LESELDA M. PAGUNTALAN, PETITIONER-APPELLEE, VS. THE LOCAL CIVIL REGISTRAR, RESPONDENT, REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES, OPPOSITOR-APPELLANT.
HERNANDO, J:
On the basis of the foregoing, the Court finds that the allegations in the petition are true and correct. The Local Civil Registrar of Tanjay City is hereby directed to correct the following erroneous entries in the Birth record of Leselda Cuevas Macay, to wit:
a. The name of petitioner from LESELDA CUEVAS MACAY to LESELDA RIVAS MACAY;
c. and the name of mother from PORFERIA VELARDE CUEVb. date of birth from MARCH 17, 1974 to MARCH 17, 1975; AS to PORFERIA VELARDE RIVAS.
No other corrections are allowed.
The Antecedents:
Petitioner alleged that she had been using in good faith the name Leselda Rivas Macay, and that her mother’s name is Porferia Velarde Rivas and her date of birth, March 17, 1975. As evidence thereof, petitioner adduced several documents, such as, Baptismal Certificate[3], her sibilings’ Certificate of Live Birth[4], her mother’s Birth Certificate[5], her Official Transcript of Records[6] and Midwife’s Certificate[7] as well as the Marriage Contract[8] of her parents.
However, in petitioner’s Certificate of Live Birth[9], the reflected entries therein are the following: (1) Leselda Cuevas Macay when it should have been Leselda Rivas Macay; (2) date of birth was entered as March 17, 1974 instead of March 17, 1975; and (3) name of her mother appeared as Porferia Velarde Cuevas instead of Porferia Velarde Rivas.
Since the correction of the above-mentioned erroneous entries in her records requires judicial order, petitioner, thus, filed the corresponding Petition before the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Negros Oriental on March 3, 2010. She asserted that the filing thereof was not intended to evade any criminal or civil liability but only for purposes of making her records straight and to prevent further confusion as to her identity.
After finding the petition to be sufficient in form and substance, the RTC issued an Order dated March 4, 2010 setting the Petition for initial hearing on June 3, 2010 at 8:30 in the morning.
The said Order of the trial court was thereafter published[10] in Negros Chronicle, a weekly newspaper of general circulation in Negros Oriental and Siquijor and the cities of Dumaguete, Bais, Canlaon, Tanjay and Bayawan, in its March 21, 28 and April 4, 2010 issues.
On March 15, 2010, the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) entered its appearance as counsel for the Republic and deputized the Office of the City Prosecutor of Dumaguete City to assist it in the proceedings and to appear in all the hearings of the case in its behalf.
On June 3, 2010, the trial court issued an Order[11] authorizing the Clerk of Court for the reception of petitioner’s evidence. Thereafter, reception of evidence ensued. Petitioner Leselda M. Paguntalan testified to substantiate the material allegations in her petition. The City Prosecutor, on the other hand, acting in behalf of the Republic of the Philippines, did not present any evidence to controvert those of the petitioner.
On June 25, 2010, the RTC rendered a Decision granting the Petition and ordered that the necessary corrections be effected.
Hence, on July 22, 2010, the Republic, through the OSG, appealed the June 25, 2010 Decision of the RTC anchored on a lone assignment of error:
The Assigned Error[12]:
The court a quo erred in granting petitioner-appellee’s petition considering that the entries sought to be corrected in her Certificate of Live Birth can only be granted in an adversarial proceeding where her mother, an indispensable party, must be notified and impleaded as party to the case.
Court’s Ruling:
The petition is impressed with merit.
In essence, the OSG argues that the desired corrections sought by petitioner are substantial in nature and not mere clerical or innocuous errors. Hence, the petition could only be granted in an appropriate adversarial proceeding where the indispensable party must be notified and impleaded.
Indisputably, it has been settled in a number of cases starting with Republic v. Valencia[13], that even substantial errors in a civil registry may be corrected and the true facts established provided the parties aggrieved by the error avail themselves of the appropriate adversary proceeding.[14] The Supreme Court, in said case of Republic v. Valencia had this to say, thus:
It is undoubtedly true that if the subject matter of a petition is not for the correction of clerical errors of a harmless and innocuous nature, but one involving nationality or citizenship, which is indisputably substantial as well as controverted, affirmative relief cannot be granted in a proceeding summary in nature. However, it is also true that a right in law may be enforced and a wrong may be remedied as long as the appropriate remedy is used. This Court adheres to the principle that even substantial errors in a civil registry may be corrected and the true facts established provided the parties aggrieved by the error avail themselves of the appropriate adversary proceeding.
x x x x x x x x x
Accordingly, when a Petition for Cancellation or Correction of Entries in the Civil Registry under Rule 108 of the Rules of Court is filed, it can either be effected by way of a summary or adversary proceeding.
