Obligation and Contracts – Atty.

Rabuya Lecture Forms of Quasi Contracts

1. Negotiorium Gestio – Juridical relation
which arises when a person referred to gestor
Basic Concepts or officious manager voluntarily assumes the
Obligation – a juridical necessity to give, to do, or management or agency of a certain business or
not to do. property which has been abandoned belonging
to another person
- Not limited only to debts
- Unitary - The property should have been
neglected or voluntarily abandoned.
- Should not be authorized by the owner
2 Aspects – - Voluntary management must be done
in good faith
1. debt (Active)
Obligations of the Gestor:
2. right (Passve)
1.to continue the management / agency
until the termination of it appears; the
ELEMENT owner can only be asked to assume the
management of the property or the
 Objective Element business if the owner is in the position to
- prestation: giving, doing, not doing do so.
 Subjective Element
Debtor / Active Subject 2. the contracts entered into by the gestor
Creditor / Passive Subject for the management of the property; gestor
 Juridical or Legal tie / Vinculum Jures – is directly liable but he can reimburse the
binds the object and the subject/ /Sources amount from the owner of the property or
the business; unless the owner ratifies the
contract or if the object of the contract is a
thing pertaining the owner, in this case the
SOURCES OFOBLIGATIONS
owner is directly liable.
1. Law
Obligation of the owner
2. Contracts
1. To reimburse the gestor for any
3. Quasi Contracts – A juridical relation which obligations incurred by the gestor in
arises from LUV (Lawful, Unitary and Voluntary) relation to contracts the gestor entered
act for the purpose of preventing unjust into in the management of the business or
enrichment to the end that no person should property
unjustly enriched himself at the expense of 2. To refund the useful and necessary
another expenses incurred by the gestor in the
management of the property or business
* in an implied contract there is consent
3. To pay damages suffered by the gestor in
given, although given impliedly
relation to his management of the business
* there is no consent because the juridical or the property
relationship arises from unitary action of
2. Solution Indebiti - a juridical
another person
relation which arises when a person, by
* implied contract – the basis is the will of mistake, delivers something to another
the parties without any just or legal ground
* quasi contract – the basis is the law

Elements:
1. no prior relationship between the giver
and the recipient
2. the delivery was without any legal or any
justifiable cause; it was delivered by
mistake
in rem verso (Article 22) – can only
prosper if there is no other remedy under
the contract, quasi contract, delicts of
quasi delicts.
- there is an obligation to return the things
given to him; with interest if the
acceptance was made in bad faith.
4. Delicts – based on Article 100 of the Revised
Penal Code.
Question: When do we know that there
is civil liability arising from crimes?
Answer: When there is a private
offended party who will have to be
indemnified.
Question: What if the accused is
acquitted, will that also extinguish his civil
liability?
4. No existing contractual relationship
between the parties.
People Vs, Bayutas (Read, Greta)
If during the pendency of the criminal
case, the accused died, both criminal and civil
liabilities, arising from delicts are extinguished.
But the civil liabilities based on quasi-delicts are
not extinguished.
The pre-existence of contract does not bar
to the recovery of the civil liability based on the
quasi delict if the act that breaks the contract is
also the case of quasi delict.
Accident – driver- pedestrian - passenger
Pedestrian and Passenger – Delict - taxi
driver is primarily liable; the operator is
subsidiarily liable
Pedestrian and Passenger - Quasi Delict
– the driver and the operator are solidarily liable.
Passenger – Contract (best option because
there is no need to prove the negligence of the
driver and the operator; all you need to prove is
the existence of the contract and its breach.

Answer: It depends. If the acquittal is

because the accused was proven not to have
committed the crime, no civil liability; but if
the acquittal was because his guilt was not
proven beyond reasonable doubts, the accused
may still be civilly liable (see article 29)..
because the quantum of evidence required in
the civil case is preponderance of evidence.

5. Quasi Delicts – there is an act or omission

characterized by a fault or negligence
Elements.

1. Someone must have suffered damages

2. The reason for that damages was an
act or omission committed by another
person
3. There must be a causal connection
between the act or omission and the
damages suffered.
Civil vs. Natural Obligation
Civil Obligation is that obligation which
gives you a right of action to demand for its
performance.

Natural Obligation is that obligation

which does not give you the right of action to
demand its performance. The performance of the
natural obligation resides in the conscience of the
debtor.

Moral Obligations are not recognized by

law as a source of obligation. Under the law,
there are just 2 kinds of obligations. Civil and
Natural. Moral obligation does not produce any
legal consequences.

Legal Consequences
1. Natural Obligation can be ratified, and be
converted again into a civil obligation

2. if a natural obligation has been voluntarily

fulfilled by the debtor, the creditor, under the law,
is authorized to retain the payment.

Voluntarily… because if the payment was

made thru mistake, the creditor may be required
to return the amount paid or the thing given, vy
virtue of Solution Indebiti.

Freedom from mistake or error and

coercion.