IN THE MATTER OF THE PETITION OF MIGUEL CHUN ENG GO TO BE ADMITTED A CITIZEN OF THE PHILIPPINES.  MIGUEL CHUN ENG GO, PETITIONER-APPELLANT, VS. REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES, OPPO…

Miguel Chun Eng Go appeals from a decision of the Court of First
Instance of Cebu dismissing his petition for
admission to Philippine citizenship.

The petition alleges that the petitioner, a subject of
Nationalist China, was born in Manila on October 26, 1935; that he has
continuously resided in the Philippines for 24 years since birth; that at the
time of the filing of the petition, his residence was at No. 71 R.R. Landon
St., Cebu City and his former residence was at Sikatuna St., same city; that he is a purchasing agent of a
certain company where he de­rives an income of P2,400.00 a year; that he
is 
single, and can speak and write English and the Cebu-Visayan dialect; that, having been born in the Philip­pines,
he is entitled to the benefit conferred by Sec­tion 3 of Commonwealth Act 473,
which reduces the 10-year continuous residence requirement under paragraph 2,
section 2 of said law to 5 years; that he has all the qualifications for
naturalization and none of the disqualifications.

The evidence discloses that at the outbreak of the last World
War, when petitioner was about 6 to 7 years of age, he and his family evacuated
to D. Jako­salem, then moved to Catmon,
and finally to Paknaa-an, Mandawe,
all of the province of Cebu.  After libera­tion, petitioner resided at Sikatuna Street, Cebu City,
but in 1957, he came to Manila as a
student in an agri­cultural school and stayed with his grandparents at Antonio
Rivera Street, Manila for
four years.  Peti­tioner, however, did
not state all of the aforementioned places of former residence in his
petition.  With regard to residence, only
“No. 71 R.R. Landon St.”,
present residence, and “Sikatuna
Street”, former residence, were alleged.  In view of petitioner’s failure to allege all
of his former places of residence, the court a quo dis­missed his petition.

At this instance, petitioner contends that the lower court
incurred in error and urges the reversal of the appealed judgment.  The Solicitor General, who, in the court
below, opposed the petition, now joins the petitioner and recommends the grant
of Philippine citi­zenship.

A careful consideration of the facts and the law has persuaded us
to reject the petition and affirm the decision of the trial court.  In a petition for natural­ization, petitioner
should set forth not only his pre­sent place of residence but also his
“former places of residence”. 
(Section 7, Revised Naturalization Law) The statement of all the places
of residence, past and pre­sent, is required to inform the general public and
to enable it to register its protest through the administra­tive agencies of
the Government, if warranted, against petitioner’s desire to embrace
citizenship.  For peti­tioner to omit
some of his previous residences is to withhold full opportunity for intelligent
objection and virtually to defeat the purpose of the law.  (Lo vs. Republic, G. R. L-15919, May 19,
1961; Qua vs. Republic, G. R. L-19834, October 27, 1964; Go vs. Republic, G. R.
L-20558, March 31, 1965; Tan vs. Republic, G. R. L-22207, May 30, 1966)

Nor would petitioner be right by his contention that the
provision of Section 7 of the Revised Naturali­zation Law refers merely to
legal residence and not to physical or actual residence as well.  Bearing in mind the purpose of the law, which
is to accord a fair oppor­tunity for protest against naturalization by those
who know the applicant, it is not difficult to see that actual or physical
residence merits the same importance, if not indeed more, as legal
residence.  For, in whatever place the
applicant establishes his actual residence, there he evinces his conduct and
exhibits his acts.  The people around him
or those with whom he mingles, acquire an intimate
knowledge of his genuine personality and be­come better judges of his fitness
for citizenship.  On the other hand,
legal residence could be the place where the applicant seldom stays.  As a gauge of his real self, information
yielded by the legal residence could be illusory, for the people in such place
may gain but a superficial knowledge of the subject’s conduct and acti­vities,
which could be just an inkling of a few
of the many facets of
his life.  Considerations such as these
have impelled this Court to underscore the importance of alleging the actual or
physical residence.  “It is import­ant
that petitioner’s actual, physical residence be like­wise set forth and
published since information
regarding petitioner and objection to his application are apt to be provided by
people in his actual physical surrounding.” (Qua vs. Republic, supra)

In recommending the grant of citizenship to peti­tioner, the
Solicitor General urges that petitioner, by omitting to state all the places of
his former residence, did not falsify the truth or purposely try to conceal
vital information concerning his life. 
To be sure, no such imputations can be hurled at petitioner.  However, his failure to state all of his
previous residences has deprived the trial court of jurisdiction to hear and de­cide
the case.  Differently stated, the
inclusion of present and former places of residence in the petition is a
jurisdictional requirement, without which the peti­tion suffers from a fatal
and congenital defect which cannot be cured by evidence on the omitted matter
at the trial.  (Vide Lo vs. Republic, supra)

WHEREFORE, finding no error in the decision subject of
appeal, the same is hereby affirmed.

Reyes, JBL, Acting C.J., Makalintal, Bengzon, Zaldivar, Sanchez, Ruiz Castro
and Fernando, JJ.,
concur.

Concepcion, C.J., and Dizon, J., are on official leave.