If the correction sought to be made in the civil register is clerical, then the procedure to be adopted is summary.[15] If the rectification affects the civil status, citizenship or nationality of a party, it is deemed substantial, and the procedure to be adopted is adversary.[16]
In the present case, before We can ascertain if indeed appellee availed of the appropriate remedy, there must first be a determination of whether or not the corrections sought by her are substantial in nature. Substantial or contentious alterations may be allowed only in adversarial proceedings, in which all interested parties are impleaded and due process is properly observed.[17] Otherwise, summary proceeding would suffice.
Summary proceeding may only be used to correct clerical, spelling, typographical and other innocuous errors in the civil registry. A clerical error is one which is visible to the eyes or obvious to the understanding; an error made by a clerk or a transcriber; a mistake in copying or writing, or a harmless change such as a correction of name that is clearly misspelled or of a misstatement of the occupation of the parent.[18]
Here, appellee sought the correction of her middle name, mother’s name and the date of her birth.
We recall that there are decided cases where the Supreme Court recognized the mistakes in the name as harmless error. These cases were cited in Republic v. Mercadera[19] where the High Court declared that:
Indeed, there are decided cases involving mistakes similar to Mercadera’s case which recognize the same a harmless error. In Yu v. Republic, it was held that “to change `Sincio’ to `Sencio’ which merely involves the substitution of the first vowel `i’ in the first name into the vowel `e’ amounts merely to the righting of a clerical error.” In Labayo-Rowe v. Republic, it was held that the change of petitioner’s name from “Beatriz Labayo/Beatriz Labayu” to “Emperatriz Labayo” was a mere innocuous alteration wherein a summary proceeding was appropriate. In Republic v. Court of Appeals, Jaime B. Caranto and Zenaida P. Caranto, the correction involved the substitution of the letters “ch” for the letter “d,” so that what appears as “Midael” as given name would read “Michael.” In the latter case, this Court, with the agreement of the Solicitor General, ruled that the error was plainly clerical, such that, “changing the name of the child from `Midael C. Mazon’ to `Michael C. Mazon’ cannot possibly cause any confusion, because both names can be read and pronounced with the same rhyme (tugma) and tone (tono, tunog, himig).” (Citations omitted)
In the Mercadera case, the Supreme Court likewise allowed the correction of the name “Marilyn” to “Merlyn”, it stated:
In this case, the use of the letter “a” for the letter “e,” and the deletion of the letter “i,” so that what appears as “Marilyn” would read as “Merlyn” is patently a rectification of a name that is clearly misspelled. The similarity between “Marilyn” and “Merlyn” may well be the object of a mix- up that blemished Mercadera’s Certificate of Live Birth until her adulthood, thus, her interest to correct the same.
In the present case, however, it is Our considered view that unlike in the above-mentioned cases, the names sought to be corrected in the present case could hardly qualify and considered as mere clerical error of an innocuous or harmless nature. Rather, the amendment sought are substantial and controversial which should be dealt with in a regular adversarial proceeding, instead of a summary proceeding.
Firstly, it must be stressed that unlike in the above-cited cases where the names sought to be corrected involved only the first and given names which generally do not affect substantial matters, the rectifications sought by appellee in the present case pertain to a surname. Although the change may not affect her legitimacy, it nevertheless involves her status in relation to her parents, particularly to her mother. This likewise holds true with respect to her date of birth. Necessarily, her mother must be impleaded or at least be notified of appellee’s petition and allowed to be heard before the proposed changes in the birth certificate are effected.
Secondly, it is well to note that Cuevas and Rivas are entirely two different surnames. While the two may probably sound alike or similar because of their last syllables, it would nonetheless be highly specious to make a conclusive finding absent conclusive proof that the surname “Cuevas” that was entered in appellee’s birth certificate as her middle name and her mother’s maiden surname, actually referred to “Rivas”. Consequently, the possibility that the change from “Cuevas” to “Rivas” would only create further confusion instead of making the records straight and aright cannot just be discounted.
Also, contrary to the belief of appellee, the pieces of documentary evidence that she adduced do not appear to establish indisputably that the errors were merely clerical or innucuous in nature to warrant summary rectifications or changes thereof. It is noteworthy that those several documents also contain some erroneous entries and discrepancies which concededly created more doubts and uncertainties.
