HECTOR MORENO, PETITIONER VS. MACARIO TANGONAN, ET AL., RESPONDENTS.

Petition filed by Hector Moreno for a review of the decision of the
Court of Agrarian Relations in CAR Case No. 119-Gba.-59 entitled Hector
Moreno vs. Macario Tangonan and Eugenio Tagatac, of the following tenor:

“Wherefore, this case is hereby dismissed, and the petitioner is hereby
ordered to maintain the respondents herein in the peaceful possession
and cultivation of their respective landholdings, as share tenants,
with all the rights and obligations prescribed by law.”

Respondents Macario Tangonan and Eugenio Tagatac are tenants of
petitioner in his hacienda at Barrio Recuerdo, Nampicuan, Nueva Ecija,
under written contracts of tenancy executed on February 1, 1956, and
duly registered with the office of the municipal treasurer of Nampicuan
on June 26 of the same year. The period stipulated was from June 1,
1956, to May 81, 1957, and from year to year thereafter, unless notice
was given by either party to the other before the expiration of the
initial period agreed upon, or any year subsequent thereto. The sharing
ratio stipulated was 55-45, in favor of respondents, with both parties
equally bearing the expenses for final harrowing and transplanting. The
net harvest for the agricultural year 1956-1957 were divided
accordingly.

At the start of the following agricultural year 1957-1958, however,
respondents refused to renew their contracts aforementioned and
proceeded, instead, with the final harrowing and the transplanting on
their respective landholdings without asking for petitioner’s share of
said expenses in spite of the virtual offer thereof to them by the
latter’s overseer. In September, 1957, after said phases of cultivation
had been completed, respondents manifested their desire to change the
sharing ratio for that year (1957-1958) to 70-30 in their favor, as
they had shouldered all the expenses of cultivation. As petitioner did
not accede to their demand, respondents filed a petition with the Court
of Agrarian Relations (Case No. 870-NE-58) for the determination of the
proper sharing ratio for the year aforesaid. After proper proceedings
therein, said Court rendered judgment to the effect that the harvest
for the agricultural year 1957-1958 should be divided on the same
sharing ratio of 55-45 in favor of respondents, as in 1956-1957.

Subsequently, petitioner filed a petition with the Court of Agrarian
Relations seeking respondents’ ejectment from their respective
landholdings on the ground that they had violated and failed to
substantially comply with the terms and conditions of their tenancy
contracts by refusing to receive petitioner’s share of the expenses for
final harrowing and transplanting in the agricultural year
1957-1958—allegedly a sufficient legal ground for their ejectment under
Section 50, paragraph (b), of Republic Act No. 1199. After trial, the
Court rendered the decision appealed from.

It cannot be denied that respondents had the right to change the
crop-sharing ratio agreed upon (45-55) to 70-30, in their favor, at the
expiration of their contracts of tenancy on May 81, 1957. As the Court
of Agrarian Relations held, however, they attempted to exercise this
right too late—in September, 1957. It is to be noted, nevertheless,
that the same Court held that they acted in good faith. We agree
entirely with this conclusion, supported as it is by the
circumstance—fully established by the evidence— that, right from the
start of the agricultural year 1957-1958, respondents had refused to
renew their contracts and proceeded, instead, with the final harrowing
and the transplanting operations on their respective landholdings
without asking for petitioner’s share in the expenses. This, in Our
opinion, was sufficient notice to the latter of their desire to have
the original contracts modified, particularly with respect to the
sharing ratio agreed upon. That it was only in September. 1957, that
they actually asked petitioner to have such change effected was,
perhaps, a mistake which, while sufficient in the opinion of the Court
of Agrarian Relations to deprive them of the right to change the
sharing ratio for the agricultural year 1957-1958 (Annex C attached to
the petition for certiorari), was not, however, sufficient to
constitute such violation of their contracts of tenancy as would
justify their ejectment as tenants pursuant to the provision of Section
50, paragraph (b), of Republic Act 1199.

Premises considered, the decision under review is affirmed, with costs.

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