Supreme Court remands Stradcom dispute to lower courts

The Supreme Court has remanded the intracorporate dispute at Stradcom Corp., the information technology (IT) systems provider of the Land Transportation Office (LTO), to the lower courts, saying it would not tackle the case until the company’s real owners are determined.

In a resolution late last month, the high court en banc ordered the case between the company’s two feuding shareholder groups to be raffled off to a designated Special Commercial Court of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court (RTC).

“It is clear that both the (Cesar) Quiambao group and the (Bonifacio) Sumbilla group lay claim as valid representatives of Stradcom,” the court resolution dated Aug. 23 said.

“There is a need to resolve the underlying intracorporate dispute between the two claimants,” the high tribunal said.

The court said the SC would not rule on any issue involving Stradcom and the LTO until the company’s real owners are known.

The Stradcom case was elevated to the SC after QC RTC Judge Edgar Dalmacio Santos ruled that service fees paid to the company by the LTO should be withheld and kept in an escrow account until the company’s new owners are determined.

“The branch of the RTC to which the case was raffled off was not a designated commercial court,” which has the authority to hear such cases, the high court said. Special commercial courts handle cases that used to be under the jurisdiction of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) when it still had quasi-judicial powers.

The case in question involves the group of current Stradcom chair Quiambao and his former partner Sumbilla, who late last year claimed he now represents the company’s new controlling block of investors.

Last Dec. 9, the Sumbilla group attempted to take over Stradcom’s offices in Quezon City by force. This led to a six-hour standoff that paralyzed LTO’s operations, which are dependent on the computer systems that Stradcom manages.

Days later, the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) issued a comment, saying the LTO should withhold service fees to Stradcom due to the ongoing dispute among its shareholders.

In another development, Urdaneta City RTC Judge Gonzalo P. Marata has ordered the dismissal of the case filed against Stradcom Corp. by Stradcom International Holdings, Inc. (SIHI) represented by a certain Rodolfo Millare  who claimed to be SIHI’s corporate secretary.

In dismissing the case, the court ruled that the case against Stradcom was a nuisance or harassment suit, noting that Millare is not a stockholder of record of SIHI nor the corporate secretary of SIHI, and thus has no cause of action against the defendant Stradcom.

SIHI is also headed by Quiambao as its president.