Novation literally means 'to make something new"

The mere circumstance of AFP-MBAI receiving payments from respondent Eleazar who acquiesced to assume the obligation of petitioner under the contract of sale of securities, when there is clearly no agreement to release petitioner from her responsibility, does not constitute novation, at most, it only creates a juridical relation of co-debtorship or suretyship on the part of respondent Eleazar to the contractual obligation of petitioner to AFP-MBAI and the latter can still enforce the obligation against the petitioner. x x x In the civil law setting, novation is literally construed as to make new. So it is deeply rooted in the Roman Law jurisprudence, the principle novatio non praesumitur that novation is never presumed. At bottom, for novation to be a jural reality, its animus must be ever present, debitum pro debito basically extinguishing the old obligation for the new one. The foregoing elements are found wanting in the case at bar. [G.R. No. 120817. November 4, 1996]