PROCESS OF RECOGNIZING

FOREIGN DIVORCE IN THE PHILIPPINES

By:
LAWYERS IN THE PHILIPPINES

There is generally no divorce allowed the Philippines, but a marriage

between a Filipino and a foreigner is a special case. The Philippines will
recognize the divorce of a Filipino obtained abroad by the foreign spouse.

[Note: As of April 24, 2018, this rule has been expanded so that
even if it was the Filipino who filed for divorce from the foreign
spouse, that divorce will also be recognized in the Philippines.]

This follows from the second paragraph of Article 26 of the Family Code of
the Philippines:

Where a marriage between a Filipino citizen and a foreigner is validly

celebrated and a divorce is thereafter validly obtained abroad by the alien
spouse capacitating him or her to remarry, the Filipino spouse shall have
capacity to remarry under Philippine law.

CONTENTS

1. Do you need to have your divorce recognized?

2. How will the divorce be recognized in the Philippines?
3. What documents should you prepare?
4. What is the court process for the recognition of foreign divorce?
5. Can this be done while I am abroad?
6. How long does it take?
7. What are the costs involved?
 DO YOU NEED TO HAVE YOUR DIVORCE RECOGNIZED

You were previously married, but your foreign spouse obtained a divorce.
You now want official Philippine records to reflect that you are no longer
married to your ex-spouse.

Do you need to have the divorce recognized in the Philippines? Yes, most
likely.

A simple way to check is to make a request with the Philippine

Statistics Office for an Advisory on Marriage or a Certificate of
No Marriage (CENOMAR).

Since a clear CENOMAR is typically needed to get a marriage license in

the Philippines, the result will inform you of where you stand.

Even if the CENOMAR comes clear, you may yet want to have your foreign
divorce recognized. Although you might technically be able to have a
wedding ceremony again in this country, legal issues concerning
properties, legitimacy, inheritance, spousal support and marital rights will
cause difficulties down the line.

HOW CAN THE FOREIGN DIVORCE BE RECOGNIZED IN THE

PHILIPPINES

It is not a simple matter of presenting a copy of your foreign divorce decree

to a Philippine government office.

Recognition is a judicial process where both the foreign divorce and the
foreign divorce law need to be proven in Court.

1. You will need to file a Petition for Recognition of Foreign

Divorce with the Regional Trial Court in the Philippines.
2. You will need to get a lawyer to prepare and conduct the case.

When you talk to a lawyer, you should disclose the whole picture to him,
providing honest and complete details about your ex-spouse, your
citizenships, your marriage and divorce. He will need to know the specific
places and dates of events. He will also need clear, accurate copies of your
marriage and divorce documents so that he can assess them himself. (Do
not edit the facts or be afraid to disclose everything to the lawyer you
consult. He needs to know these facts in order to do a good job. And a
lawyer is bound to confidentiality by his Code of Ethics.)

Don’t be embarrassed by whatever you need to tell your lawyer. Don’t

hesitate to ask him any questions you may have.
In the meantime, you can begin to put together some of the documents
your lawyer will need to review and which you’ll eventually have to submit
to the Court.

WHAT ARE THE DOCUMENTS YOU SHOULD PREPARE

1. Philippine marriage certificate/record if the marriage was in

the country
2. Official marriage certificate/record from the foreign country if
the marriage was abroad
3. Report of Marriage of a Filipino married abroad (if one was
filed with the DFA)
4. Official copies of your foreign divorce documents
5. Certified copy of the foreign country’s divorce law
6. Proofs of citizenship
7. Philippine Passport
8. Birth Certificate
9. Special Power of Attorney

Note that this is a general list. Depending on the particular foreign country
involved, and depending on the particular case, there may be other
documents necessary. This is because different countries have different
divorce processes and different kinds of marriage and divorce documents.

These documents can be merely scanned copies when you first send them
to your lawyer. The value of having these documents is firstly that they
allow your counsel a clear view of the circumstances. Reviewing them will
also allow him to advise you of what other documents you may need to get.

However, these documents will eventually have to be presented to the

Regional Trial Court with the Petition. For it to accept these documents, the
Court needs to be assured that they are genuine.

The Philippine documents will need to have been officially certified by the
correct government office (Civil Registrar/Philippines Statistics
Authority/Department of Foreign Affairs/etc.)

The foreign documents, on the other hand, will need to be certified by the
correct foreign office and they will need to be authenticated (Red
Ribboned) by the Department of Foreign Affairs or the Philippine embassy
in the foreign country. If a foreign document is not in English, then its
certified English translation is also needed and this also has to be
authenticated by the DFA.
 CAN THIS BE DONE WHILE I AM ABROAD

Yes. That the petitioner is abroad while the case is being prepared can
actually be beneficial. If foreign documents need to be secured in the
foreign country, it is then often easiest for the petitioner to get them there
herself.

Much of the remaining preparation can be done in remote coordination with

your lawyer over the internet.

Once trial begins, the petitioner should ideally come to testify on at least
one of the hearing dates. This hearing date can be scheduled well ahead of
time to account for travel and leave limitations.

However, if it is not possible for the petitioner to testify, she can

appoint a personal representative to appear on her behalf. The
advisability of doing this will depend on how well and
completely the documents presented can prove the facts of the
case.

