Palace bestows prime land in midnight deal

Failure of election automation looms, says Sen. Mar Roxas. No new President, VP or senators might be proclaimed, only congressmen and local officials. The feared scenario would follow when everyone’s term ends on June 30. “Congresswoman” Gloria Arroyo emerges as Speaker then Acting President, to rush a shift to parliamentary and become Prime Minister.

Sen. Ed Angara has a way out. The 23 incumbent senators can replace Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile before May 10, Election Day. That way he will have a successor in case, as a re-electionist stepping down on June 30, he becomes one of the un-proclaimed. Enrile’s replacement will be the Acting President to ensure the rise of the elected one within 90 days.

The new SP must come from the 12 elected in 2007, whose term is up to 2013. Based on votes garnered, these are Loren Legarda, Chiz Escudero, Ping Lacson, Manny Villar, Kiko Pangilinan, Noynoy Aquino, Angara, Alan Peter Cayetano, Greg Honasan, Joker Arroyo, Antonio Trillanes, and Miguel Zubiri.

The SP usually is the most senior or the top vote getter. But Legarda, Villar, and Aquino must be disqualified because candidates for President and VP. Lacson is hiding from kidnapping-murder raps.

Escudero, Angara and Arroyo have been mentioned as possible SP. But Arroyo, advanced in age, reportedly is not interested. Angara is too associated with the NP campaigns of Legarda and Villar, as Pangilinan is with LP senators’. That leaves independent, party-less Escudero.

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 Malacañang gave away IBC-13’s prime lot in Quezon City in a secret deal rushed last month. This was despite many misgivings of state lawyers about the legality, propriety and profitability of the transaction.

IBC-13 unionists are denouncing the “fake joint venture” of network execs with obscure condo builder Primestate Ventures Inc. They say Palace Supervising Sec. Conrado Limcaoco signed away 3.64 hectares of IBC-13’s 4.14-hectare Broadcast City in Diliman on Mar. 24. This was to get around the election ban on government contracting starting Mar. 26.

Only two days prior, Mar. 22, the Office of the Government Corporate Counsel had sent Limcaoco a memo detailing 30 contract flaws. It would have been physically impossible for President Arroyo’s agent to cure the flaws in only 48 hours, the IBC-13 employees said. Limcaoco allegedly refuses to give them a copy of the final contract.

Worst of the flaws was that the joint venture was a virtual sale of the government-sequestered property. IBC-13 is to turn over the 3.64 hectares as “contribution” to the construction and marketing of condo units. But it thence will have no more say in the project. A proviso requires IBC-13 to assign its rights and turn over its land title to Primestate. The OGCC warned that any disposal of government property should be by public bidding. Primestate had merely made an unsolicited proposal; the law’s requirement of a Swiss Challenge was unmet.

Also questioned was the value of the 3.64 hectares. Primestate is to pay IBC-13 P450 million for the lot. But its erection of a New Broadcast City, also for P450 million, would be deducted from IBC-13’s collectible. The OGCC sought proof of an independent land appraisal. It said the payment of P450 million, minus also P450 million, reinforces the notion that the joint venture is actually a sale.

At P450 million, the prime property was valued at less than P12,500 per square meter. This is too low. Two years ago Quezon City Hall had seized the complex for IBC-13’s failure to pay real estate taxes. Back then City Hall already conservatively placed its zonal value at P12,000 per square meter.

Broadcast City is adjacent to posh Ayala Homes subdivision. Before the joint venture pretense, a top Asian appraisal outfit had valued it at P16,000 per square meter. Meaning, the real estate deal should have been for a minimum of P582.4 million. Another firm rated it at P23,000 per square meter. With that, IBC-13 should have fetched P837.2 million.

 Primestate reportedly has a meager subscribed capital of P2 million, with only P500,000 paid up. Yet it contracted almost half a billion pesos.

 Also signatories were IBC-13 chairman Joselito Yabut and president Jose Javier. Network unionists say Limcaoco, Yabut and Javier can be charged with graft, for the “grossly and manifestly disadvantageous” deal.

Earlier, another government agency made a fast-break sale of prime land in Manila’s Port Area. The Home Guaranty Corp. sold 2.8 hectares of Harbour Centre to La Paz Milling Corp. at only P13,000 per square meter. Adjoining lots are priced at P25,000 per square meter. The government lost P309.5 million from the scam.

Last month authorities nearly awarded to a Kuwaiti firm the right to operate Pampanga’s Clark Airport for 25 years. Has it not been exposed by The STAR, the midnight deal would have been for a song.

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No, although the title of a new talk show on ABC-5 sounds like that of my Sapol radio commentary, I am not connected with it. Too, I have nothing to do with a similarly titled column in another tabloid. My Sapol column exclusively is published by Pilipino Star Ngayon since Nov. 2000. And Sapol ni Jarius Bondoc has been on DWIZ (882-AM) since Nov. 2001.

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 “The birth of a child is ordinary, but becomes a deep message when considered as the birth of God in our midst.” Shafts of Light, Fr. Guido Arguelles, SJ

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