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Director of Lands vs. Court of Appeals and Abisto 276 SCRA 276

THE DIRECTOR OF LANDS, petitioner vs. COURT OF APPEALS and TEODORO ABISTADO, substituted by MARGARITA, MARISSA, MARIBEL, ARNOLD and MARY ANN, all surnamed ABISTO, respondents.

G.R. No. 102858 | 1997-07-28

D E C I S I O N

PANGANIBAN, J.:

Is newspaper publication of the notice of initial hearing in an original land registration case mandatory or directory?

Statement of the Case

The Court of Appeals ruled that it was merely procedural and that the failure to cause such publication did not deprive the trial court of its authority to grant the application. But the Solicitor General disagreed and thus filed this petition to set aside the Decision 1 promulgated on July 3, 1991 and the subsequent Resolution 2 promulgated on November 19, 1991 by Respondent Court of Appeals 3 in CA-G.R. CV No. 23719. The dispositive portion of the challenged Decision...