WHAT IS THE COURT PROCESS FOR THE RECOGNITION OF

FOREIGN DIVORCE

After gathering the facts and the needed documents, the lawyer will draft
the Petition for Recognition of Foreign Divorce which needs to be signed by
the lawyer and sworn to by the petitioner. This Petition will then be filed
with the Regional Trial Court in the correct city or province. Attached to the
Petition will be copies of the relevant documents.

The case will then be raffled to one of the RTC’s branches in that city or
province. The RTC branch that gets the case will check whether the
petitioner or her lawyer have any family relation to the Court’s personnel,
and take measures to preserve impartiality. Then the RTC will order that
the substance of the Petition be published in a random newspaper once a
week for 3 weeks. The case will be calendared for first hearing and notices
of this will be served to the Philippine government offices concerned, to the
last known address of the ex-spouse, and to any other required parties.

Proof that these notices were served needs to be shown on the first
hearing date. After that, the lawyer will have the documents of the case
marked into the record of the Court.

As you can see, this is a court process with extensive pre-hearing

requirements. The trial itself requires the presentation of witnesses and
other evidence, as well as written memoranda, before the Court will make a
ruling.
The testimony of a witness will be through a judicial affidavit. A judicial
affidavit is used in order to speed up the trial. In a judicial affidavit, the
lawyer’s questions and the answers of the witness are set into writing and
notarized before the hearing. This way, no matter how long the written
testimony is, under her lawyer’s guidance the witness will simply identify
and affirm this judicial affidavit in Court in order to complete her direct
testimony. She can then be cross-examined by the government lawyer to
verify her statements. On cross-examination, she will be asked follow up
questions about her marriage and divorce.

After all the evidence is submitted, the lawyer will submit to the RTC a legal
document known as a Formal Offer of Evidence and also a final
Memorandum. Absent active opposition by other parties, we will then await
the Court’s Decision. The waiting after these submissions would probably
take a few months because of the clogged court dockets.

Assuming it is favorable, the Decision can thereafter be registered with the

civil registrar and the Philippine Statistics Authority for annotation on the
marriage record.

1. Draft a Petition for Recognition of Foreign Divorce Decree to be

signed by LAWYER and sworn by PETITIONER.

2. File the Petition with the Regional Trial Court – Office of the
Clerk of Court.

3. The Petition shall be raffled in Multi-Sala Court.

4. Compliance with the Jurisdictional Requirements

i. Posting
ii. Publication in the newspaper of general circulation
iii. Entry of appearance of the Solicitor General
iv. Deputation of OPP by the Solicitor General

5. Petition is calendared for first hearing and notices of this will be

served to the Philippine government offices concerned, to the
last known address of the ex-spouse, and to any other required
parties.
i. Local Civil Registrar
ii. Office of the Solicitor General
iii. Local Publisher

6. Prelimary Conference
i. Marking of documentary exhibits
ii. Preparation of Judicial Affidavits

7. Presentation of Witness/es
i. Identification of Judicial Affidavits
 ii. Cross Examination by the Prosecutor

8. Submission of the Formal Offer of Evidence

9. Presentation of Prosecutor’s witnesses in case of Opposition

10. Decision by the Honorable Court

i. Certificate of Finality
ii. Issuance of Decree of Finality

11. Registration with the Office of the Civil Registrar General

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKES

The trial can take about a year to about a year and a half to finish from date
of filing. Apart from the notice requirements (service of summons and
publication), the reason it can take so long is because of the heavy backlog
of court cases. Philippine courts tend to handle many, many cases at any
given time. Even though only a few hearing dates are needed in a Petition
for Recognition of Foreign Divorce, these are sometimes scheduled months
apart because the calendars of the courts are so crowded.

Also, sometimes side issues come up which need to be resolved so that

the case can move forward.

While lawyers can ask to be accommodated by the Court with closer

hearing dates, sometimes this is out of their hands. What lawyers can
assure is the quality of their work and their diligence in order to prevent
avoidable delays. That is why it is important to make the most of every
hearing date. By doing so, it may be possible to finish the case in a shorter
period of time.

12 months to 18 months

WHAT ARE THE COSTS INVOLVED

A case for recognition of foreign divorce entails different costs.

There are the minimal fees to be paid to government offices for the certified
copies of documents. Then there are the fees charged by the Department
of Foreign Affairs or Philippine embassy for authenticating public
documents.

When the Petition is filed, there is an initial filing fee collected by the Court.
There is also a requirement for the publication of the Petition in a small
newspaper chosen by the Court. There are other expenses associated with
the court proceedings, such as for the court transcripts, photocopying,
postage, and messengerial expenses.
A lawyer’s professional fees are dependent on several factors, among them
the difficulty of a particular case, the logistics involved, how much further
investigation and liasoning with government offices are needed, and other
specific circumstances. Professional fees are divided into the lawyer’s
acceptance fee for the case, by which he commits his time to study and
analyze the facts, commits to represent the client, and to prepare the
Petition for Recognition, the subsequent fees for the other written pleadings
he must submit to the Court, and court appearance fees for each hearing.
These fees are agreed on during the early consultations with the lawyer,
after the circumstances of the case are better known.

APPROXIMATE COST

LAWYER’S PROFESSIONAL FEES:

1. Acceptance Fee

2. Appearance Fee

3. Judicial affidavit Fee

4. Liaison Fee (Transportation,

Accomodation)

ADMINISTRATIVE FEES:

1. Certified True Copies

2. Authentication Fees (DFA,

Embassy)
3. Publication Expenses

COURT FEES:

1. Filing of the Petition

2. Motion Fees

3. Transcript of Stenographic
Notes