G.R. No. L-69208 May 28, 1986
Roberto Yabut, petitioner, vs. The Hon. Intermediate Appellate Court, Jose Calayag, Nicolas Calayag, Bernardo Calayag, Jesus Calayag and any other person implementing the writ, respondents.

FACTS

Private respondents, the Calayags, sued petitioner Roberto Yabut before the Court of Agrarian Relations, claiming to be tenants of his fishponds and seeking leasehold rental fixation and harvest liquidation. Yabut countered they were merely employees hired as fishpond guards. The Regional Trial Court, which replaced the agrarian court, rendered judgment denying the Calayags’ tenancy claims, declaring them to be fishpond guards/overseers only entitled to wages, and ordering possession of the fishponds returned to Yabut.
The Calayags received their copy of the adverse decision on July 23, 1984, and filed a notice of appeal the next day, July 24. Yabut received his copy earlier, on July 20, and filed a motion for execution of the judgment on July 25, which the trial court granted. The Calayags then questioned this grant of execution before the Intermediate Appellate Court, which nullified the trial court’s order. The appellate court ruled the motion for execution was filed on July 25, or after the appeal had been perfected by the Calayags’ filing of their notice of appeal on July 24.

ISSUE

Whether the trial court had jurisdiction to grant execution pending appeal based on a motion filed after the Calayags filed their notice of appeal but before the expiration of their period to appeal.

RULING

Yes, the trial court retained jurisdiction. The legal logic centers on the precise moment an appeal is deemed “perfected.” The Intermediate Appellate Court erroneously equated the mere filing of a notice of appeal with the perfection of appeal. The governing rule was Section 23 of the Interim Rules, which stated that “perfection of the appeal shall be upon the expiration of the last day to appeal by any party.” This Court, in the controlling precedent of Montelibano vs. Bacolod-Murcia Milling Co., Inc., explicitly held that an appeal is perfected not upon the filing of the notice of appeal, but upon the expiration of the last day within which any party could appeal.
Applying this rule, the Calayags’ 15-day period to appeal from their receipt of the decision on July 23, 1984, expired on August 7, 1984. Consequently, their appeal was not perfected on July 24 when they filed their notice, but only after August 7. Therefore, when Yabut filed his motion for execution on July 25, 1984, the appeal was not yet perfected, and the trial court retained jurisdiction to hear and grant the motion for execution pending appeal. The appellate court’s decision was reversed, and the trial court’s order granting execution was reinstated.