Quantifiable, not irreparable

A writ of preliminary injunction should be issued only to prevent “grave and irreparable injury”. When is an injury grave and irreparable? This is explained in this case between two corporations engaged in the business of installing outdoor advertising signs, Power Sites (PS) and United Neon (UN).

The case started when both PS and UN separately negotiated for the lease of a portion of a property located at the South Superhighway, Alabang, Muntinlupa sometime in January 2002, to put up their billboards. When the property owner rejected the proposal of PS and decided to lease the property to UN, PS negotiated with the owner of the adjacent property and secured its own lease to erect a billboard. Apparently the billboard that will be erected by either will block the line of sight of the other.

PS appeared to have started construction of its billboard first on the strength of a Billboard/Signboard permit issued to another company with the same majority owner as the majority owner of PS and of a Building and Electrical permit issued in the name of the owner of PS himself.

On the other hand, UN first registered the lease contract with the Outdoor Advertising Association of the Philippines (OAAP) in accordance with the latter’s rules and ethics guidelines giving it the exclusive right to the line of sight over the leased property. Then it also started construction of its billboard on the strength of a building permit issued to it on May 22, 2002.

When UN saw that the billboard being constructed by PS on the adjacent property about 4 meters away was blocking the line of sight of its own billboard, it urged PS to relocate the latter’s sign to another site or to construct it in such a way that the sign would not obstruct the view of its billboard. PS on the other hand requested the City Engineer to revoke UN’s building permit and to issue a cease and desist order.

Before the City Engineer could resolve the controversy however, PS already filed on July 1, 2002, a Petition for Injunction and damages with a prayer for a Temporary Restraining Order and a Writ of Preliminary Injunction before the Regional Trial Court (RTC). In its prayer for a writ of preliminary injunction PS alleged that unless UN is stopped from putting up its signage, it would suffer damages in the form of “immense loss in profit and possible damage claims from clients as well as the cost of the billboard which is a considerable amount of money”.

On August 1, 2002, after due hearing, the RTC granted PS’ prayer for a writ of preliminary injunction “considering that the commission and/or continuance of the act of installing the signage by UN during the litigation would work grave injustice and irreparable damage to PS since it would surely cause immense loss of profit and possible damage claims from clients”. Was the RTC correct?

No. Apart from the ground that PS is not clearly entitled to the relief sought since there is still a cloud of doubt as to its right to the claimed line of sight, the damages claimed by PS cannot be considered “grave and irreparable” as understood in law.

Damages are irreparable where there is no standard by which their amount can be measured with reasonable accuracy. An irreparable injury which a court of equity may enjoin includes that degree of wrong which produce hurt, inconvenience or damage that can be estimated only by conjecture and not by any accurate standard of measurement. It is destructive to the property it affects either physically or in the character in which it has been held or when the property has some peculiar quality or use so that its pecuniary value will not fairly recompense the owner of the loss thereof. The writ of injunction should never issue when an action for damages would adequately compensate the injuries caused.

Here, any damage PS may suffer is easily subject to mathematical computation and if proven is fully compensable. The damages alleged, namely, “immense loss in profit and possible damage claims from clients and the cost of the billboard which is a considerable amount of money” is easily quantifiable and certainly does not fall within the concept of irreparable damage or injury (Power Sites and Signs Inc. vs. United Neon etc. G.R. 163406, November 24, 2009).

Note: Books containing compilation of my articles on Labor Law and Criminal Law (Vols. I and II) are now available. Call tel. 7249445.

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