The Court of Appeals took the side of the Office of the Civil Registrar General (OCRG) of the National Statistics Office (NSO) and the local civil registry office in their refusal to change the status in a child's birth record following the provisions of the Family Code of the Philippines.

In a decision released on July 7, the Appellate Court reversed a lower court order and ruled that the Civil Registrar General and the municipal civil registrar of Montevista, Comval, have "no imperative duty" in the child legitimation application of the couple Junice Bongay and Alberto Bioco Jr.

Earlier, the couple filed a special civil case in the Regional Trial Court of Nabunturan, Comval, Davao in 1998. The petition sought a mandamus or a court order compelling civil registry officials to legitimate the child born of an unwed and underaged mother but whose parents later married. Legitimation gives the child the lawful right to adopt the natural father's surname in state records.

Civil registry officials stood firm on legal ground that because the mother was a minor when she gave birth, her child could never qualify for legitimation as prescribed by Article 177 of the Family Code. Article 177 maintains that only illegitimate children whose parents were "not disqualified by any impediment to marry each other" at the time the former were conceived may be legitimated.

Nevertheless, the trial court issued an order in favor of the petitioners and pursued legitimation in September 1998, on the argument that age is only an incapacity and not a disqualifying factor for marriage, such as when a would-be spouse is already married to another person. Barely a year later, the Court of Appeals found underage to be an "absolute legal impediment" and reasoned in its decision that "the judiciary cannot change a congressional law by an extensive interpretation of it."

According to NSO Administrator and concurrent Civil Registrar-General Tomas Africa, city/municipal civil registrars had just recently concluded their fifth biennial convention in Baguio City. And, among the important issues discussed included some proposed changes to Article 177 and other provisions of Family Code towards better civil registration.