Short answer. No. Article 1673 sets the grounds for ejecting an ordinary lessee, but its closing line pulls agricultural tenants out of that regime entirely. Their removal is governed by special agrarian laws, not by the Civil Code causes that apply to a house, apartment or commercial tenant.
What the law says
The ejectment of tenants of agricultural lands is governed by special laws.
Civil Code, Article 1673 — Grounds for Judicial Ejectment. Read the full provision →
The grounds that bind an ordinary renter
For a house, apartment or commercial space, Article 1673 lets the lessor go to court to eject the lessee for a closed list of causes: the agreed period has ended, or that fixed under Articles 1682 and 1687 has run out; the rent was not paid; a condition of the contract was violated; or the tenant put the property to an unstipulated use that damages it. Each is a specific, provable failing. If none is present, the lessor cannot simply take the premises back, and even where a ground exists the law requires a judicial ejectment rather than self-help such as changing the locks.
The carve-out for farmland
The article ends by removing farm tenants from all of that. It states plainly that the ejectment of tenants of agricultural lands is governed by special laws. So the four Civil Code grounds above are not the measure of whether a farmer may be removed from the land he tills. A separate body of agrarian legislation supplies its own, far narrower grounds and its own procedure, built around security of tenure — the policy that a tenant-tiller should not lightly lose the land that is his livelihood.
Why the difference is not a technicality
The practical gap is large. An ordinary lease can end simply because its term expired; a landowner who wants the property back can often rely on that alone. A farm tenant generally cannot be dislodged on that footing. The expiry of a period, a change of landowner, or the owner's wish to use the land differently do not, by themselves, translate into a right to eject an agricultural tenant. The grounds, the forum and the notices come from the agrarian statutes, and a landowner who treats a farm tenant like a defaulting apartment renter is applying the wrong law.
What this line does not settle
Article 1673 does not itself list the agrarian grounds — it only points away from the Civil Code, so this page cannot tell you the exact causes a special law allows. Nor does it decide the threshold fight that usually matters most: whether the land and the arrangement are truly agricultural tenancy at all, which is a factual question about how the land is used and how the parties share in it. It also says nothing about residential or commercial leases, which stay squarely within the four grounds above and their own rent-control overlay.
Cases citing this provision
These Supreme Court decisions cite the provision above. We list them so you can read them yourself; the summaries of what each decided are not ours to give.
- Cebu Autometric Motos, Inc. vs. Tirso Uytengsu III, G.R. No. 151168, August 25, 2010 — read the decision on LawPhil →
- Hernania "Lani" Lopez vs. Gloria Umale-Cosme, G.R. No. 171891, February 24, 2009 — read the decision on LawPhil →
- Abaya Investments Corporation vs. Merit Philippines, et al, G.R. No. 176324, April 16, 2008 — read the decision on LawPhil →
- David G. Dula vs. Dr. Restituto Maravilla, et al, G.R. No. 134267, May 9, 2005 — read the decision on LawPhil →
Related provisions
- Civil Code, Article 1673 — Grounds for Judicial Ejectment
- Civil Code, Article 1684 — Land Tenancy on Shares