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ATTY. MEL STA. MARIA: The advantage, questions, standard of a Corona testimony
InterAksyon.com
The online news portal of TV5
MANILA, Philippines – Senators saw possible conflict of interest in the sale of a property of a company owned by former Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office chairman Manuel Morato to a firm under contract with the government charity at a time when he still sat on its board.
The Senate committee is investigating the alleged misuse of PCSO funds during the administration of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
According to Senator Franklin Drilon, TF Ventures Inc., Morato’s company, sold a hotel to Malaysian firm Perdana Lands Philippines Inc. for P785, pocketing P70 million from the transaction.
Perdana owns majority shares in the Philippine Gaming Management Corp., which supplies the PCSO machines used in its lotteries.
“How can you sell this (property to a) company that has an existing contract with the PCSO, (in which) you sat as member of its board?” Drilon asked Morato.
But Morato explained that he had no control over the sale since the property was among foreclosed properties sold to Deutsche Bank under the Special Purpose Assets Vehicle Act of 2002.
“Wala po akong kontrol dyan eh, kasi the sale was consummated in … the Makati regional trial court. ‘Di po ako naghanap ng buyer na ‘yan. Sila ang namimii ng mga foreclosed na mga properties … Naunahan nga lang ako dahil may bumibili nyan na doon naman ako kikita (I had no control over that since the sale was consummated in … the Makati regional trial court. I did not look for that buyer. They were the ones who chose the foreclosed properties. They just beat me to it because there was a buyer from whom I would have made money),” Morato said.
He said the P70 million that went to TF Ventures Inc. was intended to pay the company’s stockholders and creditors.
Morato said the loan taken from a local bank to build the hotel ballooned to P1.3 billion from the original P280 million led to the sale of the hotel and the land it was constructed on.
But Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile said he believed TF Ventures Inc. declared the P70 million as the sale value of Morato’s property to evade paying the six percent capital gain tax due from the P785 million sale price.
“Mr. Morato, you avoided the paying of capital gain tax of 6 six for selling the land and the hotel for P70 million, but the property was sold to a foreign firm for P785 million,” Enrile said.
For Senator Jinggoy Estrada, “malinaw na (it is clear that there was) conflict of interest; quiet immoral on your part.”
Senator Teofisto Guingona III, who chairs the Blue Ribbon committee, ordered Morato to submit the documents of the sale.
