G.R. No. 231001 - CONSTANTINO Y. BELIZARIO,*, VS. DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENT AND NATURAL RESOURCES AND THE REGISTRY OF DEEDS OF NASUGBU, BATANGAS.R E S O L U T I O N - Supreme Court E-Library

Ruling

WHEREFORE, judgment is hereby rendered as follows: (a) Declaring as null and void Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-9550 (or Exhibit "24") of the Register of Deeds of the Province of Batangas and other subdivision titles issued in favor of Ayala y Cia and/or Hacienda de [Calatagan] over the areas outside its private land covered by TCT No. 722, which, including the lots in [TCT No.] T-9550 (lots 360, 362, 363 and 182), are hereby reverted to public dominion. In Republic of the Philippines v. Ayala y Cia , docketed as G.R. No. L-20950, dated [May 31, 1965], the Supreme Court affirmed with modification the CFI Decision. The modification of said decision, however, had no bearing at all on the issues of the annulment of the certificates of title and the reversion of illegally registered lands to the public domain. The High Court found that the excess area outside the private land of the Ayala[s] as stated in their titles usurped 2,000 hectares consisting of portions of the territorial sea, the foreshore, the beach, and navigable waters properly belonging to the public domain. Twenty-[t]hree years after the Supreme Court rendered its decision in G.R. No. L-20950, the execution of the annulment and reversion portions of the CFI [D]ecision was still incomplete. Accordingly, in [ Republic v. Delos Angeles ], docketed as G.R. No. L-30420, dated [March 25, 1988], the Supreme Court directed its Clerk of Court to issue the writ in Civil Case No. 373, and said: Contrary to respondent Zobel's assertion, the 1965 final judgment in favor of the Republic declared as null and void, not only TCT No. 9550, but also "other subdivision titles" issued over the expanded areas outside the private land of Hacienda Calatagan covered by TCT No. 722. As shown at the outset, after respondents ordered subdivision of the Hacienda Calatagan which enable[d] them to acquire titles to and "illegally absorb" the subdivided lots which were outside the hacienda's perimeter, they converted the same into fishponds and sold them to third parties. But as the Court stressed in the 1965 judgment and time and again in other cases, "it is an elementary principle of law that said areas not being capable of registration, their inclusion in a certificate of title does not convert the same into properties of private ownership or confer title on the registrant." x x x x This final 1965 judgment reverting to public dominion all public lands unlawfully titled by respondent Zobel and Ayala and/or Hacienda Calatagan is now beyond question, review or reversal by any court, although as sadly shown hereinabove, respondents' tactics and technical maneuvers have all these 23 long years thwarted its execution and the Republic's recovery of the lands and waters of the public domain. In a resolution, dated [November 16, 2006], the Supreme Court directed the RTC to proceed with the immediate execution of the CFI Decision. On [December 17, 2007], Judge Austria of the RTC issued an order directing the Departme