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Tuesday, July 15, 2003
Cojuangco vows to hold on to San Miguel
By Benjamin B. Pulta and Marie Surbano
MANILA -- Businessman Eduardo Cojuangco refused to say Monday if he would run for president in 2004 but said he would be appealing a Sandiganbayan ruling divesting him of control over the United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB).
Cojuangco came to a press briefing Monday clad in a white field polo bearing the coat of arms of San Miguel Corp., the kind worn by beer delivery truck salesmen.
This salesman, however, had the country's highest paid lawyer, former solicitor general Estelito Mendoza, at his side.
Cojuangco, at one point during the hastily called press conference, said the Sandiganbayan ruling saying his 72 percent holding in UCPB, and by extension the 27 percent stake in San Miguel, had been acquired illegally using levies imposed on coconut farmers during the corrupt regime of late dictator Ferdinand Marcos was a defeat on the part of those from whom the fund was levied.
It also opens to further question another 20 percent stake that he holds separately in San Miguel.
Mendoza said they would appeal the Sandiganbayan decision on the controversial UCPB shares.
"There is thus absolutely no basis that Eduardo M. Cojuangco Jr. used coconut levy funds in these transactions. It was the PCA (Philippine Coconut Authority), not he, who used levy funds to purchase the shares," Mendoza said.
Mendoza explained that only Congress could dispose of the funds awarded to the government.
Cojuangco said his shares in the bank had been sold to him by businessman Enrique Zobel, who in depositions before the court underscored that his family had not been browbeaten by the late strongman Marcos into entering into the transactions.A government bid for management control of San Miguel "is expected, but we will fight that off," Cojuangco told a brief news conference.
Asked pointblank about the presidential race, Cojuangco said he would stand by his earlier decision to only make any announcement "by the end of August" or the "first two weeks of September."
The business tycoon said that while he is grateful to those who "endorsed" him, he will have "to try and feel my way through" the question of running.
Cojuangco said the economic conditions of the country in 1992 when he first ran for president and lost had deteriorated. "I don't think the country has many options left," he said. "The problems are growing."
"I don't belong to Lakas. I belong to NPC (Nationalist People's Coalition)," he added.
Cojuangco, however, was evasive when asked to comment on whether he believed that President Arroyo's government had a hand in the Sandiganbayan ruling.
"It seems that way but I would not say it that way," Cojuangco said.
Local business groups, meanwhile, said the recent decision of the anti-graft court on the multi-billion Coconut Levy funds has alarmed investors.
Donald Dee, president of the Employers Confederation of the Philippines (Ecop), said the Sandiganbayan ruling stripping Cojuangco of direct control over UCPB has no effect at this time on the business community, only on SMC.
Cojuangco, in an earlier interview, projected a 30 percent increase in SMC's income for 2003, saying the company earned P3.01 billion net in the first half of 2002. With AFP
(July 15, 2003 issue)
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