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    Republic Vs Santos III, GR 160453

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    Marlouis U. Planas
    1) The Supreme Court ruled that the respondents did not meet their burden of proving that the property was formed through accretion from the Parañaque River as required by Article 457 of the Civil Code. 2) The evidence instead showed that the property was the dried river bed of the Parañaque River, which does not qualify as an accretion under Article 457. As a dried river bed, the property remained owned by the State as part of the public domain unless declared otherwise. 3) Acquisitive prescription also did not apply because the property was not proven to be declared alienable and disposable by the government, which is required for prescription to result in ownership of public land. The Court therefore rejected the

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    Republic Vs Santos III, GR 160453

    Uploaded by

    Marlouis U. Planas
    2K views3 pages
    1) The Supreme Court ruled that the respondents did not meet their burden of proving that the property was formed through accretion from the Parañaque River as required by Article 457 of the Civil Code. 2) The evidence instead showed that the property was the dried river bed of the Parañaque River, which does not qualify as an accretion under Article 457. As a dried river bed, the property remained owned by the State as part of the public domain unless declared otherwise. 3) Acquisitive prescription also did not apply because the property was not proven to be declared alienable and disposable by the government, which is required for prescription to result in ownership of public land. The Court therefore rejected the

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    Republic vs Santos III, GR 160453

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    1) The Supreme Court ruled that the respondents did not meet their burden of proving that the property was formed through accretion from the Parañaque River as required by Article 457 of the Civil Code. 2) The evidence instead showed that the property was the dried river bed of the Parañaque River, which does not qualify as an accretion under Article 457. As a dried river bed, the property remained owned by the State as part of the public domain unless declared otherwise. 3) Acquisitive prescription also did not apply because the property was not proven to be declared alienable and disposable by the government, which is required for prescription to result in ownership of public land. The Court therefore rejected the

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    2K views3 pages

    Republic Vs Santos III, GR 160453

    Uploaded by

    Marlouis U. Planas
    1) The Supreme Court ruled that the respondents did not meet their burden of proving that the property was formed through accretion from the Parañaque River as required by Article 457 of the Civil Code. 2) The evidence instead showed that the property was the dried river bed of the Parañaque River, which does not qualify as an accretion under Article 457. As a dried river bed, the property remained owned by the State as part of the public domain unless declared otherwise. 3) Acquisitive prescription also did not apply because the property was not proven to be declared alienable and disposable by the government, which is required for prescription to result in ownership of public land. The Court therefore rejected the

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    Republic of the Philippines

    SUPREME COURT
    Manila
    FIRST DIVISION
    G.R. No. 160453
    November 12, 2012
    REPUBLIC OF THE PHILIPPINES, Petitioner,
    vs.
    ARCADIO IVAN A. SANTOS III, and ARCADIO C. SANTOS,
    JR., Respondents.
    DECISION
    BERSAMIN, J.:
    Facts:
    Alleging continuous and adverse possession of more than ten years,
    respondent applied on March 7, 1997 for the registration of Lot in
    the Regional Trial Court. The property was located in Barangay San
    Dionisio, Paraaque City, and was bounded in the Southeast by the
    Paraaque River.
    He alleged that the property had been formed through accretion and
    had been in their joint open, notorious, public, continuous and
    adverse possession for more than 30 years.
    The City of Paraaque opposed the application for land registration,
    stating that the property was within the legal easement of 20
    meters from the river bank; and that assuming that the property
    was not covered by the legal easement, title to the property could
    not be registered in favor of the applicants for the reason that the
    property was an orchard that had dried up and had not resulted
    from accretion.
    On May 10, 2000,4 the RTC granted the application for land
    registration. On May 27, 2003, the CA affirmed the RTC.
    Issues:
    I. Whether or not Art. 457 of the NCC is applicable?
    II. Whether or not acquisitive prescription applies to respondent?
    Ruling:
    I. No. The CA grossly erred in applying Article 457 of the Civil Code.
    Article 457 of the Civil Code provides that "(t)o the owners of lands
    adjoining the banks of rivers belong the accretion which they
    gradually receive from the effects of the currents of the waters."

