G.R. No. 170506 - LAND BANK OF THE PHILIPPINES, VS. HEIRS OF LORENZO TAÑADA AND EXPEDITA EBARLE.

Ruling

WHEREFORE, judgment is hereby rendered: 1. Declaring that the petitioners are entitled to just compensation; and 2. That P150,000.00 per hectare is just compensation for the land of the petitioners to be paid by the Land Bank of the Philippines for the areas selected by the Department of Agrarian Reform namely: 16.7692 hectares under Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-8483 and 13 hectares under Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-12610 both of the Office of the Register of Deeds of Bataan. [5] In arriving at the said ruling, the trial court reasoned, thus: The issue to be resolved is whether or not the valuation made by the Land Bank of the Philippines and DARAB [is] just compensation for the said properties to be acquired by the Department of Agrarian Reform. In the case of Association of Small Landowners in the Philippines, Inc. vs. Secretary of Agrarian Reform, 175 SCRA 343, the Supreme Court held that: Just compensation is defined as the full and fair equivalent of the property taken from its owner by the expropriator. It has been repeatedly stressed by this Court that the measure is not the taker's gain but the owner's loss. The word just is used to intensify the meaning of the word "compensation" to convey the idea that the equivalent to be rendered for the property to be taken shall be real, substantial, full, ample. Manila Railroad Co. vs. Velasquez, 32 Phil. 286; Manotok vs. National Housing Authority, 150 SCRA 89. Based on said definition of what is just compensation, this Court believes that the price of P150,000.00 per hectare or P15.00 per square meter which the petitioners are asking is just and reasonable. This is the same price for which the owner of adjoining land was sold in Abucay, Bataan in 1996. This Court cannot close its eyes to the prevalent practice of tenants that once they are awarded lots under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program, they immediately look for prospective buyers, selling the property from P500,000.00 to P1,000,000.00 per hectare which they only acquired at a very low price to the point of being confiscatory to the prejudice of the real owners. [6] A motion for reconsideration was subsequently filed by petitioner but this was denied by the trial court in its Order dated August 7, 2003. [7] Dissatisfied with the adverse judgment, petitioner elevated the case to the Court of Appeals. However, the appellate court merely denied petitioner's appeal and affirmed the appealed decision of the trial court in the now assailed April 8, 2005 Decision, which dispositively states: WHEREFORE , the petition is DENIED for lack of merit and the appealed Decision dated 13 July 1999 is AFFIRMED in toto . [8] When the appellate court refused to reconsider the foregoing decision, petitioner sought our review of the case and our ruling on the following issue: WHETHER OR NOT THE SPECIAL AGRARIAN COURT CAN DISREGARD THE VALUATION GUIDELINES OR FORMULA PRESCRIBED UNDER DAR AO NO. 6, SERIES OF 1992, AND AS HELD IN THE CASE OF