Atok Gold Mining Co., Inc. v. Felix

 

Atok Gold Mining Co., Inc. v. Felix

G.R. No. 222637

April 20, 2022

 

FACTS:

In 1924, Gus Peterson located the mineral land of Blue Jay Fraction under the Philippine Bill of 1902 and thereafter sold his mineral claim to Atok Gold Mining Company, Inc. (AGMCI)’s predecessor, Atok Big Wedge. Since the inception of its mining operations sometime in 1935, AGMCI, through its predecessorin-interest, took possession of the mineral land and has been paying taxes therefore. However, Lydia Bahingawan and Lily Felix assert that their occupation and cultivation of their respective parcels, was open, in the concept of owners, continuous, public and known to AGMCI. Furthermore, they were issued the corresponding free patents and titles over their respective areas. AGMCI averred that it is a holder of valid and subsisting mineral claims including the disputed mineral land of Blue Jay Fraction in Itogon, Benguet, and filed a complaint for the annulment of patents and the titles issued pursuant thereto in the name of Lydia Bahingawan and Lily Felix due to allegedly being issued through misrepresentation and unlawful methods.

ISSUE:

Whether petitioner is the absolute owner of Blue Jay Fraction.

HELD:

No. The Court held that mere location is only a possessory right and does not mean absolute ownership over the affected land or the mining claim. It merely segregates the located land or area from the public domain by barring other would-be locators from locating the same and appropriating for themselves the minerals found therein. To rule otherwise would imply that location is all that is needed to acquire and maintain rights over a located mining claim. For the Philippine Bill of 1902 to apply, it must be established that the mining claim had been perfected when the Philippine Bill of 1902 was the operative law. This is so because, unlike the subsequent laws that prohibit the alienation of mining lands, the Philippine Bill of 1902 sanctioned the alienation of mining lands to private individuals. With the effectivity of the 1935 Constitution, where the regalian doctrine was adopted, it was declared that all natural resources of the Philippines, including mineral lands and minerals, were property belonging to the State. Excluded, however, from the property of public domain were the mineral lands and minerals that were located and perfected by virtue of the Philippine Bill of 1902, since they were already considered private properties of the locators. Here, petitioner neither alleged nor proved that its mining rights had been perfected and completed when the Philippine Bill of 1902 was still in force and effect. Undeniably, this is a factual issue outside the scope of the Court's jurisdiction.