By Rey E. Requejo

A litigant at the Supreme Court faces losing its multimillion-peso property after the court?s second division issued a resolution, allegedly depriving it of the constitutional right to due process and fair judicial proceedings.

Cebu-based Aqualab Philippines Inc. through its counsel Santiago Gabionza Jr. appealed to the Second Division to reconsider and set aside its Sept. 29, 2008 resolution, and instead uphold Aqualab?s ownership of the disputed 1.7 hectares of land in Lapu-Lapu City.

The assailed one-page Sept. 29, 2008 resolution of the Second Division denied Aqualab?s petition for review. Aqualab sought to reverse the Court of Appeals decision dated March 15, 2007, which in turn rejected the Sept. 30, 1997 ruling of the Lapu-Lapu City Regional Trial Court, Branch 53, that dismissed the complaint for declaration of nullity of documents, cancellation of transfer certificates of title and reconveyance with right of legal redemption filed by respondents heirs of Marcelino Pagobo et. al. on ground of lack of cause of action and prescription.

The CA, in a dangerous precedent, also ordered the nullification and cancellation of Aqualab?s TCT Nos. 18442 and 18443 issued by the Register of Deeds of Lapu-Lapu City, the petition said.

Aqualab, in a supplement to its motion for reconsideration, urged the high court to rectify the reversible errors it committed when it affirmed the CA decision dated March 15, 2007.

According to Aqualab, the Court?s Second Division failed to indicate the legal and ?which warrants the reversal on constitutional grounds.?

The firm pointed out that the questioned resolution was rendered in violation of the petitioner?s right to due process, thus, contrary to Court?s jurisprudential fiat that ?elementary due process demands that the parties to litigation be given information on how the case was decided, as well as an explanation of the factual and legal reasons that led to the conclusions of the Court.?

Aqualab also assailed the CA decision, which ignored the fundamental precepts of fair play because the respondents (Pagobo heirs) do not have any legal personality to institute the case or the legal title to the disputed lots.

?The CA arbitrarily resolved the complaint of respondent heirs of Marcelino Pagobo et. al. on the merits by nullifying and directing the cancellation of Transfer Certificate of Title Nos. 18442 and 18443 issued by the Register of Deeds for the City of Lapu-Lapu evidencing Aqualab?s lawful title and ownership of the disputed property,? the petitioner said.

?The CA not only went beyond the bounds of the law but even rendered inutile the proscription enshrined in the supreme law of the land against deprivation of property without due process of law,? Aqualab complained.

?Worse,? Aqualab said, ?the high court sanctioned such a grave affront to minimum requirements of due process, when it affirmed in to the CA?s reversal of the RTC?s order through a denial of the instant petition via a minute resolution.??

Under these circumstances, Aqualab said it cannot be blamed for believing that the respondents were unjustifiably privileged. ?Foregoing is especially so since, wittingly or not, this Court, with one broad stroke, established a ?dangerous and crippling? precedent, which does not merely give the CA an unrestrained license to dispose of issues not brought before them, but has serious far-reaching emasculating results on party litigants? inviolable right to due process, such that it may have the unintended effect of allowing appellate courts to dispense with,?? Aqualab said.

?A reexamination of the circumstances is therefore highly imperative because the questioned resolution, if allowed to become final, shall be a very dangerous precedent that would surely be used as the jurisprudential springboard,? the petitioner said.

The movant also pointed out that when an appellate court reverses a lower court?s dismissal of a case upon a motion to dismiss, the mandated procedure is for the Court of Appeals to refer the case back to the lower court for further proceedings. ?The trial court should be given the opportunity to evaluate the evidence, apply the law and decree the proper remedy,? the movant said.