G.R. No. 155830 ; August 15, 2012
Numeriano P. Abobon, Petitioner, vs. Felicitas Abata Abobon and Gelima Abata Abobon, Respondents.

FACTS

Respondents Felicitas and Gelima Abobon, registered owners of a parcel of land covered by TCT No. 201367, filed an action for recovery of possession against their first cousin, petitioner Numeriano Abobon. They alleged they allowed Numeriano to use the land out of benevolence but, needing it for their own use, demanded he vacate, which he refused. Numeriano admitted his relationship to the respondents and the existence of the title but defended his possession by claiming ownership through succession. He asserted his grandfather donated the land to his father via a donation propter nuptias in 1937, and he inherited it in 1969. He argued he and his predecessors had possessed the land openly and adversely for over 59 years and that the respondents were barred by laches.
The Municipal Circuit Trial Court (MCTC) ruled for the respondents. It traced the property’s chain of title, finding it was purchased from the grandfather by the respondents’ parents in 1941, subsequently sold and repurchased, and eventually inherited and registered by the respondents in 1994. The MCTC found the land Numeriano claimed was donated was not the same parcel due to differing boundaries. It also held the alleged donation was invalid for lack of written acceptance by the donee and was effectively cancelled when Numeriano’s parents consented to the 1941 sale. The MCTC rejected the laches defense, noting the respondents’ consistent acts of ownership. The Regional Trial Court and the Court of Appeals affirmed the MCTC decision.

ISSUE

Whether the Court of Appeals erred in affirming the lower courts’ decisions which upheld the respondents’ ownership and right to recover possession, and rejected the petitioner’s claims of ownership by succession and the defense of laches.

RULING

The Supreme Court denied the petition and affirmed the assailed decisions. The legal logic rests on the principles of land registration and the Torrens system. The respondents’ certificate of title (TCT No. 201367) is conclusive evidence of their ownership. Against this indefeasible title, the petitioner’s claim of ownership based on an unregistered donation propter nuptias and alleged possession cannot prevail. The Court upheld the factual findings of the lower courts that the donated property and the titled land were not identical, and that the donation itself was invalid for non-compliance with the formal requirement of written acceptance. The petitioner’s possession, having begun only in 1989 by the respondents’ tolerance, was merely that of a possessor in bad faith from the time of a final adverse judgment.
Furthermore, the defense of laches was correctly dismissed. Laches presupposes neglect or omission to assert a right, inducing a belief in its abandonment. The respondents’ acts—registering the property, selling and repurchasing it, executing an extrajudicial settlement, and making repeated demands to vacate—constituted a continuous assertion of ownership, negating any inference of abandonment. The petitioner’s claim of acquisitive prescription also failed. Prescription cannot run against registered land under the Torrens system, and his possession, being by mere tolerance, was not in the concept of an owner. Thus, the respondents, as registered owners, properly recovered possession through an accion publiciana.