This notwithstanding, it bears stressing that this is not to say that the errors reflected in appellee’s certificate of live birth could not be rectified. Rather, the correction of erroneous entries could be done but the same must be threshed out in an appropriate adversary proceeding. In the same case of Republic v. Valencia, the High Court explained the meaning of an appropriate adversary proceeding, thus:
What is meant by “appropriate adversary proceeding?” Black’s Law Dictionary defines “adversary proceeding as follows:
One having opposing parties; contested, as distinguished from an ex parte application, one of which the party seeking relief has given legal warning to the other party, and afforded the latter an opportunity to contest it. Excludes an adoption proceeding.” (Platt v. Magagnini, 187 p. 716, 718, 110 Was. 39).
x x x x x x x x x
Thus, Valencia requires that a petition for a substantial correction or change of entries in the civil registry should have as respondents the civil registrar, as well as all other persons who have or claim to have any interest that would be affected thereby.[20] It further mandates that a full hearing, not merely a summary proceeding, be conducted.[21]
Appellee for her part insists that the publication and posting of the notice of hearing in a newspaper of general circulation and the notices sent to the OSG and the Local Civil Registry are sufficient indicia of an adverse proceeding citing the case of Republic v. Mercadera to support her contention. Accordingly, considering that in the present case, the Order of Publication was duly complied with and the fact that the Local Civil Registrar of Tanjay City Negros Oriental and the Solicitor General were made parties to the petition, the proceedings below could therefore be considered as adversarial. Thus, appellee maintains that the fact that not a single oppositor appeared to contest the petition did not render the proceeding less adversarial.
We remain unpersuaded.
Republic v. Labrador[22] mandates that a petition for a substantial correction or change of entries in the civil registry should have as respondents the civil registrar, as well as all other persons who have or claim to have any interest that would be affected thereby.[23]
This was further reiterated in the 2004 case of Republic, et. al. v. Benemerito[24] which held that the corresponding petition should also implead as respondents the civil registrar and all other persons who may have or may claim to have any interest that would be affected thereby. In that case, the Supreme Court declared in no uncertain terms that a case does not amount to an adversarial proceeding simply because an opportunity to contest the petition was afforded by the publication of the petition in a newpaper of general circulation.
Also, in the more recent case of Republic v. Coseteng-Magpayo[25], citing Labayo-Rowe v. Republic[26], the Supreme Court once again emphasized that the publication of the notice of hearing of the petition does not change the nature of the proceeding into an adversarial one. It held:
Labayo-Rowe highlights the necessity of impleading indispensable parties in a petition which involves substantial and controversial alterations. In that case, the therein petitioner Emperatriz Labayo-Rowe (Emperatriz) filed a petition for the correction of entries in the birth certificates of her children, Vicente Miclat, Jr. and Victoria Miclat, in the Civil Registry of San Fernando, Pampanga. Emperatriz alleged that her name appearing in the birth certificates is Beatriz, which is her nickname, but her full name is Emperatriz; and her civil status appearing in the birth certificate of her daughter Victoria as “married” on “1953 Bulan” are erroneous because she was not married to Vicente Miclat who was the one who furnished the data in said birth certificate.
The trial court found merit in Emperatriz’s petition and accordingly directed the local civil registrar to change her name appearing in her children’s birth certificates from Beatriz to Emperatriz; and to correct her civil status in Victoria’s birth certificate from “married” to “single” and the date and place of marriage to “no marriage.”
On petition before this Court after the Court of Appeals found that the order of the trial court involved a question of law, the Court nullified the trial court’s order directing the change of Emperatriz’ civil status and the filiation of her child Victoria in light of the following observations:
x x x Aside from the Office of the Solicitor General, all other indispensable parties should have been made respondents. They include not only the declared father of the child but the child as well, together with the paternal grandparents, if any, as their hereditary rights would be adversely affected thereby. All other persons who may be affected by the change should be notified or represented. The truth is best ascertained under an adversary system of justice.
The right of the child Victoria to inherit from her parents would be substantially impaired if her status would be changed from “legitimate” to “illegitimate.” Moreover, she would be exposed to humiliation and embarrassment resulting from the stigma of an illegitimate filiation that she will bear thereafter. The fact that the notice of hearing of the petition was published in a newspaper of general circulation and notice thereof was served upon the State will not change the nature of the proceedings taken. Rule 108, like all the other provisions of the Rules of Court, was promulgated by the Supreme Court pursuant to its rule-making authority under Section 13, Article VIII of the 1973 Constitution, which directs that such rules “shall not diminish, increase or modify substantive rights.” If Rule 108 were to be extended beyond innocuous or harmless changes or corrections of errors which are visible to the eye or obvious to the understanding, so as to comprehend substantial and controversial alterations concerning citizenship, legitimacy of paternity or filiation, or legitimacy of marriage, without observing the proper proceedings as earlier mentioned, said rule would thereby become an unconstitutional exercise which would tend to increase or modify substantive rights. This situation is not contemplated under Article 412 of the Civil Code. (Emphasis supplied)
Based on the foregoing, it is therefore evident that the requirement of impleading not only the civil registrar but also the indispensable parties who may have interest in the petition and would be adversely affected by the grant thereof, is evidently necessary. And the failure to implead them is not cured by the subsequent publication of the notice of hearing of the petition.
