PCGG to ask SC to reverse Sandigan ruling on PLDT shares

The Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) is set to ask the Supreme Court next week to reverse an earlier ruling of the Sandiganbayan which declared that the 21-percent contested shares of the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) were legally obtained by Marcos cronies.

PCGG chief Haydee Yorac said the fight to recover the assets is not yet over and the agency remains confident that they have a strong case against Ramon Cojuangco and his wife Imelda and the Prime Holdings Inc. (PHI).

Last month, the Sandiganbayan ruled that the PCGG failed to prove that the 24.5 million sequestered PLDT shares were obtained by the Cojuangco and the PHI as Marcos dummies. The assets were valued at P1.6 billion in 1987.

The anti-graft court noted that the PCGG submitted photocopied documents to support its case.

Cojuangco owned 76,779 shares of the Philippine Telecommunications Investment Corp. (PTIC) at the PLDT while his wife owned 21,525 shares. The PHI, on the other hand, owned 111,415 shares.

Ruben Carranza Jr., PCGG commissioner, said the decision contained "serious error in facts and in law." In the first place, he said, the Sandiganbayan should have not accepted the evidence if they were inadmissible.

"What makes the documents valuable is the fact that they were recovered from the Marcoses in Hawaii. What’s the point of dragging to Hawaii these documents if they were not important," he said.

He added that one of the proofs that the Marcos family owns the sequestered stakes was the filing by former First Lady Imelda Marcos of cause-claim to the assets before the Sandiganbayan.

"For the Sandiganbayan, the claim was self-serving but not for the PCGG. It was an admission on the part of Mrs. Marcos that they own the shares, Carranza said.

The PCGG also gave assurances that the planned sale of the 24-percent stakes of the First Pacific Corp. Ltd. at the PLDT to tycoon John Gokongwei would not affect the government’s claim on the PLDT.

Carranza added that the PCGG would keep its guard up all the two to make sure the government’s interest as always protected.