BRIGIDO RAMOS AND FELICIDAD JUAN, PETITIONERS, VS. INTERMEDIATE APPELLATE COURT, RODOLFO RAMOS AND GERTRUDES MERCADO, RESPONDENTS.

The usual conflicting claims of ownership culminated in this case
involving a parcel of land in Tanawan, Bustos, Bulacan covered by
Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-92071 in the name of private respondent
Rodolfo Ramos.  Said realty was formerly
part of the public land constituting the Buenavista
Estate which was under the administration of and subject to disposition by the
Land Tenure Administration pursuant to Republic Act No. 1400 and, later, by the
Land Authority under Republic Act No. 3844.

The evidence of record show that respondent Rodolfo Ramos filed
with the Land Authority an application, dated January 5, 1965, for the purchase of the parcel of land in
question^[1]
and was later compelled to file a complaint therein against another claimant in
CLA Case No. 40, entitled “Rodolfo Ramos v. Gerardo Ramos.” The case
resulted in the adjudication to Rodolfo
Ramos of an area of 24,793 square meters of the land applied for and an area of
1,810.05 square meters to Gerardo Ramos after the Acting Governor of said
office, Remigio T.
Eusebio, found both claimants qualified to
purchase said portions.  Consequently, a
contract of sale was executed between private respondent Rodolfo Ramos and the
Land Authority on February 5, 1968,^[2]
which became the basis for the issuance of the aforesaid Transfer Certificate
of Titled No. T-92071 on February 9,
1968.^[3]

Annotated as encumbrances on said certificate of title are the conditions that, except by
hereditary succession, the land shall not be subdivided, sold or in any manner transferred
or encumbered, without the prior
written consent of the Governor of the Land Authority and only to qualified
persons specified therein.

On January 19, 1978, without the prior consent of the Minister of
Land Reform who had succeeded the Governor of the Land Authority, petitioner
spouses filed a complaint docketed as Civil
Case No. 845-B before the former Court of First Instance of Bulacan,
Branch IV, praying for the cancellation of
the name of respondent Rodolfo Ramos in the aforesaid certificate of title, to be replaced
with petitioners’ names.  Petitioners
alleged that the property in question was titled in the name of respondent
Rodolfo Ramos for convenience and in trust, petitioners claiming to be the beneficial
owners thereof all along.  They attempted
to prove in the proceedings below that they acquired the property from a
certain Patricio Cruz sometime in 1959, after which they had the same tenanted
by one Ramon Samson in 1969.  After the
latter’s death, Pancracio Lopez supposedly took over as
tenant from 1969 to 1976.  Evidence was
likewise adduced to prove that petitioner Felicidad
Juan applied for the purchase of said property sometime in 1960 but her
application was withdrawn allegedly because of some family problems.^[4]
Thereafter, petitioners were supposed to have requested their nephew,
respondent Rodolfo Ramos, to have the title of the land issued in his name with
petitioner Brigido Ramos pursuing the application
with the former Land Tenure Administration. 
Petitioners further claim that respondent Rodolfo Ramos took over the
tenancy rights to the land in 1976.

After considering all the evidence presented, the trial court
rendered a decision^[5]
dismissing the complaint and the counterclaim, for insufficiency of evidence to
warrant a declaration that petitioners are entitled to reconveyance
of the property.  Also, said the court
below, there was failure to establish petitioners’ ownership over the land and
to prove the alleged oral agreement between the parties to have the land titled
in the name of private respondent Rodolfo Ramos.  Furthermore, the court a quo
observed that the approval of
the application of said private respondent by the administrative body to which
such function belongs may not be interfered with by the courts.^[6]

Finding no reversible error on the part of the trial court, the
then Intermediate Appellate Court affirmed said decision on appeal.^[7]

The amply supported judgment of respondent court commends itself
for approval.  It being undisputed that
the parcel of land in question originally formed part of the public land, with
the present ownership thereof duly acquired by private respondents subject to
the encumbrances annotated on the certificate of title thereto, as hereinbefore
noted, petitioners have no basis
to ask for reconveyance of the land to them.  Also, as pointed out earlier, they claim to
have acquired the rights to the land from one Patricio Cruz, but they utterly
failed to show how the latter acquired said rights in the first place.  Aside from their bare assertions, neither did
petitioners adduce evidence of the transfer of such rights to them.  Furthermore, they should be deemed to have
acknowledged that the land belongs to the State when they filed an application
for its purchase with the
administrative office concerned.  It
would have been absurd for them to have applied for the purchase of property
which they believed was theirs.

