Professional Documents
Culture Documents
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G.R. No. 166704. December 20, 2006.
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* FIRST DIVISION.
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released from the obligation, and the third person or new debtor take
his place in the relation, for without such release, there is no
novation and the third person who has assumed the obligation of the
debtor merely becomes a co-debtor or a surety.·Novation which
consists in substituting a new debtor (delegado) in the place of the
original one (delegante) may be made even without the knowledge
or against the will of the latter but not without the consent of the
creditor. Substitution of the person of the debtor may be effected by
delegacion, meaning, the debtor offers, and the creditor
(delegatario), accepts a third person who consents to the
substitution and assumes the obligation. Thus, the consent of those
three persons is necessary. In this kind of novation, it is not enough
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(RTC), Branch 61, Baguio City, and the Resolution of the
appellate court denying reconsideration thereof.
The Antecedents
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Further prays for such other relief and remedies just and
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equitable under the premises.‰
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complaint be dismissed.
In their Pre-Trial Brief, the spouses Tibong maintained
that they have never obtained any loan 8
from Agrifina
without the benefit of a written document.
On August 17, 2000, the trial court issued a Pre-Trial
Order where the following issues of the case were defined:
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7 Id., at p. 26.
8 Id., at p. 51.
9 Id., at p. 72.
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and thread. Thus, Agrifina lent a total sum of
P773,000.00 to Felicidad, and each loan transaction was
covered11by either a promissory note or an acknowledgment
receipt. Agrifina stated that she had lost the receipts
signed by Felicidad for the following amounts: P100,000.00,
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P34,000.00 and P2,000.00. The particulars of the
transactions are as follows:
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17 Records, p. 4.
18 TSN, February 1, 2001, p. 3.
19 TSN, February 22, 2001, p. 9.
20 TSN, February 1, 2001, pp. 4-5.
21 TSN, February 22, 2001, p. 10.
22 Exhibits „1‰ to „11‰; Records, pp. 237-247.
23 Spouses Juliet and Tommy Tibong, Corazon Dalisay, Rita
Chomacog, Rosemarie Bandas, Virginia Morada, Helen Cabang, Edna
Papat-iw, Carmelita Casuga, Merlinda Gelacio, Antoinette Manuel, Fely
Cirilo and Lourdes Nimo.
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T o t a l·P284,659.00
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amount of P301,000.00 from FelicidadÊs debtors. In April
1990, she tried to collect the balance of FelicidadÊs account,
but the 31
latter told her to wait until her debtors had
money. When Felicidad reneged on her promise, Agrifina
filed a complaint in the Office of the Barangay Captain for
the collection
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of P773,000.00. However, no settlement was
arrived at.
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presence of Agrifina. Some of the debtors signed the
promissory notes which were likewise prepared by the
lawyer. Thereafter,40 Agrifina personally collected from
FelicidadÊs debtors. Felicidad further narrated that she
received P250,000.00 from one of her 41debtors, Rey Rivera,
and remitted the payment to Agrifina.
Agrifina testified, on rebuttal, that she did not enter into
a re-lending business with Felicidad. When she asked
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39 Id., at p. 9.
40 Id., at pp. 11-12.
41 TSN, September 27, 2001, pp. 34-35.
42 TSN, June 24, 2002, p. 8.
43 Id., at p. 9.
44 Id., at pp. 10-11.
45 Rollo, pp. 96-97; Id., at pp. 10-11.
46 Id., at p. 97; Id., at p. 319.
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51 Rollo, p. 19.
52 Records, pp. 238 & 242.
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The Issues
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SEC. 10. Specific denial.·A defendant must specify each material allegation of
fact the truth of which he does not admit and, whenever practicable, shall set
forth the substance of the matters upon which he relies to support his denial.
Where a defendant desires to deny only a part of an averment, he shall specify
so much of it as is true and material and shall deny only the remainder. Where
a defendant is without knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief as
to the truth of a material averment made in the complaint, he shall so state,
and this shall have the effect of a denial.
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on July 14, 1989 and payable on October 14, 1989. Such receipt was
lost but admitted by the defendants in their counter-affidavit as
attached [to] this complaint and marked as Annex „A‰ mentioned in
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paragraph one (1); x x x‰
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62 Id., at p. 4.
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and Ramirez.
There is no longer a need for the Court to still resolve
the issue of whether respondentsÊ obligation to pay the
balance of their loan account to petitioner was partially
extinguished by the promissory notes executed by Juliet
Tibong, Corazon Dalisay, Rita Chomacog, Carmelita
Casuga, Merlinda Gelacio and Antoinette Manuel because,
as admitted by petitioner, she was able to collect the
amounts under the notes from said debtors and applied
them to respondentsÊ accounts.
Under Article 1231(b) of the New Civil Code, novation is
enumerated as one of the ways by which obligations are
extinguished. Obligations may be modified by changing
their object or principal
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creditor or by substituting the
person of the debtor. The burden to prove the defense that
an obligation
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has been extinguished by novation falls on
the debtor. The nature of novation was extensively
explained in Iloilo65 Traders Finance, Inc. v. Heirs of Sps.
Oscar Soriano, Jr., as follows:
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353 (2001).
438
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633 (2001); Rodriguez v. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 84220, March 25,
1992, 207 SCRA 553, 558; and Nyco Sales Corp. v. BA Finance Corp.,
G.R. No. 71694, August 16, 1991, 200 SCRA 637, 641.
75 439 Phil. 192; 390 SCRA 380 (2002).
439
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