By Joel San Juan
Reporter
THE Supreme Court on Tuesday junked with finality the motions filed by the Yuchengcos and the Cojuangcos seeking to set aside its January 20, 2006 decision forfeiting in favor of the government the 111,415 shares of Philippine Telecommunications Investment Corp. (PTIC) in the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT), which were registered in the name of Prime Holdings, Inc. (PHI).
In a six-page en banc resolution, the Court denied with finality the motions for reconsideration and oral argument filed by PHI, the Estate of Ramon U. Cojuangco and Imelda Cojuangco and the motion for reconsideration of Alfonso T. Yuchengco and Y Realty Corp.
It said the points raised in the motions merely reiterated those in the pleadings and “they were already considered by this court in arriving at its decision.”
The Court said, “Private respondents PHI and Cojuangcos again lay emphasis on the Deeds of Assignment in the names of members of the Cojuangco family. This Court, however, did carefully consider those deeds and found that they do not address the issue of who was in control of PHI prior to their execution, the significance of which issue was already discussed in this Court’s decision under reconsideration.”
At the same time, the Court denied the motions for oral argument filed by the private respondents, saying that the parties, including PHI and the Cojuangcos, “have already extensively argued their positions on the material issues through their pleadings and motions.”
“If they had evidence other than the Deeds of Assignment tending to support private respondents’ position, the same should have been presented in the proceedings before the Sandiganbayan,” the resolution added.
In its ruling of January 20, 2006, the Supreme Court granted the petition of the government, through the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG), “to the extent that it prays for the reconveyance to the Republic of 111,415 PTIC shares registered in the name of PHI.”
These shares were claimed by the government from the estate of the late businessman Ramon U. Cojuangco and his wife, Imelda O. Cojuangco, PHI, and Mrs. Imelda R. Marcos.
In ruling that the PHI shares were ill-gotten, the High Court noted several changes in the composition of the board of PHI and several transfers of shares of stocks owned by the stockholders.
Court records showed that the PHI incorporated on October 5, 1977 with Jose Campos Jr. (son of Jose Yao Campos), Rolando Gapud, Renato Lirio, Ernesto Abalos, and Gervacio Gaviola as incorporators.
It said that in 1977, the incorporated elected Gapud as president. On Dec. 20, 1977, a total of 54,349 PTIC shares were registered in the name of Cojuangco. On January 27, 1978, Cojuangco and Luis Tirso Rivilla signed an agreement with Gapud to sell the PTIC shares to PHI and on April 20, 1978, a total of 111,415 common shares of PTIC representing 46.12 percent of the outstanding shares of PTIC were transferred to PHI.
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