The Supreme Court has recently upheld the dismissal for lack of cause of action the suit of certain occupants of a portion of friar lands known as the “Piedad Estate,” located in Quezon City, to file for the cancellation of certificates of title over the subject property. 

In 14-page decision penned by Justice Consuelo Ynares-Santiago, the Court’s Third Division unanimously affirmed the Court of Appeals (CA), which held that the said occupants of the subject property are not the real parties-in-interest.

The Court noted that the petitioners had conceded the State’s ownership of the property by failing to pray that they be declared owners of the land in question but only to be adjudged as bona fide occupants.

The Court also held that the CA correctly found that only the State, through the Solicitor General, may institute the suit per settled jurisprudence. 

The petitioners had sought the cancellation of the subject certificates of title, alleging that such are spurious, fictitious, issued “under mysterious circumstances,” and the holders thereof, including respondent Genuino Ice Company Inc., were never in actual possession of the property involved. (GR No. 154080, Canete, et al. v. Genuino Ice Company, January 22, 2008)