon review motu proprio by the Board of Commissioners pursuant to
the provision of Section 27(b) of the Philippine Immigration Act of 1940, as
amended, of the proceedings had on the ap­plication for admission as Philippine
citizens of GO OH, female, 29 years old, GO OH HELEN, fe­male, 12 years old,
GOOH JAMES, male, 8 years old, GOOH WILLIAM, male, 6 years old, and GOOH HENRY,
male, 3 years old, finds no basis to
disturb the decision of the Board of Special Inquiry which heard the case and
which orders the exclusion of subjects;

“WHEREAS, the Board of Commissioners in a Decision dated December 20, 1962 affirms the Deci­sion
of the Board of Special Inquiry, dated September
8, 1962, excluding subjects from admission as Fili­pino citizens;

“AND WHEREAS, the Decision of the Board of Commissioners,
dated December 20, 1962
has now become final and executory;

“NOW THEREFORE, by virtue of the authority granted in the
undersigned by law, you are hereby ordered to exclude subjects and effect their
removal from this country on the first available transportation in accordance
with law.”

Soon after, or on September 28, 1963, petitioners herein filed,
with the Court of First Instance of Manila, a petition for certiorari
and prohibition with preliminary injunction against the Board of Commissioners,
praying, inter alia, that the
aforementioned deci­sion thereof be declared null and void; that petitioners be
declared entitled to reside in the
Philippines permanently; that respondents and their subordinates be prohibited
permanently from arresting and excluding the petitioners from the Philippines;
and that a writ of preliminary injunction be issued restraining respondents
from enforcing said decision during the pendency of
this case.  On Octo­ber
11, 1963, the lower
court issued the writ of preliminary injunc­tion prayed for and, subsequently,
or on July 15, 1965,
it rendered, after appropriate proceedings, the appealed decision in favor of
petitioners herein.

The main issues in this case are (1) whether petitioners have
been denied due process, owing to the fact that notice of the deci­sion of the
Board of Special Inquiry had not been served upon them prior to its affirmance by the Board of Commissioners, and (2) whe­ther
the Board of Commissioners had acted in excess of its juris­diction in affirming
said decision of the Board of Special Inquiry.

With respect to the first issue, it is not denied that
petitioners herein had been heard and had ample opportunity to introduce their
evidence before the Board of Special Inquiry. 
Their alleged denial of due process is predicated upon the failure to
give them notice of the decision of said Board, before it was reviewed motu proprio and
affirmed by the Board of Commissioners. 
Petitioners maintain that they were thus deprived of the opportunity to
interpose their own appeal before the Board of Commissioners.  Upon a review of the record, We are satisfied
that petitioners herein have not been denied due process.

Paragraphs (b) and (c) of Section 27 of Commonwealth Act No. 613,
as amended by Section 9 of Republic Act No. 503, provide:

“(b) A board of
special inquiry shall have author­ity (1) to determine whether an alien seeking
to enter or land in the Philippines shall be allowed to enter or land or shall
be excluded, and (2) to make its findings and recommendations in all the cases
provided for in section twenty-nine of this Act wherein the Commis­sioner of
Immigration may admit an alien who is other­wise inadmissible. For this
purpose, the board or any member thereof, may administer oaths and take evi­dence
and in case of necessity may issue subpoena and/or subpoena duces tecum.  The hearing of all cases brought before a
board of special inquiry shall be conducted
under rules of procedure to be prescribed by the Commissioner of Immigration.  The decision of any two members of the board
shall prevail and shall be final unless reversed on appeal by the Board of
Commissioners as hereafter stated, or, in the ab­sence of an appeal, unless
reversed by the Board of Commissioners after a review by it, motu proprio of the
entire proceedings within one year from the pro­mulgation of said
decision.  At the conclusion of the
hearing of any case, the board of special inquiry shall at once proceed to
deliberate and decide on the merits thereof. 
The decision shall be promulgated and the findings and recommendation,
in proper cases, sub­mitted not later than two days from the date of the
deliberation.  Should the board of
special inquiry need more time to make a written decision of findings and recommendation
in view of the nature of the case, the chairman thereof shall report the case
to the Commis­sioner of Immigration who may grant an extension of time if he
considers it necessary.

