Yanson matriarch’s complaint vs 4 kin junked

BACOLOD CITY, Philippines — A civil case filed by the matriarch of a major transport company in Negros Occidental against her four children over the control of the estate left by the family patriarch has been dismissed by a local court.

In an order dated Oct. 2, Judge Maria Lina Gonzaga of the Bacolod Regional Trial Court Branch 42 said “the complaint is, as it should be, ordered dismissed without prejudice.”

In the complaint, Olivia Yanson of the Vallacar Transit Inc. sought to nullify the extra-judicial settlement executed for the estate of her late husband Ricardo Yanson.

The defendants in the case are Yanson’s children Roy, Emily, Ma. Lourdes Celina and Ricardo Jr., known as the Yanson 4.

The Yanson patriarch, founder of the Yanson Group of Bus Companies, died on Oct. 25, 2015 without leaving a will.

On Dec. 16, 2015, the Yanson children and their mother executed an extra-judicial settlement for the division of the estate among themselves. They amended the extra-judicial settlement executed on Dec. 20, 2017 to include all properties not contained in the first agreement.

In the ruling, Gonzaga said Olivia’s counsel filed an amended complaint on Oct. 11, 2018, only for this to be amended by a second complaint on Sept. 25, 2019.

In September this year, the counsel moved to withdraw the second amended complaint and to continue the proceedings under the first amended complaint.

Gonzaga said that Olivia and her counsel, by submitting and withdrawing the second amended complaint after the lapse of more than two years, excluding the pandemic years, showed a tendency to trifle with the court processes as manifested in their request to continue the proceedings based on the first amended complaint.

The Yanson matriarch received the ruling dismissing her complaint on Aug. 24 through electronic mail. Her counsel acknowledged receipt of the ruling on the same day.

Olivia was given until Sept. 8 to comply with the order. Instead of complying, the judge said she filed several motions that took up the court’s time that should have been used to resolve other important cases.

The counsel of the Yanson 4 described the court ruling as a major victory for their clients, who have been locked in a corporate battle against their mother and two siblings over the control of the family’s bus company.