MANILA CORDAGE COMPANY, PETITIONER, VS. FERNANDO VIBAR, ET AL., RESPONDENTS.

As a result of a labor dispute between petitioner and the Manila
Cordage Workers Union (CLO), a strike was declared on August 19, 1949.
This strike was submitted for compulsory arbitration to the Court of
Industrial Relations in Case No. 349-V(l) and was, in an order dated
September 16, 1949 , declared “highly unjustified and unreasonable.” As
a consequence of such finding, the dismissal of the strikers would
ordinarily have been ordered. Nevertheless, the strikers were merely
ordered “to return to their respective posts within two (2) days from
receipt, failing in which the company is authorized to replace them
with new workers.” As the court subsequently explained, this order was
made as an act of “grace,” to afford the strikers “a chance to keep
their jobs.” At the same time, it was thought necessary “as a
preventive measure” for the benefit of the petitioner, to impose upon
the strikers a prohibition from declaring a strike again within a
period of three years.

On October 27, 1958, the respondents, who were among the 1949
strikers, filed a complaint in the Court of Industrial Relations where
it was docketed as Case No. 1122-V. They alleged that, in accordance
with the return-to-work order of September 16, 1949, they offered to
return to their former positions in the petitioner company but that the
latter refused them admission. They asked that petitioner company be
ordered:

(a) To reinstate the petitioners (respondents herein) to their former positions in the respondent (petitioner herein) company;
(b) To pay the petitioners retirement benefit for their past services with the respondent;
(c) To pay the petitioners three years backpay for the Japanese occupation period;
(d) To pay each of the petitioners separation pay equivalent to one half (1/2) month of every year of service from the date they started working with the respondent to August 19, 1949 when they staged their last strike; and
(e) To pay the petitioners such other benefit as may be deemed proper by reason of their past services with the respondent, and by reason of the agreement had between the petitioners and the respondent with respect to Nos. 2, 12, 13, and 14 in the above mentioned fourteen-point demand.

In a decision dated April 20, 1963, the Court of Industrial
Relations, while denying all claims of the respondents, awarded them
“full backwages from September 20, 1949 up to the period when their
replacements were hired but not to exceed a period of thirty (30)
days.” The petitioner protested the award of backwages but its motion
for reconsideration was denied. Hence, this appeal.

Petitioner contends, first of all, that after the lapse of nine
years, i.e., from 1949 when the return-to-work order became final to
1958 when the action to enforce it was brought, the Court of Industrial
Relations no longer has the power to amend its order. It is claimed
that the appealed decision practically extends the two-day ultimatum to
one year and abrogates petitioner’s power to replace strikers who
failed to return to work within two days.

In support of this proposition petitioner cites San Pablo Oil Factory, Inc. vs. CIR,
G. R. No. L-18270, Nov. 28, 1962, which denied the power of the CIR to
amend its decision in an unfair labor practice case by ordering an
employer not only to reinstate dismissed employees but also to pay them
backwages. But the rationale of that case is not that the CIR is
powerless to modify its decision but that matters which that court has
already passed upon can no longer be reopened after the decision has
become final. Certainly, where the matter came into existence only
after the rendition of a decision, the CIR retains the power to amend
its decision. Precedents in support of this view are not wanting. In
one case, for instance, the CIR approved the lay off of security guards
as a result of their replacement by soldiers of the 19th BCT on
condition that “if and when the soldiers have been recalled the
respondent should take back the security guards.” It was held that the
CIR could inquire, even after the lapse of four years, whether the
contingency, on which the right to reinstatement was predicated had
arisen. (NARIC vs. Henson, G. R. No. L-15093, July 30, 1960. See also
Katipunan Labor Union vs. Caltex [Phil.]Inc., G. R. No. L-10337, May 27,
1952) Here, the reinstatement of respondents was made subject to the
condition that they give themselves up within two days. The Court of
Industrial Relations certainly retained the power to inquire later
whether the respondents returned to work within the period given to
them.

This power is derived from sections 7 and 17 of Commonwealth Act No.
103 empowering the court to modify its decisions, orders and awards,
even after their finality. Its purpose is to vest in the Court of
Industrial Relations continuing control over a case even after its
decision therein has became final and executory in order to accord
substantial justice to the parties. (Church v. La Union Labor Union, 91
Phil. 163 [1952]) This power has not in the least been affected by the
enactment of the Industrial Peace Act on June 17, 1953. (Insular Sugar
Refining Corp. vs. CIR, G. R. No. L-12108, Sept. 29, 1959) Since the CIR
retained jurisdiction over the original case (Case No. 349-V [l]) for
purposes of determining whether the strikers returned to work within
two days, it may not be argued that the CIR can no longer award
backwages in the exercise of its power of compulsory arbitration after
the enactment of the Industrial Peace Act.

