FRANCISCA TAAR, JOAQUINA TAAR, LUCIA TAAR AND HEIRS OF OSCAR L. GALO PETITIONERS, VS. CLAUDIO LAWAN, MARCELINO L. GALO, ARTEMIO ABARQUEZ, AUGUSTO B. LAWAN, ADOLFO L. GALO AND ED…

Taar versus Lawan

The Case

This is a petition for review on certiorari brought by Francisca Taar, Joaquina Taar, Lucia Taar, and the Heirs of Oscar L. Galo against Claudio Lawan, Marcelino L. Galo, Artemio Abarquez, Augusto B. Lawan, Adolfo L. Galo, and the Executive Secretary. The petitioners ask the Supreme Court to reverse the Court of Appeals, which had dismissed outright their petition for certiorari against a decision of the Office of the President. The dispute is over a seventy-one thousand and fourteen square meter parcel of land in Tarlac, and it pits two sets of free patent applicants against each other. The case matters because it teaches two lessons at once: the narrow office of the writ of certiorari, and the rule that a judgment approving a subdivision does not by itself entitle anyone to a free patent over public agricultural land.

Procedural History

The case began when the petitioners filed free patent applications over the property, and the private respondents filed a verified protest. The Regional Executive Director of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources for Region Three, Director Sibbaluca, issued an order finding the private respondents to be the actual occupants, cancelling the petitioners' subdivision plan, and denying the petitioners' applications. Nobody appealed that order, so it became final. The private respondents then filed their own free patent applications, which were approved, and free patents and certificates of title were issued in their favor.

The petitioners went to the Secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, who cancelled the private respondents' patents. The private respondents appealed to the Office of the President, which reversed the Secretary and reinstated the final order of Director Sibbaluca. The petitioners then filed a petition for certiorari in the Court of Appeals, which dismissed it outright as the wrong remedy, since a petition for review under Rule 43 was available. The Court of Appeals denied reconsideration. The petitioners came to the Supreme Court by petition for review on certiorari, which the Court gave due course.

Facts

Narcisa Taar, Alipio Duenas, Fortunata Duenas, and Pantaleon Taar inherited two vast tracts of land in Tarlac. One parcel was adjudicated exclusively to Pantaleon. The other was shared among the four. Narcisa sold her share to the Adaoag spouses and the Gragasin spouses. Pantaleon, Alipio, Fortunata, and the two spouses then executed an agreement to partition the second parcel, and the Court of First Instance of Tarlac approved that agreement in its decision of February 18, 1948. Pantaleon, Alipio, and Fortunata were the predecessors in interest of the petitioners.

Relying on that 1948 decision, the petitioners prepared a subdivision plan over the property, which was approved in February 2001, and then applied for free patents. The private respondents protested, claiming that their own predecessors had been in open, continuous, exclusive, and notorious possession of the land since 1948. The petitioners answered that the private respondents were merely tenants. After an ocular inspection, Director Sibbaluca found the private respondents to be the actual occupants, with no improvements or traces of possession by the petitioners. He cancelled the subdivision plan and denied the petitioners' applications, and that order became final.

The private respondents then obtained their own free patents and certificates of title. The petitioners asked the Secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to annul the final order and cancel those patents. The Secretary did so, but the Office of the President reversed him, holding that the final order could no longer be disturbed. The Court of Appeals dismissed the petitioners' certiorari petition, and the case reached the Supreme Court.

Issues

• Whether or not the Court of Appeals erred in dismissing outright the petition for certiorari filed by the petitioners.
• Whether or not the February 18, 1948 decision of the Court of First Instance bars the private respondents from applying for free patents over the property.
• Whether or not the free patents and certificates of title issued in favor of the private respondents are valid, or were secured through fraud and misrepresentation.

Applicable Provisions

Section 1 of Rule 65 of the Rules of Court, on the extraordinary remedy of certiorari, provides:

When any tribunal, board or officer exercising judicial or quasi-judicial functions has acted without or in excess of its or his jurisdiction, or with grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction, and there is no appeal, or any plain, speedy, and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law, a person aggrieved thereby may file a verified petition in the proper court, alleging the facts with certainty and praying that judgment be rendered annulling or modifying the proceedings of such tribunal, board or officer, and granting such incidental reliefs as law and justice may require.

