DOJ orders transfer of SMC shares in coco levy fund to Treasury

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Justice sees no more legal impediment for the transfer of coconut levy assets to the government with the Supreme Court ruling that the shares were part of the ill-gotten wealth of the Marcoses.

Justice Secretary Leila de Lima issued this statement after the SC junked the petition of the United Coconut Planters Bank and United Coconut Planters Life Assurance Corp. claiming ownership over a portion of the 24 percent bloc of shares in San Miguel Corp. bought with coconut levy funds.

“All coco levy funds, including the SMC shares and their proceeds not yet transferred to the National Treasury, should now be transferred without further delay,” De Lima said.

De Lima lauded the Presidential Commission on Good Government and the Office of the Solicitor General – both attached agencies of the DOJ – for blocking what she described as “last-ditch feeble attempt by UCPB and Cocolife to reverse settled jurisprudence in the public nature of the coco levy funds.”

De Lima believes “powerful interest groups” could be behind such “legal machination to frustrate the SC previous rulings declaring the fund as one established for the benefit of coconut farmers, including those used by UCPB to purchase San Miguel shares.”