Chua vs Canangbang,

[27 SCRA 791]

CASTRO, J.:

FACTS:

Pacita Chua, when still in the prime of youth, supported herself by working in nightclubs as a hostess. And sexual liaison she had with man after man without benefit of marriage. She first lived with a certain Chua Ben in 1950 by whom she had a child who died in infancy. She afterwards cohabited with Sy Sia Lay by whom she had two children named Robert and Betty Chua Sy. The latter child was born on December 15, 1957. Shortly after the birth of Betty, Pacita Chua and Sy Sia Lay separated. Pacita Chua lingered in and around nightclubs and gambling joints, until she met Victor Tan Villareal. In due time she became the latter's mistress. In 1960 another child, a girl, was born to her. In 1961 when this last child was still an infant, she and Villareal separated. Without means to support the said child, Pacita Chua gave her away to a comadre in Cebu.

Sometime in May 1958 Bartolome Cabangbang and his wife, a childless couple, acquired the custody of the child Betty who was then barely four months old. They have since brought her up as their own. They had her christened as Grace Cabangbang on September 12, 1958.

She surrendered the custody of her child to the Cabangbangs in 1958. She waited until 1963, or after the lapse of a period of five long years, before she brought action to recover custody. Her claim that she did not take any step to recover her child because the Cabangbangs were powerful and influential, does not deserve any modicum of credence.

  At all events, the lower court dismissed the petition. Finding that the child was given to the Cabangbang spouses by Villareal with the knowledge and consent of Pacita Chua. In support of the finding, it cited the facts that the petitioner did not at all — not ever — report to the authorities the alleged disappearance of her daughter, and had not taken any step to see the child when she allegedly discovered that she was in the custody of the Cabangbangs.

There is some testimonial conflict on how the Cabangbang spouses acquired custody of the girl Betty (or Grace), Pacita Chua avers that in October 1958, while she and Villareal were still living together, the latter surreptitiously took the child away and gave her to the Cabangbangs, allegedly in recompense for favors received. She supposedly came to know of the whereabouts of her daughter, only in 1960 when the girl, who was then about three years old, was brought to her by Villareal, who shortly thereafter returned the child to the Cabangbangs allegedly thru threats intimidation, fraud and deceit.

The petitioner tenders for resolution two issues of law which, by her own formulation, read as follows:

  

ISSUE:

Whether or not the lower court erred when it awarded the custody of petitioner's daughter Betty Chua Sy or Grace Cabangbang, who is less than seven (7) years old, in favor of respondents Mr. and Mrs. Bartolome Cabangbang, and [2] illegally deprived petitioner of parental authority over her daughter.

HELD:

The judgment a quo is affirm the lower court's decision with no pronouncement as to costs.

The petitioner's inconsistent demands in the course of the proceedings below, reveal that her motives do not flow from the wellsprings of a loving mother's heart. Upon the contrary, they are unmistakably selfish — nay, mercenary. She needs the child as a leverage to obtain concessions — financial and otherwise — either from the alleged father or the Cabangbangs. Indeed, the petitioner's attitude, to our mind, does nothing but confirm her intention to abandon the child — from the very outset when she allowed Villareal to give her away to the Cabangbangs. It must be noted that the abandonment took place when the child, barely four months old, was at the most fragile stage of life and needed the utmost care and solicitude of her mother. And for five long years thereafter she did not once move to recover the child. This was not the only instance when she gave away a child of her own flesh and blood. She gave up her youngest child, named Betty Tan Villareal, to her comadre in Cebu because she could not support it.

Of incalculable significance is the fact that nowhere in the course of the petitioner's lengthy testimony did she ever express a genuine desire to recover her child Betty Chua Sy or Grace Cabangbang — or, for that matter, her other child Betty Tan Villareal — because she loves her, cares for her, and wants to smother her with motherly affection. Far from it. She nevertheless signified her readiness to give up the child, in exchange for a jeep and some money.

For, by her own admission, the petitioner has no regular source of income, and it is doubtful, to say the very least, that she can provide the child with the barest necessities of life, let alone send her to school. There is no insurance at all that the alleged father, Sy Sia Lay — an unknown quantity, as far as the record goes — would resume giving the petitioner support once she and the child are reunited. This is not to say that with the Cabangbang spouses, a bright and secure future is guaranteed for her. For life is beset at every turn with snares and pitfalls. But the record indubitably pictures the Cabangbang spouses as a childless couple of consequence in the community, who have given her their name and are rearing her as their very own child, and with whom there is every reason to hope she will have a fair chance of normal growth and development into respectable womanhood.

In all questions on the care, custody, education and property of children, the latter's welfare shall be paramount applies only when the litigation involving a child is between the father and the mother. That the policy enunciated, in the above quoted legal provision is of general application, is evident from the use of the, adjective all — meaning, the whole extent or quantity of, the entire number of, every one of.  It is, therefore, error to argue that if the suit involving a child's custody is between a parent and a stranger, the law must necessarily award such custody to the parent. Sec 7, Rule 99 of the Rules of Court, precisely contemplates, among others, a suit between a parent and a stranger who, in the words of the provision, is "some reputable resident of the province." And under the authority of the said rule, the court — if it is for the best interest of the child — may take the child away from its parents and commit it to, inter alia, a benevolent person.

Art. 332 of the Civil Code provides, inter alia:

The courts may deprive the parents of their authority or suspend the exercise of the same if they should treat their children with excessive harshness or should give them corrupting orders, counsels, or examples, or should make them beg or abandon them. (emphasis supplied)

Abandonment is therefore one of the grounds for depriving parents of parental authority over their children.