MADRIGAL SHIPPING CO., PETITIONER, VS. MONICA MELAD, FRANCISCA SICCUAN, JUANA SICCUAN, BARBARA TULIAO, PLACIDA DE LA CRUZ, APARRI PILOT’S ASSOCIATION AND WORKMEN’S COMPENSATION …

The S.S. “Cetus” was owned and operated by petitioner Madrigal Shipping Co.,
Inc. On November 25, 1955, it left the port of Aparri for Manila. However, after
sailing five miles, the officers of the ship decided to return to the port of
Aparri for repair of its rudder. For this purpose, the Captain sent Jua Siong
Kong Ho, Inc., the ship’s agent in Aparri, a telegram with instruction to
“PLEASE ADVISE PILOT WILL ENTER AGAIN FOR RUDDER REPAIR.”

Accordingly, the agent informed the Aparri Pilots’ Association of the
contents of the telegram and, forthwith, Primitivo Siccuan, chief pilot, and
Francisco Ricerra, Ricerra; district pilot, of pilots association, made
arrangements with Filoteo Siccuah and Domingo Batta to take them by  boat to
the ship in distress.

The party reached the ship about past 12 midnight of Novemoer 25. Primitivo
Siccuan, Francisco Ricerra and Filoteo Siccuan boarded the ship while Domingo
Batta remained on the boat. At about 2:30 a.m., November 26, the ship sank on
account of heavy waves. The boat was also lost. Among those who perished in the
tragedy were Primitivo Siccuan, Francisco Ricerra, Filoteo Siccuan and Domingo
Batta.

In due time, four claims were filed in the Workmen’s Compensation Commission
against petitioner. Upon the creation by Reorganization Plan 20~A of. Regional
Offices in the Department of Labor, these cases were transferred to Regional
Office No. 2, which, after hearing, made an award ordering petitioner to pay the
claimants the following :

“1. To the heirs and dependents of decedent FRANCISCO RICERRA, the sum of
FOUR THOUSAND PESOS (P4,000,00), the maximum amount allowed by law, which should
be divided among them; .

“2. To the heirs and dependents of decedent FILOTEO SICCUAN, the sum of
FOUR THOUSAND PESOS (P4,000.00), the maximum amount allowed by law, which
should be divided among them;

“3. To the heirs and dependents of decedent PRIMITIVO SICCUAN, the sum FOUR THOUSAND PESOS (P4,000.00), the maximum amount allowed by law, which should bo
divided among them;

“4. To the widow and dependent of decedent DOMINGO BATTA, the sum of ONE THOUSAND SEVEN HUNDRED TWENTY FIVE PESOS AND TWELVE CENTAVOS (P1,725.12),
which includes burial expenses.

“5. To this office, the sum of One Hundred Forty-One Pesos Only (P141.00),
pursuant to Section 55 of said Act.”

This award was affirmed by Associate Commissioner Jose Sanchez and later by
the Workmen’s, Compensation Commission sitting en banc. Hence, this petition for
review, petitioner contending in seven assignments of errors:

1. That the hearing officer of Regional Office No. 2 had no jurisdiction to
decide these cases;

2. That there was no employer-employee relationship between it (petitioner)
and the persons for whose death these claims were filed; and

3. That some of the respondents were not the depend­ents of Primitivo Siccuan
and Domingo Batta, as the term dependents is used in the law.

With regard to the first point, petitioner argues that Reorganization Plan
20-A, which confers jurisdiction to hear workmen’s compensation claims on
Regional Offices of the Department of Labor, is unconstitutional.

The contention is without merit. As this Court held in San Miguel Brewery,
Inc. vs. Sobremesana, et al., G.R. No. L-18730, September 16, 1961,

“Petitioner argues incorrectly that our previous rulings (Corominas vs. Labor
Standards Commission, G.R. No. L-14837, and related cases decided June 20, 1961)
held null and void Reorganization Plan 20-A in so far as it vests the Regional
Offices of the Department of Labor with original and exclusive jurisdiction to
try and decide labor claims including worhnen’s compensation claims. This Court
never ruled that the Regional Offices have no authority to pass upon workmen’s
compensation claims under Plan 20-A; on the contrary, in our decisions in the
ease of Miller vs. Mardo, G. R. No. L-15138, and related cases, promulgated on
July 31, 1961, we said:

“On the basis of the foregoing consideration, we hold and declare that
Reorganization Plan No. 20-A, insofar as it confers judicial power to the
Regional Offices over cases other than those falling under the Workmen’s
Compensation Law, is invalid and of no effect. (Italics supplied)

“The reason for the ruling is that, as pointed out. in the same cases, the
consideration and adjudication of claims under the Work­men’s Compensation Law
was already being exercised by the Department of Labor’s Compensation Commission
even prior to its reorganization under Plan 20-A. In conferring initial power to
hear and decide such claims upon the hearing officers of the Department’s
Regional Offices, section 25 of Plan 20-A was merely reallocating powers already
possessed by the Department, and was in conformity with the authority granted by
section 6 of Republic Act 997 aa amended by Republic Act No. 1241. There was in
the particular case no assumption of powers not previously vested in the
Department, and, therefore, no transgression of the reorganizational authority
and purposes of the enabling laws.”

