House to probe coconut levy fund case

LUCENA CITY, Philippines—Quezon farmers’ groups and the peasant group Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) on Tuesday welcomed moves by Congress to investigate a possible conflict of interest case involving coconut levy funds being claimed by the government-sequestered United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB).

Arvin Borromeo, spokesperson of Coco Levy Funds Ibalik sa Amin (CLAIM-

Quezon), said that while they welcomed the investigation, a “cover-up” by congressmen would be unacceptable to small coconut farmers.

He said in a statement that his group wanted the investigation to lead to the filing of criminal charges against the UCPB directors involved.

UCPB in a statement denied that there was conflict of interest in the case. It said the government and the people stand to benefit from the cases that it filed against the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG).

Jansept Geronimo, spokesperson of Kilusan Para sa Tunay na Repormang Agraryo at Katarungan Panlipunan (Katarungan-Quezon) in a phone interview said millions of coconut farmers across the country would follow every step of the investigation.

KMP chair Rafael Mariano in a statement said the investigation should also focus on the return of the coconut levy fund to farmers who are the legitimate owners of the fund, which is now estimated to be around P72 billion. The fund was levied from farmers 40 years ago.

Borromeo recalled a Senate inquiry in 2011 when it was found that UCPB siphoned off billions of coconut levy funds when the bank allowed its preferred clients to take out unsecured loans. The fund scandal prompted the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. to loan UCPB P12 billion while the national government also lent it P30 billion at low interest rates to bail the bank out.

On Monday, House Deputy Assistant Majority Speaker Jose Christopher “Kit” Belmonte filed a resolution calling for the investigation of the UCPB board of directors.

The resolution was prodded by allegations of the antigraft watchdog National Coalition of Filipino Consumers  and different farmers’ groups that questioned the motive behind UCPB’s filing of cases against the PCGG and laying claim to P15.6 billion of the coco levy funds.

In a statement, UCPB denied there was conflict of interest in the role of bank board member Nilo Divina. Divina denied allegations of conflict of interest and said his law firm was handling only one case for UCPB. The other petition involved Cocolife, where Divina is not a board director. With a report from Jerome Aning