Despite such inconsistent postures, petitioners shift to a new
tack, this time on a claim of ownership of the land by invoking Article 440 of
the Civil Code on accession natural.  We do not have to unduly dwell on this issue
which was only raised by petitioners for the first time on appeal.  An
issue which was neither averred in the complaint nor raised during the trial in
the court below cannot be raised for the first time on appeal as it would be
offensive to the basic rules of fair play, justice and due process.^[8]
Besides, We cannot but note
petitioners’ apocryphal submissions on the matter.  They contend that the land in dispute, being
supposedly a part of an abandoned river bed, is automatically owned by them as
owners of the adjoining lot.  Had the
petitioners proceeded to read the succeeding provisions of the Civil Code, they
would not have missed Article 461 thereof which provides that “river beds
which are abandoned through the natural change in the course of the waters ipso
facto belong to the owners of the land occupied by the new course”
with the owners of the adjoining lots having the right to acquire them only
after paying their value.

With the undisputable absence of any legal right to the land in
favor of petitioners, the award to private respondents consequent to their
purchase of said land should be given the respect it deserves.  As the body empowered by law to approve applications
to purchase and dispose of lots under its administration, the determination of
the Land Authority in favor of private respondents is binding on this Court,
there being a demonstrated absence of any grave abuse of discretion, collusion,
fraud or clear error of law and fact.^[9]

Incidentally, We digress to clarify what appears to have been an
oversight on the part of respondent court when it noted that the action herein
had prescribed after four years from registration of the deed of sale in favor
of private respondent Rodolfo Ramos. 
This was premised on the assumption that the action was for annulment of
a contract on the ground of fraud.  A
scrutiny of the basic complaint^[10]
which commenced this case, however, shows that petitioners based their claim for
recovery on an alleged implied trust. 
Consequently, the action for reconveyance
prescribes after ten years counted from the date adverse title to the property
was asserted, that is, from the registration of the title.^[11]
At any rate, such misperception would not affect the adjudication made by
respondent court since, as already explained, there is no ownership of
petitioners over the land on which they can anchor their fancied theory of an
implied trust in their favor.

WHEREFORE, the decision of respondent court is AFFIRMED.

SO ORDERED.

Melencio-Herrera, (Chairman), Paras, Padilla, and Sarmiento, JJ., concur.

^[1]
Exhibits 2, 2-a and 3; Original Record,
219-220.

^[2]
Exhibit 5; ibid., 225-226.

^[3]
Exhibit 6; ibid, 227.

^[4]
Original Record, 277.

^[5]
Penned by Judge Natividad
G. Dizon, Regional Trial Court, Branch XIII, Malolos, Bulacan.

^[6]
Original Record; 278.

^[7]
CA-G.R. CV. No. 07309; Coquia, J., ponente, Bellosillo and Aldecoa, JJ.,
concurring.

^[8]
De la Santa vs. Court of Appeals,
et al., 140 SCRA 44 (1985); Dihiansan, et al. vs.
Court of Appeals, et al., 153 SCRA
712 (1987); Dulos
Realty & Development Corporation vs. Court of Appeals, 157
SCRA 425 (1988).

^[9]
Batangas Transportation Company vs. Rivera, et
al., 109 Phil. 175 (1960); Timbancaya vs.
Vicente, 9 SCRA 852 (1963); Lim vs. Secretary of Agriculture and Natural
Resources, 34 SCRA 751 (1970).

^[10]
Original Record, 1-5.

^[11]
Villagonzalo, et al. vs. Intermediate
Appellate Court, et al., G.R. No. 71110, Nov. 22, 1988.