FINDING ways to continue living and to survive every single day is challenging during the pandemic.
For almost a year, one of the issues raised by many is credit. Many have inquired and requested for credit score information during the pandemic as more people apply for loans or ask someone to lend them money to help them cope with the crisis.
However, this is also the time that creditors think they are in a difficult situation to recover credit from debtors or rescind contracts due to fraud or failure to do his or her obligations.
This is also one of the topics I discussed in my class in Obligations and Contacts just a few days before the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ). The topic focused on Accion Pauliana and its prescription.
Accion Pauliana is an action to rescind in fraud of creditors. Here, there must be an existing credit prior to the contract to be rescinded, although it is not yet due or a demandable later. The subsequent contract made by the debtor conveys a patrimonial benefit to a third person. There must be fraud on the part of the debtor which may be presumed or proved. The creditor has no other legal remedy. He cannot recover his credit in any other matter.
This reminds me of the lecture I attended for almost a month ago with the title “The Acción Pauliana as an Instrument to Protect the Creditor’s Interest.” This is an online lecture of Prof. José Manuel de Torre Perea. He is a civil law professor at the Facultad de Derecho of the Universidad de Málaga (UMA).
Prof. de Torres discussed the civil law principle of Accion Pauliana and how the Spanish Civil Code (SCC) is related to Philippine Civil Code (PSS) counterparts. Both laws include Accion Pauliana as one of the remedies of a creditor and its advantages and disadvantages.
The criminal counterpart is called fraudulent insolvency.
This is a timely lecture hosted by the University of San Agustin – College of Law in collaboration with the Capacity Building for Legal and Social Advancement in the Philippines (CALESA).
We have been in this unusual lifestyle for almost a year now. I hope that people will have less worry on 2021. I hope that issues will be amicably solved and that everyone will have easy access to justice./PN
