Title
Badillo vs. Court of Appeals
Case
G.R. No. 131903
Decision Date
Jun 26, 2008
Owners dispute road lot sale by respondent, alleging illegal conversion and blocked access. Courts ruled HLURB has jurisdiction; appeal dismissed for procedural errors.
subdivision road lots
petition for certiorari
exclusive jurisdiction
A

Case Summary (G.R. No. 131903)

Factual Background

Petitioners alleged that they owned lots adjoining a subdivision road lot known as Lot 369-A-29 or Apollo Street under subdivision plan Psd-37971, which provided them access to the main Road 20. The road lot was covered by Transfer Certificate of Title No. RT-20895 and was registered in the name of Pedro del Rosario. An annotation on TCT No. RT-20895, Entry No. 605/T-22655 dated 18 August 1953, recorded a court order that the street lot “shall not be closed or disposed of by the registered owner without previous approval of the court.” Petitioners averred that del Rosario sold an unsegregated portion of the road lot to Josefa Conejero and Ignacio Sonoron without securing prior court approval, and that the parties thereafter executed a partition which resulted in partial cancellation of TCT No. RT-20895 and issuance of new titles in the names of Conejero, del Rosario, and Sonoron. Petitioners further alleged that del Rosario sold one of the resulting titles to Goldkey Development Corporation, that the Register of Deeds allowed registration without judicial approval, and that Goldkey erected cement fences obstructing ingress and egress to petitioners’ lots.

Administrative Proceedings

Petitioners initially filed a complaint with the Quezon City Office of the Building Official in May 1991, docketed as Building Case No. R-10-91-006. The building official resolved that the disputed parcel was a residential lot and not a road lot; that decision became final and executory. The Housing and Land Use Regulatory Board issued a Development Permit to Goldkey on 10 September 1991 authorizing development of the parcel as a “Residential Townhouse Subdivision”. Petitioners did not appeal the administrative determinations of the building official or the HLURB.

Trial Court Proceedings

On 4 November 1991 petitioners filed with the Regional Trial Court of Quezon City an action for Annulment of Documents with a Prayer for Issuance of Prohibitory and Mandatory Injunction and Damages, seeking to annul the sales and partition affecting the road lot and to enjoin respondents. On 5 June 1995 Branch 222 of the RTC issued an order dismissing the complaint for lack of jurisdiction over the subject matter. The trial court relied on the prior final administrative determination by the building official that the property was a residential lot and on HLURB approval for development, concluding that petitioners should have pursued administrative remedies and that the HLURB’s expertise and determinations removed the controversy from the jurisdiction of the regular courts.

Ruling of the Court of Appeals

The Court of Appeals, in a Decision dated 17 September 1997 in CA-G.R. CV No. 50035, dismissed petitioners’ appeal. The appellate court reasoned that the complaints were premised on the contention that subdivision road lots were illegally converted into residential lots and disposed of by the subdivision owner, and that the controversy therefore concerned enforcement of contractual and statutory obligations relating to subdivisions. The CA held that jurisdiction over such matters lay with the HLURB pursuant to PD 957, PD 1216, PD 1344, EO 648, and EO 90, and that the appeal raised only questions of law concerning which tribunal had jurisdiction. Accordingly, the appellate court concluded that petitioners should have sought relief by petition for review on certiorari to the Supreme Court rather than by ordinary appeal to the Court of Appeals.

Issues Presented to the Supreme Court

Petitioners advanced three issues: whether the Court of Appeals acted without or in excess of jurisdiction or with grave abuse of discretion in dismissing the appeal on the ground that jurisdiction over the subject matter lay with the HLURB; whether the Court of Appeals acted without or in excess of jurisdiction or with grave abuse of discretion in dismissing the appeal on the ground that petitioners did not assign any error of fact; and whether a petition for certiorari under Rule 65 of the Rules of Court was a proper remedy for petitioners’ procedural error.

Petitioners’ Contentions

Petitioners contended that the trial court had acquired jurisdiction over the persons of the defendants and over the subject matter and that the annotation on TCT No. RT-20895 prohibiting disposition without prior court approval continued to bar any private conversion of the road lot. Petitioners argued that relief by annulment of title and damages remained cognizable in the regular courts and that certiorari under Rule 65 was a proper remedy to correct the dismissal of their appeal by the Court of Appeals.

The Supreme Court’s Ruling

The Supreme Court dismissed the petition and affirmed the 17 September 1997 Decision of the Court of Appeals. The Court held that the HLURB is the sole regulatory body for housing and land development insofar as the subject matters delineated by statute are concerned, and that the agency’s jurisdiction is defined by the enabling statutes and implementing executive orders. The Court ruled that petitioners’ action essentially sought specific performance of statutory and contractual obligations to preserve subdivision roads and to undo unlawful conversions, a species of controversy within the exclusive jurisdiction of the HLURB under PD 957 as amended by PD 1344 and as transferred and vested by EO 648 and EO 90.

Legal Basis and Reasoning

The Court traced the statutory framework: PD 957 vested regulatory authority over subdivisions and prohibited alteration of approved subdivision plans and roads without the authority’s permission and homeowner consent, particularly under Section 22; PD 1344, pursuant to Section 1, conferred exclusive jurisdiction on the National Housing Authority (and successors) to hear cases involving unsound real estate practices, refund claims by buyers, and cases involving specific performance of contractual and statutory obligations by developers; EO 648 transferred NHA regulatory functions to the Human Settlement Regulatory Commission; EO 90 renamed the Commission the HLURB and retained its regulatory and adjudicatory powers. The Court applied its precedent in Osea v. Ambrosio, Pena v. GSIS, C.T. Torres Enterprises, Inc. v. Hibionada, and Cristobal v. Court of Appeals to hold that controversies concerning noncompliance with requisites for conversion of subdivision lots and related enforcement of subdivision obligations fall within the HLURB’s quasi-judicial specialization and are removed from the cognizance of regular courts.

Appeal Procedure and Proper Forum

The Court examined the procedural posture of petitioners’ appeal and the correct mode of review. It quoted Section 2, Rule 41 of the Rules of Court concerning modes of appeal and reiterated the doctrine that where only questions of law are involved from an RTC decision rendered in original jurisdiction, the appeal lies to the Supreme Court by petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45, not by ordinary appeal to the Court of Appeals. The Court observed that petitioners’ Appellants’ Brief raised solely a question of law—whether the trial court erred in holding lack of subject-matter jurisdiction—and therefore the Court of Appeals correctly dismissed the appeal pursuant to the rule that the Court of Appeals lacks jurisdiction to entertain appeals that involve only questions of law, citing the dismissal provision quoted from the rules. The Court further held that Rule 65 is not a remedy for a

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