GR 93090; (March, 1999) (Digest)
G.R. No. 93090 March 3, 1999
Romeo Cabellan, petitioner, vs. Court of Appeals, Hon. Amir PD Pundogar, Branch III of Regional Trial Court, Iligan City; City Sheriff or Deputy Sheriff Reynaldo Neri, Iligan City and Nathaniel Dinoro, respondents.
FACTS
Private respondent Nathaniel Dinoro acquired rights to a 50-square-meter parcel of land in Iligan City by purchase. Petitioner Romeo Cabellan had been in possession of the subject land since 1968 through mere tolerance. After acquiring the land in 1986, Dinoro demanded that Cabellan vacate. Following failed barangay conciliation, Dinoro filed an unlawful detainer complaint. The Municipal Trial Court ordered Cabellan’s ejectment, a decision affirmed by the Regional Trial Court (RTC) upon reconsideration. The MTC subsequently granted a motion for execution, declaring its judgment final.
Cabellan then filed a petition for certiorari in the Court of Appeals, arguing the land was government-owned, thus stripping the lower courts of jurisdiction. The appellate court dismissed the petition, ruling certiorari was improper and that even if treated as a petition for review, it was filed out of time and failed to allege material dates. Cabellan elevated the case to the Supreme Court via petition for review.
ISSUE
Whether the Court of Appeals erred in dismissing Cabellan’s petition and whether the lower courts had jurisdiction to order ejectment over land claimed to be public.
RULING
The Supreme Court affirmed the Court of Appeals’ decision. On the procedural issue, the Court held that the proper remedy from the RTC’s decision in an ejectment case was a petition for review under the Revised Internal Rules of the Court of Appeals, not a special civil action for certiorari. Cabellan’s petition was correctly dismissed for using the wrong remedy and for being filed late, as the perfection of an appeal within the prescribed manner is jurisdictional.
On the substantive issue, the Court ruled that the alleged public character of the land does not divest courts of jurisdiction over possessory actions like ejectment. Citing Molina v. De Bacud, the Court emphasized that the sole issue in ejectment is physical or material possession, independent of claims of ownership. The RTC correctly focused on who had a better right of possession, finding Dinoro’s evidence (deed of sale, tax declarations, receipts) superior to Cabellan’s claim of mere tolerance. Since the ejectment judgment determined only possession, it remained binding between the parties and did not prejudice the government’s title, if any.