“(c) An alien
excluded by aboard of special in­quiry or a dissenting member thereof may
appeal to the Board of Commissioners, whose decision in the case shall be
final.  The decision on appeal shall be
put in writing and promulgated not less than seven days from the time the case
is submitted for decision.  In appeal cases,
the alien shall have the right to be re­presented by an attorney or counsel who
shall have access to the record of the board of special inquiry in the
particular case on appeal.”

Pursuant to these provisions, the decision of a Board of Spe­cial
Inquiry may be reviewed by the Board of Commissioners, either on appeal taken
by an alien excluded by said decision, or motu
pro­prio “within one year from the
promulgation of said decision.” The proceedings before the Board of
Special Inquiry “shall be conducted under the rules of procedure to be
prescribed by the Commissioner of Immigration,” pertinent provisions of
which are:

“When an alien is excluded by a board of special inquiry he
shall be advised of the decision together with the reason or reasons therefor; also of his right to ap­peal his case to the
Board of Commissioners.  In every case
the alien shall be furnished with a copy of the deci­sion upon promulgation
thereof.  If the applicant appeals, he
shall thereupon be informed of his right to be repre­sented by attorney or
counsel in prosecuting his appeal.  An
attorney or counsel representing an appellant shall have access to the records
of the proceedings of the board in the particular case, and may also appear in
person before the Board of Commissioners on behalf of his client.”
(Section 14)

“Appeals must be in writing and filed with the board of
special inquiry which decided the case, with­in forty-eight hours from the time
a copy of the deci­sion is furnished the applicant.  No appeal filed after this period shall be
accepted. ” (Section 16, subdivision B, Rule 2)

“The record of the hearing and all documents considered by a
board of special inquiry in reaching its decision shall be forwarded, within
two days from the date of notice of intention to appeal is filed, to the
Commissioner of Immigration for considera­tion by the Board of
Commissioners.” (Section 17)

Pursuant to these rules, an alien whose exclusion has been
ordered by a Board of Special Inquiry “shall be advised of the de­cision,
together with the reason or reasons therefor; also of
his right to appeal his case to the Board of Commissioners,” and the
appeal “must be in writing and filed with the board of special in­quiry x x within forty-eight hours from the time a copy of the de­cision
is furnished the applicant.” In the case at bar, it is conce­ded that
petitioners herein had no notice of said decision of the Board of Special
Inquiry until September 20, 1963, when they received the communication of the Secretary of the Board of Com­missioners
enclosing copy of the decision thereof dated December 20, 1962, affirming that
of the Board of Special Inquiry, dated Sep­tember 8, 1962.  Said decision of the Board of Commissioners
explicitly stated that “in a decision, dated September 8, 1962, ” the Board of Special Inquiry had
“decided to exclude” the petitioners “for failure to prove their
claim to Philippine citizenship.” This was sufficient notice of said
decision of the Board of Special Inquiry, so that, if pe­titioners wanted to
appeal therefrom, they could have done so within the
period prescribed in the aforementioned rules, but petitioners herein did not
do so.  As a consequence, said decision
of the Board of Special Inquiry has become final and executory,
owing to petition­ers’ failure to appeal therefrom or
to move that the decision of the Board of Commissioners be reconsidered or set
aside, so that they (petitioners) could appeal from the decision of the Board
of Special Inquiry.

The decision of the Board of Commissioners is assailed as null
and void, upon the ground that the authority of that Board to motu proprio review
the proceedings may be exercised only “within one year from the
promulgation” of the decision of the Board of Special Inquiry of September
8, 1962, or not later than September 8, 1963, and that notice of the decision
of the Board of Commis­sioners was not serve upon petitioners herein until
September 20, 1963, or twelve (12) days after the expiration of said
period.  The flaw in this argument is
manifest.  It is based upon the
assumption that the action of the Board of Commissioners is coetaneous with the
service of said notice, which is obviously false.