Nor is there any merit in the claim that respondents’ action should
have been brought within a year from the time they were refused
admission by the petitioner. It is true that in one case the statement
was made that actions for reinstatement must be filed within a
“reasonable time, say one year.” (Gutierrez vs. Bachrach Motor Co., G.
R. Nos. L-11298, 11586 and 11603, Jan. 19, 1959) But it is important to
note that the respondents’ action is not an action for reinstatement.
Their right to reinstatement had already been established in the
return-to-work order of September 16, 1949. It was only to enforce that
right that this case was filed.

This brings us to petitioner’s last point, which, in our opinion, is
well taken. The return-to-work order was received by the strikers on
September 17, 1949. This means that they had until September 19, to
give up their strike and return to work. Did the respondents in this
case, who were among the strikers, return to work on or before
September 19?

The Court of Industrial Relations found they did, thus—

“It is apparent from the records that petitioners
reported back for work upon learning that this Court ordered them to
return to work. In fact, they reported back to work for the first time
sometime in September 1949 then in January 1950, January 1953 and
lastly in January 1956. When they first reported back to work, Mr.
Centeno and Mr. Nazario, the supervisor and second superintendent,
respectively, told them that they could not yet be accepted back to
work because respondent was still in the stage of preparing to resume
full operation. They were told that they will, however, be notified
when they will be called back to work. Sometime in January 1950,
petitioner Fernando Vibar received a communication from respondent
asking him to come to respondent’s office and when he did, he was told
by the manager that he could no longer be accepted back to work and was
Sold instead to draw the balance of his salary.

“When
petitioners, numbering around forty first reported back, their
representatives were told by the mill superintendent, Mr. Green, that
as soon as the company have made the necessary adjustments, they will
be called back to work. The conversation that petitioners had with
Centeno and Nazario is different from the conversation that the
representatives had with the mill superintendent. When they reported
back to work for the first time, the security guard then posted at the
company gate refused to allow them to enter and it was here that the
conversation with Centeno and Nazario took place. Later, their
representatives like Vibar and Glipeneo were allowed to come in and
were able to talk with Green. The promises made by Centeno and Nazario
were substantially the same as that made by Green. In spite of this
promise, though, not one of the petitioners was able to return to work.
Hence, they were forced to file this case.”

But the foregoing findings of the CIR are contradicted by the following evidence in the record.

First, on September 27, 1949, petitioner had to ask for an
injunction precisely on the allegation that respondent Vibar and other
officers and members of the union were intimidating other strikers who
wanted to return to work, and the following day the court had to issue
an injunctive order. As of September 27, 1949, then, respondents,
against whom the injunction was directed, had not returned to work but
were maintaining their illegal strike.

Second, it appears that on November 5, 1949, respondents’
union asked the court for clarification as to whether the filing of
their motion for reconsideration in Case No. 349-V (1) suspended the
two-day ultimatum given to the strikers, and the court stated that it
did not because the return-to-work order expressly stated that it would
be effective immediately. If respondents had returned to work on
September 19 as the CIR found, why was there a need for them to secure
a clarification?

Third, in their petition in Case No. 1122-V, respondents made the
vague allegation that they returned to work but were refused admission
into the petitioner company. When asked to specify, respondents stated
in their bill of particulars that they “tried to return to their former
positions with the respondent company sometime (a) in October, 1949,
February, 1950; January, 1953 and January, 1956.” It would appear,
therefore, from respondents’ own admission that they did not return to
work within two days of September 17 (when they received a copy of the
return-to-work order), because they offered to return to work only
“sometime in October, 1949.”

The evidence therefore shows that in defiance of the court’s order
to return to work within two days, respondents continued their unlawful
strike. In fact in the appealed decision, the court, unable to explain
the issuance of an injunction on September 28, 1949 against the
strikers, had to rationalize by stating that, pending resolution of the
union’s motion for clarification as to when the return-to-work order
took effect, the strikers had a right to “exercise their economic
weapon of maintaining the picket line.” But if the court itself
maintained that the two-day period had not been suspended by the filing
of a motion for reconsideration of the return-to-work order, indeed, if
the court itself had found in the earlier case that the strike was
“unjustified and unreasonable,” how could the same court in the next
breath assert that until a clarification was made the strikers had a
right to continue that strike?

As stated in the beginning, the two-day period given to the strikers
was an act of grace on the part of the court, intended to give the
strikers every chance to make good after their strike had been found
illegal. In not taking advantage of that opportunity, respondents have
shown themselves undeserving of further consideration. Petitioner had
the right to replace them and should not be penalized for exercising
that right by being made to pay backwages.

Wherefore, the order of April 30, 1963 and the resolution of May 17,
1963, so far as they award backwages to the respondents, are hereby
reversed, without pronouncement as to costs.

Bengzon, C.J., Bautista Angelo, Concepcion, Reyes, J. B. L., Barrera, Makalintal, Bengzon, J. P., Zaldivar, and Sanchez, JJ., concur.