GR 42582; (October, 1977) (Digest)
G.R. No. L-42582. October 2, 1977.
ARNULFO C. LOPEZ, petitioner, vs. WORKMEN’S COMPENSATION COMMISSION and GOVERNMENT SERVICE INSURANCE SYSTEM (GSIS), respondents.
FACTS
Petitioner Arnulfo C. Lopez, an employee of the GSIS, filed a claim for compensation with the Workmen’s Compensation Commission for coronary artery disease and PTB (minimal), alleging his disability commenced on January 4, 1973, “at the office.” The acting referee awarded Lopez P6,000 in disability benefits, finding the claim uncontroverted as GSIS failed to submit its position paper, thereby waiving its right to present contrary evidence. The referee held that the claimant’s unrebutted allegations established a prima facie case for compensability.
However, upon GSIS’s motion for reconsideration, the respondent Commission reversed the award. It acknowledged that the claim was not controverted but denied compensation, relying on an alleged evaluation from its own Evaluation Division which stated that the medical findings (distant heart sounds, normal lungs and extremities) were insufficient to prove disability for labor. The Commission held that entitlement to GSIS disability benefits did not automatically equate to compensability under the Workmen’s Compensation Act, which required proof of actual disability for work.
ISSUE
Whether the Workmen’s Compensation Commission committed grave abuse of discretion in reversing the award of compensation.
RULING
Yes. The Supreme Court set aside the Commission’s decision, reinstating the award. The legal logic is anchored on two established principles in workmen’s compensation jurisprudence. First, where an illness supervenes during employment, as Lopez’s did at the GSIS office, it is presumed to have arisen out of or been aggravated by such employment. The burden to rebut this presumption by substantial evidence shifts to the employer. GSIS presented no evidence to discharge this burden.
Second, GSIS’s failure to validly controvert the claim within the statutory period resulted in a waiver of all non-jurisdictional defenses, including the defense of non-compensability. By this failure, the employer is deemed to have renounced its right to contest the claim. Consequently, the Commission erred in entertaining and sustaining the defense of non-disability raised only in a motion for reconsideration. Furthermore, the Commission seriously erred in disregarding the uncontested medical findings of the GSIS’s own physicians, who certified Lopez’s total and permanent disability and recommended leave, in favor of an unsigned and unsubstantiated evaluation report not found in the records. The decision constituted a departure from the compassionate mandate of the workmen’s compensation law.