SECOND DIVISION
[G.R. No. 179643. September 11, 2013.]
ERNESTO L. NATIVIDAD, petitioner, vs. FERNANDO MARIANO, ANDRES MARIANO AND DOROTEO GARCIA, respondents.
NOTICE
Sirs/Mesdames :
Please take notice that the Court, Second Division, issued a Resolution dated 11 September 2013which reads as follows:
G.R. No. 179643 (Ernesto L. Natividad v. Fernando Mariano, Andres Mariano and Doroteo Garcia). — In our Decision 1 dated June 3, 2013, we denied the petition for review on certiorari filed by petitioner Ernesto L. Natividad and affirmed with modification the November 28, 2006 decision and the August 10, 2007 resolution of the Court of Appeals (CA) in CA-G.R. SP No. 89365.
In the present motion for reconsideration, 2 Ernesto maintains that: first, as the October 27, 1999 decision of the Provincial Adjudicator (PARAD) of Nueva Ecija had already become final and executory, the Department of Agrarian Reform Adjudication Board (DARAB) had been effectively divested of jurisdiction to entertain the appeal filed by respondents Fernando Mariano, Andres Mariano and Doroteo Garcia. Ernesto stresses that the respondents' omission to exercise their statutory privilege to appeal the PARAD's decision within the reglementary period did not constitute sufficient reason for this Court to disregard the doctrine of immutability of judgments. The Rules of Court, Ernesto points out, enjoins strict compliance with the reglementary period for filing an appeal. SCHIcT
And second, the respondents' non-payment of the lease rental was deliberate and willful for as early as July 7, 1988, the respondents already knew that Ernesto was the new owner of the subject landholding when the latter filed the action for annulment of levy and execution sale. Yet, despite his repeated demands, the respondents still failed to pay the lease rentals to him.
Our Ruling
We DENY the motion for reconsideration for lack of merit.
The arguments raised in Ernesto's motion merely amplify, if not outrightly reiterates, those that we already considered and ruled upon in the decision denying the petition for review on certiorari.
Section 3 of the 1994 DARAB New Rules of Procedure specifically grants the DARAB wide procedural latitude in hearing and deciding agrarian cases, disputes and controversies. The pertinent portion reads:
Section 3. Technical Rules Not Applicable. — The Board and its Regional and Provincial Adjudicators shall not be bound by technical rules of procedure and evidence as prescribed in the Rules of Court, but shall proceed to hear and decide all agrarian cases, disputes or controversies in a most expeditious manner, employing all reasonable means to ascertain the facts of every case in accordance with justice and equity.
xxx xxx xxx
c) The provisions of that Rules of Court shall not apply even in a suppletory character unless adopted herein or by resolution of the Board. [emphases ours, italics supplied] EHaDIC
In the present motion, Ernesto would have this Court reverse the CA's ruling, and uphold the October 27, 1999 PARAD decision, rendered against his favor simply on the basis of technicality. We cannot agree with his position, for the specific rules governing agrarian cases explicitly forego with the application, even in a suppletory character, of the rules generally observed in courts. Technical rules are, after all, designed to promote, not defeat, the ends of justice. More so in this case where the respondents' protected inchoate right, under their certificates of land transfer, over the subject landholding had been placed in peril.
The case of Fraginal v. The Heirs of Toribia Belmonte Parañal, 3 while similarly from the PARAD as pointed out by Ernesto, does not bear close factual resemblance to the present case. The petitioners in that case did not appeal the PARAD decision; only after two years from the issuance of the PARAD decision did the petitioners therein file, before the CA, a petition for annulment of judgment. Thus, the petitioners in that case were delayed by two years in assailing the PARAD's decision; they additionally sought an improper remedy. On top of all these, the petitioners in that case did not offer sufficient explanation for their failure to avail of the proper remedy within the reglementary period. EIDaAH
In contrast, as we pointed out in our June 3, 2013 Decision, the respondents in the present case filed before the PARAD the petition for relief from judgment on May 4, 2000, or just four months from their receipt of the October 27, 1999 decision of the PARAD, and 35 days from their discovery of their excusable negligence, on June 9, 2000. These were well within the six-month and 90-day period for filing petitions for relief from judgment. Moreover, the respondents offered sufficient explanation or justifiable grounds that should have warranted the grant of their petition before the PARAD. Thus, based on these circumstances, we upheld the CA's ruling that affirmed the DARAB's decision that, among others, allowed the respondents' appeal despite the lapse of the reglementary period.
Finally, while Ernesto insisted that the respondents deliberately and willfully failed to pay the lease rental, the records nevertheless sufficiently belied his claim. And more than anything else, the records convinced us that the respondents' non-payment was not of the character that the law considers as willful and deliberate to warrant their ejectment from the subject landholding.
WHEREFORE, in view of these considerations, we hereby DENY the Motion for ReconsiderationWITH FINALITY. No further pleadings shall be entertained.
SO ORDERED.
Very truly yours,
MA. LOURDES C. PERFECTODivision Clerk of Court
By:
(SGD.) TERESITA AQUINO TUAZONDeputy Division Clerk of Court
Footnotes
1.Rollo, pp. 246-261.
2.Id. at 263-270.
3.545 Phil. 425 (2007).