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Thursday, July 03, 2008
Shipping firm seeks reconsideration on P6M damages
CEBU CITY -- A month before the sinking of its flag carrier, the mv Princess of the Stars, the past came back to haunt the people behind Sulpicio Lines Incorporated.
The Cebu Regional Trial Court (RTC), in a ruling the firm received last May 23, directed Sulpicio Lines to pay a family over P6 million in damages for the loss of a relative during the 1998 sinking of the Princess of the Orient.
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Judge Estela Alma Singco held Sulpicio Lines liable for the sinking and said that a shipping company cannot rely on the defense of force majeure unless it can prove that it was, in every way, faultless.
Going by its pronouncements on the June 22 Princess of the Stars tragedy, the company seems poised to cite force majeure again. It has filed a suit against the weather bureau, blaming it for what it described as a wrong forecast.
The shipping company has filed a motion for reconsideration against the order.
It alleged that the court relied on disputed facts as basis and that it brushed aside the "authoritative findings" of the Coast Guard's Board of Marine Inquiry (BMI) that cleared it of any liabilities.
Judgment
In the 19-page ruling, Judge Singco noted how the Maritime Industry Authority (Marina) and the BMI both found that Ersum Mahilum, skipper of the Orient on the night it sunk, erred in his handling of the vessel.
It noted how the ship captain maintained his course and speed for a certain period even after the ship had already listed three degrees to the left.
"Prudent judgment," said the report, "would dictate that the captain should have considerably reduced the ship's speed."
The findings of the two bodies, the judge said, are significant when taken in tandem with how the same skipper had figured in other incidents before, but was never sanctioned. At least once, his vessel had allegedly sideswiped another Sulpicio ship. Another vessel under his command allegedly caught fire while berthed.
It was established, said Judge Singco, that "the sinking had been caused by the fault of the ship captain and his crew."
"(And) for failing on the part of the defendant to take disciplinary action against Captain Mahilum relative to those (previous) incidents, and allowing him to retain his job, the defendant unnecessarily exposed the vessel and the passengers to the tragic mishap," she ruled.
Blocked
Verna Unabia filed the case that Judge Singco resolved. She is the widow of the late Ernesto Unabia, a seaman of 11 years who, at the time of the incident, was employed as the second engineer of a foreign shipping company.
They have three children, John Erve, Orlan and Yves Vincent.
In her suit, she alleged that passengers in the lower deck were "not properly notified" of the real condition of the Orient when it was already listing and about to sink.
She added that passengers were "falsely told that nothing was wrong" and that crew "blocked the stairways to prevent the passengers from the lower deck from going up the stairs."
She accused the company of "recklessness and wanton disregard for the safety of its passengers" when it decided to proceed with the trip during bad weather.
The shipping company denied the charge, saying, "The proximate and only cause of the sinking of the vessel was by reason of force majeure."
Represented by lawyer Arthur Lim, Sulpicio Lines said the vessel was seaworthy and properly manned when it left the port and provided documentation to show that it was cleared for the voyage by port authorities.
Not enough
But the court ruled in favor of the complainant.
"It was not enough for the common carrier to show that there was an unforeseen or unexpected occurrence. It had to show that it was free from any fault-a fact it miserably failed to prove," it added.
The court directed the firm to pay family P6.24 million as compensatory damage for lost income.
In reaching the amount, Judge Singco noted how Unabia was only 37 at the time of his death and was already earning $3,000 a month (P120,000 at the 1998 exchange rate of P40 to a dollar).
In awarding civil indemnity, Singco noted how the Civil Code fixed damages for incidents like sinking ships at P3,000 and how the Supreme Court, in 1988, increased the amount to P50,000.
That case, Sulpicio Lines vs. the Court of Appeals, was about yet another Sulpicio Lines vessel that had sunk, the mv Doņa Paz.
The court ordered Sulpicio Lines to pay the heirs of Unabia another P50,000 in civil indemnity. Judge Singco threw in another P50,000 for litigation expenses in the case that lasted a few months shy of 10 years. (Karlon N. Rama of Sun.Star Cebu)
For more Philippine news, visit Sun.Star Dumaguete. (July 3, 2008 issue)
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