No more transport disruption, Yanson matriarch assures public

MANILA, Philippines — The bus operations of Vallacar Transit Inc. (VTI)’s will not be disrupted again, Yanson family matriarch Olivia has assured the public amid an ongoing squabble involving her children.

The Yanson family owns VTI’s Ceres and Sugbo provincial bus lines, which operate in the Visayas and Mindanao.

However, Olivia’s camp maintained that it would hold the company’s former chief financial officer Celina Yanson-Lopez accountable for the P380 million that went missing in 2018.

In a statement sent by Olivia’s camp, VTI’s legal team denied reports that audit firm Sycip Gorres Velayo & Co. (SGV) cleared Lopez of any liability on the fund mess.

The Yanson family is locked in a boardroom battle, with one of the groups led by Olivia and her children Leo and Ginnette. The other group is led by Olivia’s eldest son Roy and her other children Emily, Celina and Ricardo Jr.

A boardroom fight ensued in July when Roy’s group held a meeting and voted to unseat Leo as president. Another special stockholders meeting on Aug. 19 reaffirmed Leo as company president.

Cracks in the company surfaced last year over the P380 million in company funds that allegedly went missing under Celina’s watch.

Celina said she could not be held responsible for the missing money and instead pointed to a “pet employee” of Olivia.

She cited a letter dated Sept. 10 of  SGV’s legal counsel Poblador Bautista and Reyes law offices which said that she was “not the person directly liable for the loss of funds.”