G.R. No. 186166; October 20, 2010
Republic of the Philippines, Petitioner, vs. Jose T. Ching represented by his Attorney-in-fact, Antonio V. Ching, Respondent.

FACTS

Respondent Jose Ching filed an application for original registration of title over a parcel of land in Butuan City. He claimed ownership by purchase in 1979 from a former governor and congressman. To prove the required possession, he presented tax declarations, the earliest of which were effective starting 1980, and a certification showing realty tax payments commencing from the same year. The Republic, through the Office of the Solicitor General, opposed the application, arguing that respondent failed to prove open, continuous, exclusive, and notorious possession in the concept of an owner since June 12, 1945, or prior thereto, as required by law. The Regional Trial Court (RTC) dismissed the application for insufficiency of evidence, finding that the evidence only established possession starting from 1965, not 1945. The RTC also refused to consider additional tax declarations submitted with a motion for reconsideration, as they were not formally offered in evidence. The Court of Appeals (CA) reversed the RTC, granting the application for registration.

ISSUE

Whether the Court of Appeals erred in granting the application for registration of title despite the respondent’s failure to prove possession since June 12, 1945.

RULING

Yes, the Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals and reinstated the RTC’s dismissal of the application. The Court held that for original registration under Section 14(1) of Presidential Decree No. 1529, an applicant must prove: (a) that the land forms part of the alienable and disposable agricultural land of the public domain, and (b) that he and his predecessors-in-interest have been in open, continuous, exclusive, and notorious possession and occupation under a bona fide claim of ownership since June 12, 1945, or earlier. The applicant bears the burden of proving these facts by clear, positive, and convincing evidence. In this case, respondent’s evidence, consisting of tax declarations effective only from 1980 and tax payments starting the same year, was utterly insufficient to prove possession since 1945. The earliest documentary evidence pointed only to 1965. The CA’s reliance on the alleged possession of the respondent’s vendor was misplaced, as there was no competent evidence presented to establish the nature and duration of the vendor’s possession. Consequently, respondent failed to overcome the presumption that the land remains part of the inalienable public domain. The application was correctly dismissed for failure to meet the stringent requirements for judicial confirmation of imperfect title.