489 Phil. 367
CARPIO-MORALES, J.:
WHEREFORE, premises considered, judgment is hereby rendered in favor of the plaintiff and against defendant (sic) as follows:Petitioner and her co-defendant Francisco Santiago, Jr. appealed. The Department of Agrarian Reform and Adjudication Board (DARAB), by Decision of February 16, 1998, dismissed the appeal, affirmed in toto the decision of the Provincial Adjudicator, and ordered petitioner and her co-defendants to vacate the premises and respect respondent’s peaceful possession and cultivation thereof.
- Finding the plaintiff to be a bonafide tenant of the landholding in question;
- Ordering defendants, Mun. of Bocaue, Bulacan, Ma. Rosario Batongbacal, Celso S. Lazaro, Consorcia Santiago, Rodolfo Lazaro and all other persons acting in their behalves are hereby ordered (sic) to cease and desist from committing any acts tending to eject, oust or disturb the plaintiff in his landholding;
- Making the Preliminary Injunction issued permanent.
SO ORDERED.
“This is the crux of [petitioner’s] defense: not being the owner of the landholding that [respondent] claims, even assuming that he is a lawful tenant of [petitioner], he is not entitled to possession of the land owned by another. Neither can a judgment to place him in possession be legal against [petitioner], who is not the owner; any such judgment would be clearly ineffective as in the first place she has no right to transfer possession of a third party’s land.”[1]Petitioner’s argument is flawed. Although the identity of the land is a question of fact, this Court has to resolve the same to finally put this case to rest, as the lack of an explicit resolution thereon appears to be at the root of this controversy.[2] The decisions of the Court of Appeals, the DARAB, and the DAR Provincial Adjudicator on the case at bar all refer to the “land in question” and the “subject land” without, however, explicitly identifying it.
4. On May 27, 1984, [petitioner] and her five (5) siblings (Celso, Lauro, Consorcia, Pablito, and Rodolfo) filed a request for cancellation of Certificates of Land Transfer with the then Minister of Agrarian Reform Conrado F. Estrella, seeking their exemption from Operation Land Transfer under Presidential Decree No. 27 on the ground that the land was already commercial in nature since 1974, and they were entitled to exercise retention rights over the abovementioned lands. The letter-request for cancellation of the CLTs was docketed as Adm. Case No. III-62-87 of the Ministry of Agrarian Reform.Respondent’s complaint in the case at bar, on the other hand, which challenged petitioner’s acts in relation to the same land involved in Adm. Case No. III-62-87 alleged:
5. [Respondent] is among those whose Certificates of Land Transfer were sought to be cancelled, he having been a tenant of [petitioner’s ascendant] Pedro G. Lazaro over a landholding in Lot 5-E-5-C, (LRC)Psd-03-024538; his CLT was denominated as CLT No. 0-255927, PMS No. 006, Lot No. 00013, with an area of 00.7200 hectares.” (Emphasis and underscoring supplied)
Although the subject land was merely described in the complaint in the present case by respondent as “located at Caingin, Bocaue, Bulacan” and as “adjacent to and abutting the land whereon a public (municipal) market is being constructed,” his reference to Adm. Case No. III-62-87 shows that that land subject of the latter case is identical with that in the present case.x x x
3. Plaintiff [herein respondent] is tenanting a parcel of land located at Caingin, Bocaue, Bulacan previously owned by the late Pedro Lazaro while defendants [herein petitioner, et al.] are all heirs of the latter.
