The heirs of Jose L. Africa, a close associate of the Marcos family, have scored a "partial" victory before the Sandiganbayan Special Third Division as the court agreed to the "deletion" of the award of exemplary damages in the court's decision promulgated last year.
The Sandiganbayan junked the motion for reconsideration filed by the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) and affirmed that the civil case against Imelda Marcos, her son Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr., and former Senator Juan Ponce Enrile is dismissed.
On December 4, 2019, the anti-graft court ordered the cronies of the late President Ferdinand Marcos and his wife, Imelda, to return all their shares in the Eastern Telecommunications Philippines Inc. (ETPI) and pay the government over P69 million which represents the value of the ETPI shares conveyed to ISM Communications in July, 2005, and exemplary damages.
Civil Case No. 0009 is based on the complaint for reconveyance, reversion, accounting, restitution, and damages filed against the Marcoses and their close associates Africa, Manuel H. Nieto, the late Roberto Benedicto, and Enrile filed by the government, represented by the PCGG, back in July, 1987.
The PCGG sought to recover P2.756 billion worth of shares of stocks and P2.274 million worth of real properties.
The properties involved in the case include ETPI, Philippine Overseas Telecommunications Corporation (POTC), Philippine Communication Satellite Corporation (PHILCOMSAT), Domestic Satellite (DOMSAT), and Oceanic Wireless Network Inc. (OWNI).
The PCGG said the defendants, through "dubious arrangements" with the members of the board of the National Development Corporation (NDC), purchased NDC's shareholdings in PHILCOMSAT "under highly unconscionable terms and conditions manifestly disadvantageous to the government and its people."
The defendants were accused of creating a scheme in order to monopolize the telecommunications industry by "manipulating the purchase of the major stockholding of London-based Cable and Wireless Limited in ETPI."
In its December, 2019 ruling, the anti-graft court said that defendants Africa and Nieto Jr. failed to present sufficient evidence to overturn the prima facie evidence that their shares in the ETPI are ill-gotten wealth.
Africa and Nieto Jr., substituted by their legal heirs, were directed to reconvey to the government "all the stock/cash dividends received/deposited and interests that may have accrued/may still accrue thereto" and pay P1 million as exemplary damages.
But in the Motion for Partial Reconsideration filed by the heirs of Africa, they claimed that there is no evidence that their shares in ETPI are ill-gotten wealth of the late President Marcos because there was no proof that the property originated from the government itself.
They insisted that there is a lack of competent evidentiary substantiation to declare the subject property as ill-gotten wealth.
Meanwhile, the PCGG said in its Motion for Reconsideration that the court erred in letting Imelda, Bongbong, and Enrile off the hook as their acts of conspiracy were properly established.
But in a resolution promulgated on September 22, the anti-graft court said that both motions filed by the heirs of Africa and the PCGG were "without merit."
Contrary to their claims, the court stressed that evidence all points to the ETPI shares being part of the ill-gotten wealth of the late President Marcos. "Defendant Africa blatantly abused his right when he willingly and knowingly acted as dummy of defendant Marcos in acquiring 60 percent of the shares of stock in the ETPI," the resolution read.
Despite these, the anti-graft court also ruled that there is no basis for the award of exemplary damages in favor of the government.
The court explained that the New Civil Code provides that "exemplary or corrective damages are imposed, by way of example or correction for the public good, in addition to the moral, temperate, liquidated, or compensatory damages."
In this case, the Sandiganbayan found there was no basis for the award of either moral damages or temperate damages. So the ruling for the heirs of Africa and Nieto to jointly and severally pay the government P1 million as exemplary damages should be deleted.
Meanwhile, the court affirmed its earlier ruling that the PCGG's documentary evidence failed to prove that Imelda, Bongbong, and Enrile have ill-gotten shares in the corporations subject to the case. The only thing provided by the prosecution were its allegations that they all conspired to accumulate ill-gotten wealth in the form of ETPI shares of stocks.
"Wherefore, the Motion for Partial Reconsideration… filed by Lourdes A. Africa, Nathalie A. Africa-Verceles, Jose Enrique A. Africa, and Paul Delfin A. Africa dated December 26, 2019, insofar as it prays for the deletion of the award of exemplary damages are concerned, and, accordingly, the award of exemplary damages in the Court's Decision promulgated on December 4, 2019, is hereby DELETED; and DENIES the Motion for Reconsideration dated December 20, 2019 filed by plaintiff Republic of the Philippines for lack of merit," the dispositive portion of the 45-page resolution read.
It was penned by Presiding Justice Amparo Cabotaje-Tang with the concurrence of Associate Justices Bernelito Fernandez and Sarah Jane Fernandez.