Court dismisses case against Megawide’s executive team

Megawide [MWIDE 3.63 14.51%] [link] received notice that the Regional Trial Court of Lapu-Lapu City has dismissed the criminal case against MWIDE’s owner, Edgar Saavedra, and other MWIDE officers and directors.

The court found that the new law, Republic Act No. 11659, which was signed into law on March 21, 2022, explicitly excluded “airport operations and maintenance” from the list of activities that would be considered a “public utility” under the law.

This issue is critical to the case against MWIDE’s officers and executives since the allegation against the team was that it was permitting foreign entities to have an unlawful level of influence over a company, in this case, the Mactan-Cebu International Airport project.

As part of its decision, the court said, “RA No. 11659 has completely eradicated any alleged violation of the anti-dummy law of which the Megawide respondents were wrongfully accused of.”
 

MB BOTTOM-LINE

This is a great outcome for MWIDE, Mr. Saavedra, and all of the officers, directors, and executives that were named in the case.

It’s also a great outcome for MWIDE shareholders, and for those shareholders of Citicore Energy REIT [CREIT 2.42 0.41%] who had considered the pendency of this case to be a potential long-term risk.

The court basically said that, regardless of whether the evidence against MWIDE would have shown that it was in violation of the Anti-Dummy Law, the actions that they were accused of doing are simply no longer illegal, so there’s literally no point in looking any closer at the complaint.

For anyone who has been involved in a lawsuit or criminal case like this, you know very well how the weight of it hangs over the head of everyone involved.

Even if the case is filed to be more of a nuisance rather than a tool of blind justice, it’s hard to feel completely confident in your present and future until the thing is resolved.

Now, it appears as though the clouds have parted in this legal dispute, to give the named MWIDE and CREIT personnel some much-needed respite from that weight of feeling. 

--

Merkado Barkada's opinions are provided for informational purposes only, and should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any particular stock. These daily articles are not updated with new information, so each investor must do his or her own due diligence before trading, as the facts and figures in each particular article may have changed.