Senate inquiry on Legacy resumes tomorrow

MANILA, Philippines - The Senate investigation on the controversy involving the Legacy Group will resume tomorrow and will tackle the credibility of Securities and Exchange Commission chair Fe Barin and her husband, Energy Regulatory Commission commissioner Alejandrino Barin in the probe.

Sen. Manuel Roxas II, chairman of the Senate trade and commerce committee, said Mr. Barin was invited to the hearing since he was dragged into the Legacy fund mess after news reports came out indicating he had sold one of his cars to a lawyer of the beleaguered group of companies.

The revelation had raised questions on the credibility of the head of SEC, the government’s regulatory body on investments, including pre-need firms.

But the ERC commissioner has told the Senate panel he could not attend the hearing because of conflict with the regular meeting of ERC.

He furnished the committee a copy of the ERC notice of meeting and assured Roxas “that given the proper notice, the undersigned shall attend subsequent meetings.”

Meanwhile, Roxas said the SEC had agreed to extend to April 30 the filing of claims for reimbursement from the collapsed pre-need companies of the Legacy Group owned by controversial businessman Celso de los Angeles.

Roxas said the SEC agreed to his request to give Legacy pre-need planholders more time to comply with documentary requirements so they could make their claim out of the trust fund now being managed by the SEC.

“It is important that these planholders are given the extra time to file their claims to be able to get back their hard-earned monies,” he said.

Barin had announced the SEC’s Mandaluyong office and extension offices in the provinces would continue to accept applications for Legacy claims beyond the April 15 deadline.

But Barin clarified the SEC was not setting a new deadline for the filing of reimbursement claims to discourage policy-owners from waiting up to the last minute to submit their applications.

“We opted to adopt this arrangement - instead of setting a new deadline - because, based on our experience, the planholders may wait for the last minute before filing their claims and, in the process, create long queues in the designated filing centers,” she explained in her letter to Roxas.

“Acting on your request, we issued (on April 15) a notice (with corresponding advice to the media) informing the planholders that the Commission’s offices in Mandaluyong City and extension offices in the provinces shall continue to accept their claims even beyond the April 15 deadline earlier set,” Barin said.