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Province of Nueva Ecija vs. Imperial Mining Co., Inc.

PROVINCE OF NUEVA ECIJA, plaintiff-appellant, vs. IMPERIAL MINING COMPANY, INC., defendant-appellee.

G.R. No. L-59463 | 1982-11-19

D E C I S I O N


PLANA, J.:

This is an appeal from the decision of the Court of First Instance of Nueva Ecija, Branch VIII, in Civil Case No. C-4 for collection of real property tax, which has been certified to this Court by the Court of Appeals as a case involving purely a question of law. The legal issue is whether defendant-appellee Imperial Mining Company, Inc. (IMC), lessee of some parcels of mineral land (placer mining claims) in Carranglan, Nueva Ecija, is liable for real property tax thereon, although the said mineral land forms part of the public domain.

The antecedent facts are simple. In 1968, IMC leased from the Government...