Case Digest (G.R. No. 181912)
Facts:
Ramon M. Alfonso v. Land Bank of the Philippines and Department of Agrarian Reform, G.R. Nos. 181912 & 183347, November 29, 2016, the Supreme Court En Banc, JARDELEZA, J., writing for the Court.
The controversy concerns two agricultural parcels formerly registered in the name of Cynthia Palomar (San Juan, 1.6530 ha., TCT No. T-21136; Bibincahan, 26.2284 ha., TCT No. T-23180). After the enactment of RA 6657 the DAR made preliminary valuations and the landowner rejected them; on April 16, 2001 Palomar sold the parcels to petitioner Ramon M. Alfonso. The DAR Provincial Adjudication Board directed summary proceedings (Land Valuation Cases Nos. 68-01 and 70-01), and, applying then-applicable DAR administrative orders, issued initial valuations substantially lower than Alfonso’s preferred figures.
The Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) (as CARP financial intermediary) sought reconsideration before the DAR adjudicator, which was denied. Both LBP and Alfonso filed separate judicial petitions for de novo determination of just compensation before Branch 52, Regional Trial Court (RTC) sitting as a Special Agrarian Court (SAC); the two cases were consolidated and a court-appointed commissioner (Cuervo Appraisers, Inc.) submitted a report using the Market Data Approach (MDA) and the Capitalized Income Approach (CIA), averaging the two to reach a much higher valuation (approx. P6.09M total).
On May 13, 2005 the SAC adopted the Cuervo report and awarded P6,090,000.00 as just compensation, rejecting DAR/LBP valuations as “unrealistically low.” LBP and DAR moved for reconsideration which the SAC denied; they appealed to the Court of Appeals. In its Decision dated July 19, 2007 (and Resolution of March 4, 2008) the Court of Appeals set aside the SAC decision for failure to observe DAR AO No. 5 (1998) and remanded the case to the SAC to compute just compensation in...(Subscriber-Only)
Issues:
- Did the petitioner properly raise a direct constitutional attack on Section 17 of RA 6657 and the DAR formulas (i.e., is the constitutionality of Section 17/DAR AO No. 5 properly before the Court)?
- Are courts obliged to apply the DAR basic formula (and consider the factors in Section 17) in determining just compensation for lands covered by RA 6657, and if so, ma...(Subscriber-Only)
Ruling:
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Ratio:
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Doctrine:
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