NDC AGRIX V. PHILIPPINE VETERANS BANK (PVB) GR No. 84132-33 December 10, 1990
FACTS:
The particular enactment in question is Presidential Decree No. 1717, which ordered the rehabilitation of the Agrix Group of Companies to be administered mainly by the National Development Company.
The law outlined the procedure for filling claims against the Agrix Companies and created a claims committee to process these claims.
Especially relevant to this case, and noted at the outset, is section 4(1) thereof providing that “all mortgages and other liens presently attaching to any of the assets of the dissolved corporations are hereby extinguished.”
Earlier, the Agrix Marketing Inc. had executed in favor of private respondent Philippine Veterans Bank a real estate mortgage dated July 7, 1978 over three parcels of land situated in Los Baños, Laguna.
During the existence of the mortgage, Agrix went bankrupt. It was the expressed purpose of salvaging this and the other Agrix companies that the aforementioned decree was issued by President Marcos.
Pursuant thereto, the private respondent filed a claim with the AGRIX Claims Committee for the payment of its loan credit. In the meantime, the New Agrix, Inc. and the National Development Company, petitioners herein, invoking Sec. 4 (1) of the decree, filed a petition with the Regional Trial Court of Calamba, Laguna, for the cancellation of the mortgage lien in favor of the private respondent. For its part, the private respondent took steps to extrajudicially foreclose the mortgage, prompting the petitioners to file a second case with the same court to stop the foreclosure. The two cases were consolidated
After the submission by the parties of their respective pleadings, the trial court rendered the impugned decision. Judge Francisco Ma. Guerrero annulled not only the challenged provision, viz., Sec. 4 (1), but the entire Pres. Decree No. 1717 on the grounds that:
(1) the presidential exercise of legislative power was a violation of the principle of separation of powers;
(2) The law impaired the obligation of contracts; and
(3) the decree violated the equal protection clause. The motion for reconsideration of this decision having been denied, the present petition was filed.
The Court granted the petitioner's prayer for a temporary restraining order and instructed the respondents to cease and desist from conducting a public auction sale of the lands in question.
The petitioners contend that the private respondent is now estopped from contesting the validity of the decree.
The Court, after noting that the petitioners had already filed their claims with the AGRIX Claims Committee created by the decree, had simply dismissed the petition on the ground of estoppel.
The petitioners stress that in the case at bar the private respondent also invoked the provisions of Pres. Decree No. 1717 by filing a claim with the AGRIX Claims Committee. Failing to get results, it sought to foreclose the real estate mortgage executed by AGRIX in its favor, which had been extinguished by the decree. It was only when the petitioners challenged the foreclosure on the basis of Sec. 4 (1) of the decree, that the private respondent attacked the validity of the provision. At that stage, however, consistent with Mendoza, the private respondent was already estopped from questioning the constitutionality of the decree.
ISSUE:
WON Philippine Veterans Bank as creditor of Agrix is still entitled for payment without prejudice to PD 1717.
HELD:
YES. A mortgage lien is a property right derived from contract and so comes under the protection of Bill of rights so do interests on loans, as well as penalties and charges, which are also vested rights once they accrue. Private property cannot simply be taken by law from one person and given to another without just compensation and any known public purpose. This is plain arbitrariness and is not permitted under the constitution.
The court also feels that the decree impairs the obligation of the contract between Agrix and the private respondent without justification. While it is true that the police power is superior to the impairment clause, the principle will apply only where the contract is so related to the public welfare that it will be considered congenitally susceptible to change by the legislature in the interest of greater number.
Our finding in sum, is that PD 1717 is an invalid exercise of the police power, not being in conformity with the traditional requirements of a lawful subject and a lawful method. The extinction of the mortgage and other liens and of the interest and other charges pertaining to the legitimate creditors of Agrix constitutes taking without due process of law, and this is compounded by the reduction of the secured creditors to the category of unsecured creditors in violation of the equal protection clause. Moreover, the new corporation being neither owned nor controlled by the government, should have been created only by general and not special law. And in so far as the decree also interferes with purely private agreements without any demonstrated connection with the public interest, there is likewise an impairment of the obligation of the contract.