GR 149281; (June, 2005) (Digest)
G.R. No. 149281; June 15, 2005
NEW CITY BUILDERS, INC., petitioner, vs. NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION, LEONILO GANDA, NOLITO RICASA and HERBERT EPIS, respondents.
FACTS
Petitioner New City Builders, Inc., a construction company, hired private respondents Leonilo Ganda, Nolito Ricasa, and Herbert Epis for its Infinity Tower project in Makati City. After the respondents filed a complaint with the DOLE for labor standards violations, petitioner terminated their services on March 6, 1996, alleging habitual absenteeism, abandonment of work, and, in Ganda’s case, fraud through overpricing materials. The respondents subsequently filed an illegal dismissal case.
The Labor Arbiter found petitioner’s evidence insufficient to prove the alleged grounds for termination. The charge of overpricing was rejected due to lack of proof. The Arbiter ruled that respondents were regular, not project, employees as they performed duties necessary and desirable to petitioner’s construction business. Consequently, petitioner was ordered to reinstate the respondents and pay backwages. The NLRC affirmed this decision, and the Court of Appeals dismissed petitioner’s subsequent petition for certiorari.
ISSUE
Whether the Court of Appeals erred in affirming the findings of the Labor Arbiter and NLRC that respondents were regular employees illegally dismissed.
RULING
The Supreme Court denied the petition and affirmed the assailed issuances. The Court reiterated that it is not a trier of facts, especially in labor cases where factual findings of quasi-judicial agencies like the NLRC, when supported by substantial evidence and concurred in by the Labor Arbiter and the Court of Appeals, are accorded finality and respect. The Court found no compelling reason to deviate from the uniform findings below.
The lower tribunals correctly classified respondents as regular employees under Article 280 of the Labor Code, as they were engaged in activities necessary and desirable to petitioner’s usual construction business. Their employment was not coterminous with a specific project. As regular employees, their dismissal was valid only if for a just or authorized cause and with due process. Petitioner failed to substantiate its claims of absenteeism, abandonment, and fraud. Since the dismissal was illegal, respondents were entitled under Article 279 to reinstatement without loss of seniority rights and payment of full backwages from the time compensation was withheld until actual reinstatement.