4. Plaintiff has been pronounced as rightful tenant of the land in question by the Department of Agrarian Reform resolution of DAR ADM. CASE NO. III-62-87 embodied in the Order dated August 27, 1987. The Order directed the landowner to, among others, maintain the tenants in the peaceful possession and cultivation of their respective farmholdings under leasehold. xxx
5. Sometime during the first half of February, 1990, Defendants caused the dumping of filling materials on subject landholding being as it is adjacent to and abutting the land whereon a public (municipal) market is being constructed. xxx[3] (Emphasis and underscoring supplied)
. . . [T]he Board is convinced to resolve the same in the affirmative. Plaintiff has been found by the DAR Team Office and by the investigation conducted by Atty. Rufino Antonio, Trial Attorney II DAR-BALA, Malolos, Bulacan (sic). This finding is supported by the Affidavit of Mr. Gil Del Rosario, an adjacent (kahangga) landholder of the plaintiff, certifying plaintiff is indeed a tenant of the landholding he is claiming since the 1940’s, exhibit ‘A’. The landowners ledger, EP Form 1 also revealed that plaintiff is a bona-fide tenant of Pedro Lazaro, Exhibit ‘B’. The tenancy status of the plaintiff is fortified by receipts, exhibits D. D-1, D-2, D-3 all pointing that the former has been paying his lease rentals. Although there is no written contract to prove plaintiff’s tenancy status, his long period of cultivating and performing all the phases of agriculture in his landholding coupled with his act of sharing his harvest through the payment of lease rental establishes his status as a bonafide tenant.[5] (Underscoring supplied)The affidavit of Mr. Gil Del Rosario referred to above identifies the land being tilled by respondent as that covered by CLT No. 255927. The Landowner’s Ledger in the name of petitioner’s ascendant Pedro Lazaro includes respondent in the list of farmer-beneficiaries and acknowledges his possession of CLT No. 255927. When the Provincial Adjudicator cited then these documents as evidence of a tenancy relationship between the parties over the land, he must have referred to the landholding covered by CLT No. 255927, the same land subject of Adm. Case No. III-62-87.
b. Said Order affects Lot No. 000013, PMS No. 006, containing an area of 7,200 square meters and which forms part of that piece of land denominated (before) as Lot 5-E, Psd-26727, Sheet 1, and, (later) as Lot 5-E-5-C, Psd-03-024538, embrace[d] in, and covered (before) by Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-13569 and (later) by Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-95.491(M), of Bulacan, xxxGiven this admission, not only is the identity of, but also the tenancy relationship between the parties over the land is established.
c. Answering defendant Ma. Rosario L. Batongbacal did not and does not have any tenancy relationship with the plaintiff with respect to any land other than in, and over a portion of what used to be Lot 5-E, Psd-26727, Sheet 1, formerly covered by Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-3852 and later T-13569, of Bulacan.”[7] (Emphasis and underscoring supplied)
xxx This being so, the herein plaintiffs who happen to be legitimate tenants are entitled to a security of tenure and be maintained in the peaceful possession and cultivation of their respective landholdings until and after their status as a tenant[s] has been proven otherwise. Furthermore, even if the defendants [now petitioners] were to claim that they are unaware of the occupancy of the land by the herein tenants on the assumption that the deceased Faustino Ocampo did not report the matter to them, the law is clear on the matter that the successor or the transferee of an agricultural land is bound and subrogated to the rights and obligations of the transferor.[8] (Underscoring supplied)Classification of the subject land
There is no question that the “essence of due process is a hearing before conviction and before an impartial and disinterested tribunal” but due process as a constitutional precept does not, always and in all situations, require a trial-type proceeding . The essence of due process is to be found in the reasonable opportunity to be heard and submit any evidence one may have in support of one’s defense. “To be heard” does notonly mean verbal arguments in court; one may be heard also through pleadings. Where opportunity to be heard, either through oral arguments or pleadings, is accorded, there is no denial of procedural due process.[11] (Underscoring supplied; citations omitted)Petitioner nevertheless argues that a motion for reconsideration is not sufficient for the purpose of submitting her evidence because she intended to present “properly authenticated copies of titles to property, technical plans and surveys, testimony of the real-parties-in-interest, authenticated copies of government agencies holding such records x x x court records, and the like, which could not be properly submitted by means of a mere motion.” Her evidence, however, consisted in the main of public documents which she could have attached to her motions for reconsideration and her appeals to merit a disturbance of the assailed decisions. The testimonial evidence she intended to present could have been submitted in the form of affidavits, as is usual in administrative proceedings.
“One must bear in mind that the court is not required to state in its decision all the facts found in the records. It is enough that the court states the facts and the law on which it is based (Section 1, Rule 36 of the Revised Rules of Court). Thus, the mere fact that no mention was made in its decision of the testimony of prosecution witness Augusto Hara before the former Presiding Judge, Hon. Jorge S. Imperial does not necessarily mean that said testimony was overlooked by the trial court in arriving at its decision, as alleged. Moreover, if no reference was made of said testimony, it is because such is insignificant.”While the DARAB, to show that petitioner was not denied due process, cited the existence in the record of the questioned documents, such documents were not the only bases to support its ruling. Petitioner’s filing of a motion for reconsideration was also mentioned as having a curative effect on the issue of due process. Hence, even if the questioned documents were disregarded, there would still be sufficient legal ground to support DARAB’s ruling.