    Respondents did not discharge their burden of proof. They did not
    show that the gradual and imperceptible deposition of soil through
    the effects of the current of the river had formed Lot 4998-B.
    Instead, their evidence revealed that the property was the dried-up
    river bed of the Paraaque River.
    Still, respondents argue that considering that Lot 4998-B did not yet
    exist when the original title of Lot 4 was issued in their mothers
    name in 1920, and that Lot 4998-B came about only thereafter as
    the land formed between Lot 4 and the Paraaque River, the
    unavoidable conclusion should then be that soil and sediments had
    meanwhile been deposited near Lot 4 by the current of the
    Paraaque River, resulting in the formation of Lot 4998-B.
    The argument is legally and factually groundless. For one,
    respondents thereby ignore that the effects of the current of the
    river are not the only cause of the formation of land along a river
    bank. There are several other causes, including the drying up of the
    river bed. In other words, respondents did not establish at all that
    the increment of land had formed from the gradual and
    imperceptible deposit of soil by the effects of the current. Also, it
    seems to be highly improbable that the large volume of soil that
    ultimately comprised the dry land with an area of 1,045 square
    meters had been deposited in a gradual and imperceptible manner
    by the current of the river in the span of about 20 to 30 years the
    span of time intervening between 1920, when Lot 4 was registered
    in the name of their deceased parent (at which time Lot 4998-B was
    not yet in existence) and the early 1950s (which respondents
    witness Rufino Allanigue alleged to be the time when he knew them
    to have occupied Lot 4988-B). The only plausible explanation for the
    substantial increment was that Lot 4988-B was the dried-up bed of
    the Paraaque River. Confirming this explanation was Arcadio, Jr.s
    own testimony to the effect that the property was previously a part
    of the Paraaque River that had dried up and become an orchard.
    The RTC and the CA grossly erred in treating the dried-up river bed
    as an accretion that became respondents property pursuant to
    Article 457 of the Civil Code. That land was definitely not an
    accretion. The process of drying up of a river to form dry land
    involved the recession of the water level from the river banks, and
    the dried-up land did not equate to accretion, which was the gradual
    and imperceptible deposition of soil on the river banks through the
    effects of the current. In accretion, the water level did not recede
    and was more or less maintained. Hence, respondents as the
    riparian owners had no legal right to claim ownership of Lot 4998-B.
    Considering that the clear and categorical language of Article 457 of
    the Civil Code has confined the provision only to accretion, we
    should apply the provision as its clear and categorical language tells

    us to. Axiomatic it is, indeed, that where the language of the law is
    clear and categorical, there is no room for interpretation; there is
    only room for application. The first and fundamental duty of courts
    is then to apply the law.
    The State exclusively owned Lot 4998-B and may not be divested of
    its right of ownership. Article 502 of the Civil Code expressly
    declares that rivers and their natural beds are public dominion of
    the State. It follows that the river beds that dry up, like Lot 4998-B,
    continue to belong to the State as its property of public dominion,
    unless there is an express law that provides that the dried-up river
    beds should belong to some other person.
    II. No. The principle that the riparian owner whose land receives the
    gradual deposits of soil does not need to make an express act of
    possession, and that no acts of possession are necessary in that
    instance because it is the law itself that pronounces the alluvium to
    belong to the riparian owner from the time that the deposit created
    by the current of the water becomes manifest27 has no applicability
    herein. This is simply because Lot 4998-B was not formed through
    accretion. Hence, the ownership of the land adjacent to the river
    bank by respondents predecessor-in-interest did not translate to
    possession of Lot 4998-B that would ripen to acquisitive prescription
    in relation to Lot 4998-B.
    Yet, even conceding, for the sake of argument, that respondents
    possessed Lot 4998-B for more than thirty years in the character
    they claimed, they did not thereby acquire the land by prescription
    or by other means without any competent proof that the land was
    already declared as alienable and disposable by the Government.
    Absent that declaration, the land still belonged to the State as part
    of its public dominion.
    Subject to the exceptions defined in Article 461 of the Civil Code
    (which declares river beds that are abandoned through the natural
    change in the course of the waters as ipso facto belonging to the
    owners of the land occupied by the new course, and which gives to
    the owners of the adjoining lots the right to acquire only the
    abandoned river beds not ipso facto belonging to the owners of the
    land affected by the natural change of course of the waters only
    after paying their value), all river beds remain property of public
    dominion and cannot be acquired by acquisitive prescription unless
    previously declared by the Government to be alienable and
    disposable. Considering that Lot 4998-B was not shown to be
    already declared to be alienable and disposable, respondents could
    not be deemed to have acquired the property through prescription.

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