Pretermission (exclusion from computation) of a holiday

The pretermission (exclusion from computation) of a holiday applies only to a period ﬁxed by law or the Rules of Court, not to a date ﬁxed by the Judge or a government ofﬁcer. Thus, if a public sale or foreclosure is set by the sheriff for a certain day, and that day is declared a special public holiday, the next date of the sale cannot be the next day if the needed publication for the sale on that day has not been made. If, by the Rules of Court, a defendant should answer within 15 days, and the 15th day is declared a holiday, the last day for the answer will be the 16th day. But, if a Judge ﬁxes a trial hearing for a certain day, and that day is declared a holiday, trial will not be on the following day.

In the case of Rural Bank v. Court of Appeals G.R. No. L-32116, Apr. 21, 1981, the final issue raised was the validity or invalidity of the extrajudicial foreclosure sale at public auction of the mortgaged property that was held on April 11, 1961.

Petitioners contended that the public auction sale that was held on April 11, 1961 which was the next business day after the scheduled date of the sale on April 10, 1961, a special public holiday, was permissible and valid pursuant to the provisions of Section 31 of the Revised Administrative Code which ordains: "Pretermission of holiday. - Where the day, or the last day, for doing any act required or permitted by law falls on a holiday, the act may be done on the next succeeding business day."

Respondent court ruled that the aforesaid sale is null and void, it not having been carried out in accordance with Section 9 of Act No. 3135, which provides: "Section 9. - Notice shall be given by posting notices of the sale for not less than twenty days in at least three public places of the municipality or city where the property is situated, and if such property is worth more than four hundred pesos, such notice shall also be published once a week for at least three consecutive weeks in a newspaper of general circulation in the municipality or city."

The Supreme Court agreed with respondent court. Since April 10, 1961 was not the day or the last day set by law for the extrajudicial foreclosure sale, nor the last day of a given period, but a date fixed by the deputy sheriff, the aforesaid sale cannot legally be made on the next succeeding business day without the notices of the sale on that day being posted as prescribed in Section 9, Act No. 3135.