Moreover, the reliance by the appellee on Barco v. Court of Appeals[27] is flawed. Unlike in the present case, there was an earnest attempt on the part of the petitioner in that case to include in her petition all the indispensable parties. Accordingly, those inadvertently excluded were deemed notified by the subsequent publication of the notice of hearing of the petition. The Supreme Court in said case declared that:
Undoubtedly, Barco is among the parties referred to in Section 3 of Rule 108. Her interest was affected by the petition for correction, as any judicial determination that June was the daughter of Armando would affect her ward’s share in the estate of her father. It cannot be established whether Nadina knew of Mary Joy’s existence at the time she filed the petition for correction. Indeed, doubt may always be cast as to whether a petitioner under Rule 108 would know of all the parties whose interests may be affected by the granting of a petition. For example, a petitioner cannot be presumed to be aware of all the legitimate or illegitimate offsprings of his/her spouse or paramour. The fact that Nadina amended her petition to implead Francisco and Gustilo indicates earnest effort on her part to comply with Section 3 as quoted above. (Emphasis supplied)
This pronouncement was further clarified in the case of Republic v. Coseteng-Magpayo where the High Court explained that:
What is clear then in Barco and Kho is the mandatory directive under Section 3 of Rule 108 to implead the civil registrar and the parties who would naturally and legally be affected by the grant of a petition for correction or cancellation of entries. Non-impleading, however, as party-respondent of one who is inadvertently left out or is not established to be known by the petitioner to be affected by the grant of the petition or actually participates in the proceeding is notified through publication.
In fine, when a petition for cancellation or correction of an entry in the civil register involves substantial and controversial alterations, a strict compliance with the requirements of Rule 108 of the Rules of Court is mandated.
WHEREFORE, in view of all the foregoing, the Republic’s appeal is GRANTED and the Decision dated June 25, 2010 of the Regional Trial Court (RTC), Branch 43 of Tanjay City, Negros Oriental in Sp. Proc. No. 361 is REVERSED and SET ASIDE. No pronouncement as to costs.
SO ORDERED.
Quijano-Padilla, and Azcarraga-Jacob, JJ., concur.
[1] Per Notice of Appeal; Rollo, pp. 63-66.
[2] Penned by Presiding Raphael B. Yrastorza, Sr.; Rollo, pp. 56-59.
[3] Exh. “G”; Record, p. 6.
[4] Exhibits “L” and “M”, respectively; Record, pp. 7-10.
[5] Exh. “E”; Record, p. 11.
[6] Exh. “H”; Record, p. 12.
[7] Exh. “I”; Record, p. 13.
[8] Exh. “K”; Record, pp. 25-26.
[9] Exh. “N”; Record, p. 5.
[10] Per Affidavit of Editor-Publisher Emmanuel P. Dejaresco, Exh. “F”; Record, p. 27 and Newspaper clippings dated April 4, 2010, March 28, 2010 and March 21, 2010, respectively.
[11] Record, p. 31.
[12] Rollo, Brief for the Oppositor-Appellant, p. 30.
[13] G.R. No. L-32181, March 5, 1986.
[14] Republic v. Uy, G.R. No. 198010, August 12, 2013.
[15] Republic v. Bautista and Sorensen, G.R. No. L-35316, October 26, 1987.
[16] Ibid.
[17] Braza, et. al v. The City Civil Registrar of Himamaylan City, et. al., G.R. No. 181174, December 04, 2009.
[18] Braza, et. al v. The City Civil Registrar of Himamaylan City, et. al., G.R. No. 181174, December 04, 2009.
[19] G.R. No. 186027, December 08, 2010.
[20] Republic v. Labrador, G.R. No. 132980, March 25, 1999.
[21] Ibid.
[22] G.R. No. 132980, March 25, 1999.
[23] Republic v. Coseting-Magpayo, G.R. No. 189476, February 02, 2011.
[24] G.R. No. 146963, March 15, 2004.
[25] G.R. No. 189476, February 2, 2011.
[26] G.R. No. L-53417, December 9, 1988.
[27] G.R. No. 120587, January 20, 2004.