563 Phil. 339
AUSTRIA-MARTINEZ, J.:
WHEREFORE, premises considered, judgment is hereby rendered in favor of the plaintiff Honofre Fuentes and against the defendant Felomino Caguimbal ordering the latter and all persons claiming rights under him to vacate and surrender possession of the land covered by TCT No. T-51758 located at Barangay Sambungan, Calatagan, Batangas with an area of 12,382 square meters registered in the name of plaintiff, Honofre Fuentes.On appeal, the Regional Trial Court of Balayan, Batangas, Branch 11, in a Decision dated March 13, 2001, reversed and set aside the MTC Decision, and dismissed the case. The dispositive portion of the Decision reads:
Calatagan, Batangas, August 21, 2000.[1]
WHEREFORE, under the foregoing, the decision of the Municipal Trial Court of Calatagan, Batangas is hereby reversed and set aside, thereby dismissing this case. Ordering Plaintiff-Appellee to pay Twenty Thousand Pesos (P20,000.00) as attorney’s fee.Petitioner then filed a petition for review with the Court of Appeals (CA), docketed as CA-G.R. SP No. 63990. On September 3, 2001, the CA rendered its Decision[3] denying due course to the petition. The dispositive portion of the Decision reads:
SO ORDERED.[2]
WHEREFORE, premises considered, the present petition for review is hereby DENIED DUE COURSE and accordingly DISMISSED, for lack of merit. The Decision dated March 13, 2001 which was rendered by Branch XI of the Regional Trial Court of Balayan, Batangas in Civil Case No. 3782, dismissing the complaint for unlawful detainer in Civil Case No. 188, entitled “Honofre Fuentes v. Felomino Caguimbal,” is hereby AFFIRMED and REITERATED.His motion for reconsideration having been denied,[5] petitioner is now before us on a petition for review under Rule 45 of the Rules of Court, raising the following issues:
No pronouncement as to costs.
SO ORDERED.[4]
Whether or not there is an agricultural tenancy relation between the appellant Honofre Fuentes and the respondent Felomino Caguimbal which materialy [sic] affects the cause of action of the plaintiff-appellant;The MTC found that petitioner had a cause of action for ejectment against respondent on the sole ground that the property allegedly being cultivated by respondent as a tenant is not the property subject of the present controversy.Second Question of law:
Whether or not the Regional Trial Court of Balayan, Batangas acted without or in excess of jurisdiction or with grave abuse of discretion tantamount to lack of jurisdiction when it failed to dismiss the defendant (respondent’s) appeal despite the fact that the respondent failed to file his memorandum on appeal within the fifteen (15) days [sic] period provided for by law and in admitting and granting the respondent’s motion to admit appeal memorandum and appeal memorandum which is not even verified, without any affidavit of merit, not even set for hearing and in immediately submitting the case for decision without even giving the plaintiff (Petitioner-Appellant) an opportunity to file appellee’s memorandum on appeal;Third Question of law:
Whether or not the appellate court have [sic] jurisdiction to award attorney’s fee even if the same have [sic] not been assigned as an error in the respondent memorandum on appeal and no evidence was presented to show that the filing of this case was made in bad faith.Fourth Question of law:
Whether or not the plaintiff-appellant as an owner of the lot in question have [sic] the right to eject the defendant-appellee on the premises in question;[6]
x x x Culled from the records, there was an agrarian case before, between the father of defendant-appellant, Andres Caguimbal and the father of the plaintiff-appellee, Epifanio Caguimbal (sic), docketed as DAR Case No. 1438, Quezon City. Furthermore, a later or subsequent case was filed by plaintiff-appellee against the father of the defendant-appellant for Recovery of Possession at the former CFI, Br. VII, Balayan, Batangas, docketed as Civil Case No. 1083. (Annex “1”, Position Paper of Defendant-Appellant). Said case was filed on March 24, 1977. It was, however, dismissed for non-suit on July 20, 1984. (Annex “2”, Position Paper of Defendant-Appellant). In the said case, the title pleaded in the complaint was TCT No. T-34791 and not TCT No. T-31760 acquired by plaintiff-appellee way back in 1975. (Exhibit “A”, Plaintiff-Appellee). The present title of plaintiff-appellee pleaded in the case is TCT No. T-51758, Exhibit “5”, derived from TCT No. T-31760. Defendant-Appellant claims that plaintiff-appellee pleaded the wrong TCT number reason why he allowed the case to be dismissed for non-suit. The Court is inclined to believe such claim of defendant-appellant because the land covered by TCT No. T-34971 (subject of Civil Case No. 1083, for Recovery of Possession) was later sold by plaintiff-appellee in 1982 to a certain Florida Butiong, resident of Calatagan, Batangas. TCT No. T-34971 was cancelled by TCT No. 42785 in the name of said Florida Butiong. (Annex “D”, Position Paper of Defendant-Appellant). Yet from 1982 to the present, Florida Butiong never claimed ownership of the land subject of the case, neither did she demand share from the palay harvest of Defendant-Appellant. Thus, for the last 18 years, Florida Butiong never asserted ownership over the subject land simply because her land is different from and apart from the subject land. Error in the pleading was quite probable in the light of averment of Andres Caguimbal in the Answer in Civil Case No. 1083 that Honofre Fuentes had several applications at the DAR covering different parcels of land with a total area of eight (8) hectares.[9]The CA found no cogent reason to disturb the RTC findings. Even as petitioner argues in his present petition that both the RTC and the CA failed to respect the finding of the MTC, petitioner failed to demonstrate any error committed by the RTC and the CA except to quote the pertinent portion of the MTC decision. Consequently, the Court finds no compelling reason to disturb the findings of the RTC and the CA on this matter.