Moreover, the record shows that the Board of Commissioners had
gone over the records of the case and voted thereon on Decem­ber 20, 1962, or well
within the aforesaid period of one year from September 8, 1962. 
This fact has been fully established by the vot­ing slip of said Board,
by the testimony of its Secretary, Pio Noche, and by the Memorandum Exh.
H of Victor F. de Romas, the Chief of the Law and
Investigation Division of the Bureau of Immigration It is already settled that
“the operative date of the Commissioners action is that when the resolution of exclusion was voted and
adopted by them as a Board, regardless of the date when the decision in
extenso was prepared, written and
signed,” for, in the language of Mr. Justice J. B. L. Reyes:

“x x x the
decision in extenso must relate back to
the day the resolution to exclude was ac­tually adopted.  Necessarily, the extended opinion had to be posterior to the day when the
Commis­sioners voted and resolved to reverse the findings of the Board of
Special Inquiry.  The Secretary’s
certificate (Annex F, L-24853) shows that the Board of Immigration Commissioners
acted upon not less than eight immigration cases (including that of the Gatchalians) on July 6, 1962; and it was of course
impracticable to prepare and sign fully reasoned decisions in all these cases
on the same day. “

This view, expressed in Arocha v. Vivo,1 and Vivo v. Arca,2 was
reiterated in Neria v. Commissioner of Immigra­tion.3 What is more, the philosophy thereof was justified
in the Neria case, in which, referring to the Board
of Special Inquiry, Mr. Justice Castro,
speaking for the Court, said:

“If, as provided in section 12 above, ‘the result of the
deliberation [of the Board of Special Inquiry] shows that at least two members
vote for landing, a note thereof shall
be made and the alien shall, without waiting for the decision to
be put in writing, be released from custody’, then promulgation can take
place even before a decision is actually written and a copy thereof served upon
the alien.  Again, if, as provided in
section 14 above, ‘[i]n every case the alien
shall be furnished with a copy of the decision upon promulgation
there­of, then notice of a decision of the board shall be made only after or
upon promulgation, and not before.  In
both sections 12 and 14, therefore, promulgation always takes place before copy
of the written decision of the board is furnished to an alien.  Of course, section 12 contemplates an alien
who is under ‘custody’, while section 14 contemplates a case of an alien
‘excluded by a board of special in­quiry’. Nonetheless, there seems to be no
reason why the same rule would not apply to the case at bar, where the
petitioner, who was ‘unanimously voted’ for admission by the Board of Special
Inquiry No. 1, was at liberty pending the conclusion of the investigation of
his filiation and paternity to a Filipino
citizen.  And in any of these
circumstances, the date of promulgation is the date when the Board of Special
Inquiry in question voted and resolved to admit an alien, and this date can be
ascertained from the mi­nutes of the proceedings had before such board. x x.”

In short, the decision of the Board of Special Inquiry was re­viewed
and affirmed by the Board of Commissioners on December 20, 1962, or within the period prescribed by law
therefor. 
Hence, the decision of the Board of Commissioners is perfectly valid, ap­art
from the fact that, independently of said decision, that of the Board of
Special Inquiry may be deemed final and executory
owing to petitioners’ failure to appeal therefrom.

It may not be amiss to note, also, that petitioners have never
assailed the correctness of the findings made and the conclusions reached in
either decision. Referring to a comparable situation, in connection with taxes,
it has been held:

“Yet further, the confessed purpose of the mo­tion of April 9, 1940, condemns it, and the
action on it.  The legislative policy of
speeding the disposal of income tax controversies by limiting the time for
review cannot be thus nullified.  Aside
from the statement attributed to the Board member, the purpose of the procedure
is evident on the face of the motion. 
The sole reason it offered for vacating the decision was that a copy had
not been served.  It was not asserted
that the decision was incorrect or irregular in itself.  What sense would there be in vacating a
correct decision in order to serve another identical decision? x x x.” [Commis­sioner of
Internal Revenue v. Realty Operators, Inc., 118 F. 2d 286, 288-289.]

WHEREFORE, the decision of the lower court should be as it
is hereby reversed, and another shall be entered dismissing the petition herein
and dissolving the writ of preliminary injunction issued by the lower court,
with costs against herein peti­tioners-appellees.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Reyes, Dizon,
Makalintal, Zaldivar, Ruiz Castro,
Teehankee, Villamor, and Makasiar, JJ., concur.

Barredo, J., concurs in a separate opinion.

Fernando, J., reserves his vote.

^[1]
Alleged children of Paulino Roon
and alleged brothers of petitioner Go Oh.

1 L-24844, October 26, 1967.

2 L-24853, October 26, 1967.

3 L-24800, May 27, 1968.

Clean

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