This provision governs the first issue, because the availability of an appeal under Rule 43 is what made certiorari the wrong remedy.

Section 11 of Commonwealth Act No. 141, the Public Land Act, provides:

Public lands suitable for agricultural purposes can be disposed of only as follows, and not otherwise: (1) For homestead settlement; (2) By sale; (3) By lease; (4) By confirmation of imperfect or incomplete titles, either by judicial legalization or by administrative legalization.

This provision frames the second issue, because a free patent is a mode of administrative legalization, and entitlement to it must be shown under the Public Land Act.

Section 48 of the Public Land Act, as amended, provides:

The following described citizens of the Philippines, occupying lands of the public domain or claiming to own any such lands or an interest therein, but whose titles have not been perfected or completed, may apply to the Court of First Instance of the province where the land is located for confirmation of their claims and the issuance of a certificate of title therefor, under the Land Registration Act, to wit: (b) Those who by themselves or through their predecessors in interest have been in the open, continuous, exclusive, and notorious possession and occupation of agricultural lands of the public domain, under a bona fide claim of acquisition or ownership, except as against the government, since June 12, 1945, immediately preceding the filing of the applications for confirmation.

This provision states the possession requirement that every applicant for confirmation of an imperfect title, including by free patent, must satisfy.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that the petition for certiorari was properly dismissed. A petition for certiorari is an extraordinary remedy limited to errors of jurisdiction, while errors of judgment are corrected only by appeal. The petitioners' complaint, that the Office of the President failed to appreciate the merits of the 1948 decision, was an error of judgment. The petitioners could have filed a petition for review under Rule 43, and they neither alleged nor proved that such an appeal would have been inadequate. Certiorari cannot substitute for a lost appeal, especially where the loss came from the party's own choice of remedy.

On the second issue, the Court held that res judicata did not bar the private respondents. The Court listed the elements of res judicata: a final judgment, rendered by a court with jurisdiction, on the merits, with identity of parties, subject matter, and causes of action. The first three were present, but the fourth was not. There was no identity or substantial identity of parties, because the private respondents were not parties to the 1948 partition agreement, and no common interest with its parties was shown. Neither was there identity of subject matter: the 1948 decision merely approved a partition of a bigger parcel, while the free patent applications concerned the applicants' own occupancy and cultivation. The Court also stressed that the 1948 decision did not declare the petitioners' predecessors to be owners ipso jure, nor did it recognize their possession since 1915. The Court concluded that entitlement to agricultural lands of the public domain requires a clear showing of compliance with the Public Land Act, and that a subdivision judgment does not preclude others with a better right from applying for free patents.

On the third issue, the Court upheld the free patents and certificates of title issued in favor of the private respondents, there being no showing that they were secured through fraud and misrepresentation.

Doctrine

First, a petition for certiorari under Rule 65 lies only for errors of jurisdiction, or for grave abuse of discretion amounting to lack or excess of jurisdiction, and only where there is no appeal or other plain, speedy, and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law. Errors of judgment are corrected by appeal, here a petition for review under Rule 43 from a quasi-judicial agency.

Second, res judicata requires a final judgment on the merits by a court of competent jurisdiction, and identity of parties, subject matter, and causes of action. Substantial identity of parties exists only where there is a community of interest between a party in the first case and a party in the second.

Third, a judgment approving a subdivision or partition of land does not bar other parties with a better right from filing free patent applications over the same land. Entitlement to agricultural lands of the public domain requires a clear showing of compliance with the Public Land Act, and the modes of disposition under Section 11 are exclusive.

Disposition

The petition was denied, and the resolutions of the Court of Appeals dismissing the petition for certiorari were affirmed, leaving the free patents and certificates of title of the private respondents in place.

Remember This

The one line to memorize: a judgment approving a subdivision does not preclude other parties with a better right from instituting free patent applications over the land. Examiners use this case to test the distinction between errors of judgment and errors of jurisdiction, and the requirement of a clear showing of compliance with the Public Land Act for a free patent.