Sandiganbayan (INQUIRER FILE PHOTO)
MANILA, Philippines — Sandiganbayan’s Fourth Division dismissed the ill-gotten wealth lawsuit case against the associates of former president Ferdinand Marcos Sr. and his wife Imelda Marcos involving the 3,305 shares in Eastern Communications, the oldest telecommunication company in the country.
In a 19-page resolution penned by Associate Justice Lorifel Pahimna furnished to the media on Friday, the antigraft court granted the demurrer to evidence or a bid to prove that the evidence presented is not enough to prove the case lodged by the defendants dubbed as “Nieto group,” a minor stockholder in the telecommunication company.
The defendants are Rosario Arellano, Victoria Legarda, Angela Lobregat, Benito Nieto, Carlos Nieto, Manuel Nieto III, Ma. Rita delos Reyes, Carmen Tuazon, Ramon Nieto Jr. (standing as legal representative of deceased Ramon Nieto) and Benigno Manuel Valdes (legal representative of Rafael Valdes).
“The plaintiff offered no explanation as how such series of transactions became illegal that would constitute ill-gotten wealth,” said Pahimna’s resolution concurred in by Associate Justices Georgina Hidalgo and Michael Frederick Musngi, the division’s chairperson.
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The court accepted documentary evidence like the original copy of receipts and passbook accounts which was under the custody of Maria Lourdes Magno, chief administrative officer of the Presidential Commission on Good Government’s (PCGG) library and records division.
Magno is the government prosecutors’ lone witness in the case.
However, the court noted that Magno stipulated that she is only a custodian of the records as chief librarian of the PCGG and “has no personal knowledge of the transactions contained in the documents she identified.”
Furthermore, the PCGG’s chief librarian stipulation “clearly shows that Ms. Magno is not a credible witness to substantiate the allegations of the plaintiff.”
“In short, the plaintiff failed to substantiate on its allegation that herein defendants Nieto group knowingly allowed themselves to be used as dummies of Manuel H. Nieto and/or spouses Ferdinand E. Marcos and Imelda R. Marcos in acquiring ETPI shares of stocks without lawful consideration,” it added.
Now owned by PLDT and Globe Telecom, Eastern Communication was founded in 1878 and laid the first submarine cable linking the Philippines and Hong Kong.
In the 1970s, the telco company was acquired by Marcos cronies Jose Africa, Manuel Nieto Jr. and Roberto Benedicto, whose shares were later sequestered in 1987.