Probe sale and transfer of government property along C-5 in Pasig City - solon

Friday, 05 August 2011 01:41

A veteran lawmaker has asked the House Committee on Government Enterprises and Privatization to investigate sale of a P4.3-billion worth of government property along C-5 in Pasig City alleged to be gravely disadvantageous to the government. In House Resolution 1437, Rep. Danilo Suarez (3rd District, Quezon) said the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) headed then by Camilo Sabio sold the 12-hectare prime property to the Consolidated Property Development Corporation, a member-corporation of SM Development Corporation, for only P1.2 billion.

Suarez said it was reported that former Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) President and General Manager Winston Garcia facilitated the transfer of the property to the SM Group for P1.1 billion, P330 million of which was paid by GSIS to the government as transfer tax.

"This arrangement left less than P900 million as net compensation received by both PCGG and GSIS for the property," Suarez said.

The deal was gravely disadvantageous to the government, Suarez said quoting the present PCGG Chairman, Andres Bautista, who described the sale as another midnight transaction initiated, negotiated and executed during the final eight months of the previous administration.

"The PCGG blasted the alleged grossly disadvantageous sale entered into by the previous commission headed by former Chairman Camilo Sabio as they filed an affidavit of adverse claim in an effort to prevent the transfer of a 12-hectare government-owned lot located along the C-5 road in Pasig City," Suarez said.

Sabio refuted the allegations of Bautista and insisted that the decision of the PCGG under his leadership was legally and morally correct and blasted his successor for ignorance of facts and of law.

According to Suarez, former PCGG officials and the Office of the Solicitor General executed a Memorandum of Agreement where the PCGG waived all of its rights and interests to the property of approximately P100 million in favor of the SM group.

Suarez said the lot is owned by Meat Packing Corp. of the Philippines (MPCP), which the latter had leased to Philippine Integrated Meat Corp. (PIMECO) under a lease-purchase agreement. The lease-purchase agreement between PIMECO and MPCP, a subsidiary of the Government Service Insurance System matured in 2009, giving PIMECO purchase rights.

"The government, through PCGG, owns 30 percent of PIMECO, while the latter owns the right to buy the property. The remaining 70 percent of PIMECO’s capital stock was sequestered and is being claimed by the government as ill-gotten wealth hence, the PCGG maintains the legal position that the government owns 100 percent of PIMECO," Suarez said.