PMI COLLEGES vs.NLRC, G.R. No. 121466. August 15, 1997

 PMI COLLEGES vs. THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION and ALEJANDRO GALVAN

G.R. No. 121466. August 15, 1997

FACTS:

1. On July 7, 1991, petitioner hired private respondent as contractual instructor. Pursuant to this engagement, private respondent then organized classes in marine engineering.
2. Initially, private respondent and other instructors were compensated for services rendered during the first three periods of the abovementioned contract.
3. However, for reasons unknown to private respondent, he stopped receiving payment for the succeeding rendition of services.
4. This claim of nonpayment was embodied in a letter. However the salary of private respondent corresponding to the shipyard and plant visits and the ongoing on the job training of Class 41 on board MV Sweet Glory of Sweet Lines, Inc. was not yet included.
5. Private respondent’s claims, as expected, were resisted by petitioner.
6. It alleged that classes in the courses offered which complainant claimed to have remained unpaid were not held or conducted in the school premises of PMI Colleges.
7. Petitioner maintained that it exercised no appropriate and proper supervision of the said classes which activities allegedly violated certain rules and regulations of the DECS.
8. Later in the proceedings, petitioner manifested that Mr. Tomas G. Cloma, Jr., a member of the petitioners Board of Trustees wrote a letter to the Chairman of the Board on May 23, 1994, clarifying the case of private respondent and stating therein, inter alia, that under petitioners bylaws only the Chairman is authorized to sign any contract and that private respondent, in any event, failed to submit documents on the alleged shipyard and plant visits in Cavite Naval Base.

ISSUE:

            Whether or not the contract of employment is invalid

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RULING:

            The court cannot concede that such contract would be invalid just because the signatory thereon was not the Chairman of the Board which allegedly violated petitioner’s bylaws. Since bylaws operate merely as internal rules among the stockholders, they cannot affect or prejudice third persons who deal with the corporation, unless they have knowledge of the same. No proof appears on record that private respondent ever knew anything about the provisions of said bylaws.

In fact, petitioner itself merely asserts the same without even bothering to attach a copy or excerpt thereof to show that there is such a provision. How can it now expect the Labor Arbiter and the NLRC to believe it? That this allegation has never been denied by private respondent does not necessarily signify admission of its existence because technicalities of law and procedure and the rules obtaining in the courts of law do not strictly apply to proceedings of this nature.

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