At this juncture, the crucial reason why We are convinced that the complaint in Civil Case No. 188 was correctly dismissed is the rationale made by the RTC anent the findings, which We are now upholding, on the incidental issue of agricultural tenancy, which materially affects the cause of action of the plaintiff:The Court finds merit in the petition.As to the issue of agricultural tenancy, based on the record of DAR Case No. 1438, the father of Defendant-Appellant, Andres Caguimbal, had been possessing and planting the land with palay even before 1976. According to the father, he had been possessing and cultivating the land since 1928 when the land was part of Hacienda Calatagan; that Defendant-Appellant had been helping his father since he was a young boy under (sic) his father became physically incapacitated to continue farming in 1976. Defendant-Appellant took over the possession and cultivation of land from his incapacitated father. He continued the tenancy relationship of his father with Plaintiff-Appellee, however, the latter refused to recognize him as tenant and refused to receive his share from palay. These facts were not disputed by Plaintiff-Appellee and his witnesses either in the pleadings or their affidavits. On the other hand, Defendant-Appellant and his witnesses are united to state that Defendant-Appellant had been cultivating the land since 1976, not since 1991 when he substituted his incapacitated father; that, prior to Defendant-Appellant and his deceased father had no other land that they cultivate (sic) except the land subject of the case. These lend credence to the claim of the Defendant-Appellant that he is the agricultural tenant of Plaintiff-Appellee through succession from his deceased father, Andres Caguimbal.[12] (Emphasis supplied)
(1) The parties are the landowner and the tenant or agricultural lessee;and emphasized that to deprive the MTC of jurisdiction, they must all be shown to be present.[15]
(2) The subject of the relationship is agricultural land;
(3) There is mutual consent to the tenancy between the parties;
(4) The purpose of the relationship is agricultural production;
(5) There is personal cultivation by the tenant or agricultural lessee; and
(6) There is a sharing of harvests between the parties.[14]
In Berenguer, Jr. v. Court of Appeals, we ruled that the respondents’ self-serving statements regarding their tenancy relations could not establish the claimed relationship. The fact alone of working on another’s landholding does not raise a presumption of the existence of agricultural tenancy. Substantial evidence does not only entail the presence of a mere scintilla of evidence in order that the fact of sharing can be established; there must be concrete evidence on record adequate enough to prove the element of sharing. We further observed in Berenguer, Jr.:In concluding that there is a tenancy relationship between the parties, the RTC, as affirmed by the CA, held:With respect to the assertion made by respondent Mamerto Venasquez that he is not only a tenant of a portion of the petitioner’s landholding but also an overseer of the entire property subject of this controversy, there is no evidence on record except his own claim in support thereof. The witnesses who were presented in court in an effort to bolster Mamerto’s claim merely testified that they saw him working on the petitioner’s landholding. More importantly, his own witnesses even categorically stated that they did not know the relationship of Mamerto and the petitioner in relation to the said landholding. x x x The fact alone of working on another’s landholding does not raise a presumption of the existence of agricultural tenancy. Other factors must be taken into consideration like compensation in the form of lease rentals or a share in the produce of the landholding involved. (Underscoring supplied)
x x x x
In the absence of any substantial evidence from which it can be satisfactorily inferred that a sharing arrangement is present between the contending parties, we, as a court of last resort, are duty-bound to correct inferences made by the courts below which are manifestly mistaken or absurd. x x x
Without the essential elements of consent and sharing, no tenancy relationship can exist between the petitioner and the private respondents.[19]
As to the issue of agricultural tenancy, based on the record of DAR Case No. 1438, the father of Defendant-Appellant, Andres Caguimbal, had been possessing and planting the land with palay even before 1976. According to the father, he had been possessing and cultivating the land since 1928 when the land was part of Hacienda Calatagan; that Defendant-Appellant had been helping his father since he was a young boy under [sic] his father became physically incapacitated to continue farming in 1976. Defendant-Appellant took over the possession and cultivation of land from his incapacitated father. He continued the tenancy relationship of his father with Plaintiff-Appellee, however, the latter refused to recognize him as tenant and refused to receive his share from palay. These facts were not disputed by Plaintiff-Appellee and his witnesses, either in the pleadings or their affidavits. On the other hand, Defendant-Appellant and his witnesses are untied to state that Defendant-Appellant had been cultivating the land since 1976, not since 1991 when he substituted his incapacitated father; that, prior to 1976, his father was cultivating the land as early as 1928; that, Defendant-Appellant and his deceased father had no other land that they cultivate except the land subject of the case. These land credence to the claim of Defendant-Appellant that he is the agricultural tenant of Plaintiff-Appellee through succession from his deceased father, Andres Caguimbal.[20] (Emphasis supplied).What was established by the evidence in the present case was that respondent and his predecessor had been planting on the property since 1928. What is wanting, however, is proof showing the sharing of harvests or that petitioner, as landowner of the subject property ever gave his consent to establish or maintain a tenancy relationship.