This ruling was reiterated in later cases.^[1]

Anent the second point, Section 2 of the
Workmen’s Compensation Law (Act No. 3428, as amended) provides:

“When an employee suffers personal injury from any accident arising out of
and in the course of his employment, or contracts tuberculosis or other illness
dicectly caused by such employment, or either aggravated by or the result of
the nature of such employment, his employer shall pay compensation in the sums
and to the person hereinafter specified. * * *.”

As may be noted from the above-quoted provision, the existence of
employer-employee relationship is the jurisdictional foundation for recovery
under the law. (Asia Steel Corp. vs.
Workmen’s Compensation Commission, et al., G. R. No. L-7638, June 27, 1955).
Hence, the question is: Was there such a relationship between petitioner, on
the one hand, and Primitivo Siccuan, Francisco Ricerra, Filoteo Siccuan and
Domingo Batta, on the other? Petitioner contends that there was none for the
following reasons:

1. Because its pilotage contract was with the Aparri Pilots’ Association
and.not with the members thereof;

2. Because the salaries of the pilots were paid not by petitioner but by the
association;

3. Because petitioner had no control over the action of the chief pilot and
district pilot; and

4. Because the services of Filoteo Siccuan and Domingo Batta were contracted
by the pilots’ association and not by the petitioner.

Petitioner’s claim lacks merit. As pointed out by the Workmen’s Compensation
Commission, Primitivo Siccuan and Francisco Ricerra were members of the Aparri
Pilots’ Association not its employees. While it is true that their salaries were
paid by the association, yet it is equally true that the same were taken out of
the pilotage fees paid by the vessels. The pilots’ association cannot be
con­sidered an independent contractor so as to free the petitioner from the
liability of an employer because it appears to have neither capital nor money to
pay its employees nor does it appear to have filed a bond.. (Madrigal Shipping
Co., Inc. vs. Workmen’s Compensation Com­mission, et al., G. R. No. L-17395,
June 29, 1962; Caro vs. Rilloraza, et al., 102 Phil., 61.)

The claim that petitioner had no right of control over the work of the pilots
is based on Customs Administrative Order No. 26 (Nov. 28, 1946) which provides
as follows:

“Par. XLIII. A pilot shall be held responsible for the direction of a vessel
from the time he assumes control thereof until he leaves it anchored free from
shoal; Provided, That his responsibility shall cease at the moment
the master neglects or refuses to carry his instruction” (Italic ours)

Petitioner misreads the provision in question, for while it says that a pilot
is responsible for the direction of the vessel from the moment he assumes
control of the same, the provision nevertheless makes the conduct of the pilot
subject to approval by the master of the vessel. That is why it relieves the
pilot of responsibility if his action is disapproved by the master of the
vessel.

Besides, as the Commission held Customs Administrative Order No. 69 (Oct 1,
1948), likewise invoked by petitioner, shows that coast pilots are employed by
the vessels needing their services. Thus, it provides:

“Any vessel employing, a coast pilot between pilotage
districts shall pay the prescribed compulsory or optional pilotage fee lo the
pilots’ association within whose jurisdictional waters any part of said
service may be rendered and any vessel employing a district pilot from one
pilotage district to another in addition to the payment provided for in
paragraph II, shall pay to the association in the district or in which such
vessel is piloted, the compulsory pilot­age fee provided for said district.”
(Italics ours)

In some respects, this case. is similar to the case of Martha Lumber Mill,
Inc. vs. Lagradante, et al., 99 Phil. 434; 52 Off.. Gaz., No. 9, 4230. In the
latter case, the deceased was appointed by the Department of Agriculture and
Natural Resources pursuant to the following provisions of Forestry
Administrative Order No. 11 (Sept. 11, 1934) :

“34(s) Within thirty (30) days from the date of the issuance of a
license, and after the terms and conditions of said license had been duly
accepted in their entirety by the license concerned, at least one concession
guard, if so required in the license, shall be employed by said licenses. The
name and address of the concession guard so employed shall be reported to the
local forest office under whose jurisdiction the license area falls. The
concession guard, whose salary will be paid him directly by the licensee,
shall from time to time, report to the herein mentioned forest officer for
instruction regarding his duties and obligations to patrol and cooperate
with the government in the protection of the area of the licensee employing him”

His appointment by the Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources and his
being under the supervision and control of that department notwithstanding, this
Court held the Concession guard to be an employee of licensee.

