04/02/2020 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly In this case, respondent was charged with indirect contempt for issuing the subject orders enjoining the implementation of demolition orders against illegal structures constructed on a portion of the Busol Watershed Reservation located at Aurora Hill, Baguio City. In the Decision dated February 4, 2009 rendered in G.R. No. 180206, the Court indeed upheld the authority of the NCIP to issue temporary restraining orders and writs of injunction to preserve the rights of parties to a dispute who are members of indigenous cultural communities or indigenous peoples. However, the Court categorically ruled that Elvin Gumangan, et al., whose houses and structures are the subject of demolition orders issued by petitioner, are not entitled to the injunctive relief granted by herein respondent in his capacity as Regional Hearing Officer of the NCIP, thus: The crucial question to be asked then is whether private respondents’ ancestral land claim was indeed recognized by Proclamation No. 15, in which case, their right thereto may be protected by an injunctive writ. After all, before a writ of preliminary injunction may be issued, petitioners must show that there exists a right to be protected and that the acts against which injunction is directed are violative of said right. Proclamation No. 15, however, does not appear to be a definitive recognition of private respondents’ ancestral land claim. The proclamation merely identifies the Molintas and Gumangan families, the predecessorsin-interest of private respondents, as claimants of a portion of the Busol Forest Reservation but does not acknowledge vested rights over the same. In fact, Proclamation No. 15 explicitly withdraws the Busol Forest Reservation from sale or settlement. It provides: “Pursuant to the provisions of section eighteen hundred and twenty-six of Act Numbered Twenty-seven Hundred and eleven[,] I hereby establish the Busol Forest Reservation to be administered by the Bureau of Forestry for the purpose of conserving and protecting water and timber, the protection of the water supply being of primary importance and all other uses of the forest are to be subordinated to that purpose. I therefore withdraw from sale or settlement the following described parcels of the public domain situated in the Township of La Trinidad, City of Baguio, Mountain Province, Island of Luzon, to wit:” The fact remains, too, that the Busol Forest Reservation was declared by the Court as inalienable in Heirs of Gumangan v. Court of Appeals. The declaration of the Busol Forest Reservation as such precludes its conversion into private property. Relatedly, the courts are not endowed with jurisdictional competence to adjudicate forest lands. All told, although the NCIP has the authority to issue temporary restraining orders and writs of injunction, we are not convinced that private respondents are entitled to the relief granted by the Commission.[30] (Emphasis supplied.) elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/56526 5/11