EL DESLINDE ADMINISTRATIVO. ASPECTOS CIVILES Y REGISTRALES.

Abstract

One of the faculties and prerogatives that Act 33/2003 grants the government for defending public assets is the ability to take administrative action to have surveys made of government-owned immovable property when the conditions outlined in the act are met. Because of the public nature of the property concerned, administrative surveying contains a series of specific notes that makes it different from civil surveying and turns it into a manifestation of government's privilege of self-protection, enabling government to take immediate, autonomous action to defend its property and rights without depending on the court system, so that government can do its job properly. This position of government supremacy can be observed clearly in the surveying procedure. But one of the most important issues concerning administrative surveys is that of the effects, especially as regards the rights of third persons and, in a related matter, as regards whether an administrative act concluding a survey is sufficient grounds for amending registration entries. Even though Act 33/2003 strictly limits the efficacy of administrative surveys to the possessory realm, sector- specific legislation on coasts, water and livestock trails gives administrative surveys much greater efficacy. Under this latter type of legislation, declaratory effects of possession and inalienable property ownership in the public domain may stem from administrative surveys, and survey titles are vested with an efficacy that prevails over any contradictory titles. Lastly, the act lays down the system of rules for land left over after an administrative survey. Such land causes no few problems, fundamentally the problem of what is to be done with it.