Here’s something that should keep everyone busy over the long weekend. One of the recurring issues in this forum, perhaps primarily because of the apparent increase in interest of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW) in annulment, is the proper venue of petitions for annulment or declaration of nullity. To address this issue, let’s consider the following [...]

There are a lot of questions posted here and at the Forum as to how much will it cost for an annulment. The standard reply is: it depends. We could not possibly speak for the standard fees charged by all lawyers and the costs would normally go up if the case drags on as a [...]

If you check the recent comments, this issue is pretty much alive. Please post your opinion here, but preferrably at the previous post. The poll is to the right. Update (26 November 2007): Let’s close the poll. There’s a total of 68 votes. According to 14 votes (21%), divorce should not be allowed in the [...]

We previously noted that same-sex marriage, while allowed in some U.S. states, is definitely far from being accepted here in the Philippines. This is true even with the increasing trend of sex reassignment or sex transplant.

When is a man a man and when is a woman a woman? In particular, does the law recognize the changes made by a physician using scalpel, drugs and counseling with regard to a person’s sex? May a person successfully petition for a change of name and sex appearing in the birth certificate to reflect [...]

The Family Code clearly provides that a court declaration of presumptive death of a spouse is indispensable before the other spouse may marry again. Failure to comply with this requirement results not only in a void second marriage, but also opens the guilty spouse to a criminal charge of bigamy. Article 41 of the Family [...]

I previously wrote about “something that appears to be increasingly common nowadays — the live-in relationship, also called common-law marriage.” This is governed by Article 147 of the Family Code, which recognizes, and expressly governs the property relations in, the relationship where a man and a woman live exclusively with each other just like a [...]

There’s an interesting article published in the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, entitled: The Legal Impediments to the Application of Islamic Family Law in the Philippines. The abstract of the article reads:

Through all the family cases that we’ve handled, we’ve come to accept, without discounting the contrary, the sad fact that bad blood exists between the opposing parties (e.g., estranged spouses in annulment/separation/property cases, siblings and relatives in estate proceedings). In particular, with respect to custody-support cases over children, it’s easily understandable that custody is one [...]

There were a lot of questions on the first FAQ, some of which were not answered due to certain prohibitions (see Part 1 or Part 3). For information purposes, we added Part II, wherein we discussed other common issues relating to the topic on annulment and divorce. These issues include the role of the Solicitor [...]