Petitioner also
argues that, even assuming that Primitivo Siccuan and Francisco Ricerra were its
employees within the purview of the law, yet the same cannot be said of Filoteo
Siccuan and Domingo Batta, sounder and carsman, respectively, because these two
were employed not by petitioner but by the pilots’ association. But it is a
fact that the services of the two were needed so that the pilots could be
taken to the S.S. “Cetus.” It is well settled that a person who is asked for
help in an emergency which threatens the employer’s interests becomes an
employee under an implied, contract of hire. (I Larson, Workmen’s Compensation
Law, sec. 47.42 (c) 699; I Schneider, Workmen’s Compensation Text, sec. 234,
627) Here, as stated in the beginning, the S.S. “Cetus” had to return to port
for a needed repair of ite rudder. Losing no time, the pilots engaged the
services of Filoteo Siccuan and Domingo Batta to take them to the ship in
trouble. It is under these circumstances that We held the sounder and the
oarsman to be employees of the petitioner.

Viewing from another point the relationship of the petitioner with the
victims, We hold that even granting that the Aparri Pilots’ Association was an
independent contractor and that the deceased were its employees, still the
result would be the same. Section 39 of the Work­men’s Compensation Act provides
in part:

“In this Act, unless the context indicates otherwise, the
definition of various words used therein shall be as follows:

(a)
‘Employer’ includes every person or association of persons, incorporated or not,
public or private, and the legal representative of the deceased employer. It
includes the owner or lessee of a factory or establishment or place of work at
any other person who is virtually the owner or manager of the business carried
on in the establishment or place of work but who, for the reason that there is
an independent contractor in the same, or for any other reason, is not the direct
employer of laborers employed there.

(b) ‘Laborer’ is used as a synonym
of ‘Employee’ and means every person who has entered the employment of, or
works under a service or apprenticeship contract for an employer. It does not
include a person whose employment is purely casual and is not for the purposes
of the occupation or business of the employer. Any refeience to a laborer
injured shall, in case he dies, include a ref­erence to the person dependent on
him, as defined in this Act, if the context so requires, or, if the employee is
a minor or incapacitated, to his guardian ot nearest of kin. * *
*”

Construing this provision, We held in De los Santos vs. Javier, 58
Phil., 82; that although the owner of the factory is not the direct employer of
the laborers employed therein because there is an independent contractor in the
factor, the owner of the factory is nevertheless to be considered for the
purposes of the law as the employer of the laborers working under the
independent contractor, as long as the work is for the purposes of the business
of the owner.^[2]

Certainly, the
pilotage of the ship so that it could enter poit for necessary repair was in the
usual course of the business of the petitioner in the same way that the repair
of the window railing of a building intended for rent (Caro vs. Rilloraza, et
al., 102 Phil., 61) and the construction of a mezzanine floor of a hotel
(Shellborne Hotel vs. de Leon, G. R. No. L-9149, May 31, 1957) have been
held for the purpose of the owner’s business.

Our conclusion upon this
point is in accord with the doctrine that the Workmen’s. Compensation Law should
be construed fairly, reasonably, or liberally in favor of and for the benefit of
employees and their dependents and all doubt as to right of compensation
resolved in their favor and all presumption indulged in their favor. (Caro vs.
Rilloraza, et al., 102, Phil., 61; Francisco vs. Consing, 63 Phil., 354)

And now We come to the last point. It is contended that the claimants of
Primitivo Siccuan, who are his children, have all reached the age of 18 and
therefore cannot be considered dependents under Section 9. But We find that the
Commission modified the decision of the hearing officer and instead gave the
award to Primitivo Siccuan’s grandchildren to whom the Commission directed the
amount of P4,0000.00, to be divided equally. The Commission’s finding that the
grandchildren were dependent on Primitivo Siccuan is one of fact which We will
not review unless shown to be without support in evidence.

Petitioner
does not explain in what way proof of respondent Placida de la Cruz’ marriage to
Domingo Batta is not satisfactory. The same goes with respect to the claim that
there is no evidence as to the amount of wages of the deceased. Hence We shall
not pass upon these points.

Wherefore, the decision of the Workmen’s
Compensation Commission is affirmed, with costs against
petitioner.

Bengzon, C. J, Padilla, Bautista Angela, Concepcion,
Reyes, J.B.L., Barrera, Paredes, Dizon, and Makalintal, JJ.,
concur.

---

^[1] La Mallorca, et al. vs. Ramos, et
al., G.R. No. L-15746, Sept. 19, 1961; Madrigal Shipping Co., Inc. vs. Workmen’s
Compensation Commision, et al., G.R. L-17495, June 29, 1962.

^[2] See also Philippine Mfg. Co. us.
Geronimo, 96 Phil., 276; Caro vs. Rilloraza, et al., 102 Phil., 61.