Legacy depositors jarred by PDIC message

The thousands of Negrense depositors in the Nation Bank in Bacolod City were jarred Tuesday with the appeal by the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. for them to remain calm because the firm has yet to recover missing and incomplete bank records.

First, as I had mentioned previously, despite the fact that they are entitled to P250,000 payment of their deposits, the initial processing only involved those claims for P100,000. Later yesterday, the PDIC claimed that there are many missing incomplete bank records.

“We have sent demand letters to officers and employees of the Legacy-affiliated banks to turn over the documents to us because we need them to process claims,” the notice declared.

In short, a lot will have to wait longer for these documents to be surrendered and thousands more may have to wait for their claims for P250,000 which PDIC is supposed by law to pay them.

A local law firm is handling the complaints of local depositors of more than P100 million deposited with Nation Bank. And that claim may have to wait for more action by the courts.

But as explained by Philip Piccio, a lawyer of the claimants, Legacy’s convoluted scheme was designed to break up “investments by some depositors” into small segments of as much as P250,000 which were then redistributed to several rural banks of the Legacy group.

“Thus, it became very apparent that the main aim was to grab the money of the depositors,” Piccio said.

DBM: Iloilo budget inoperative

The Department of Budget and Management last week declared Iloilo province’s annual budget inoperative, and this was described as a “big slap” on the face of the Sangguniang Panlalawigan by provincial administrator Manuel Mejorada.

This was the third time in a row that the DBM had declared the appropriations ordinance inoperative.

This created jitters among provincial employees who fear that the supplemental budget approved for their bonuses last year would also suffer the same fate.

“The employees feel that they may be forced to return their bonuses,” said Mejorada.

Vice Gov. Rex Suplico, the estranged nephew of Gov. Niel Tupaz Sr., is the presiding officer of the SP. He was a former member of the House of Representatives.

DBM assistant regional director Alfonso Bedonia claimed that the supplemental budget will most likely be declared inoperative. Thus, the jitters among provincial employees.

Sagay GK site

Just shortly after the declaration of the Sagay City Agro-Industrial Processing Zone in Barangay Paraiso by PEZA chair Lilia de Lima last Saturday, Sagay City officials presided on Tuesday over the groundbreaking ceremonies for the Gawad Kalinga housing project to be put up soon in Punta Roma, Barangay Tabao in the old Sagay poblacion.

The groundbreaking rites were attended by Sagay City Mayor Alfredo Marañon Sr., Vice Mayor Leo Rafael Cueva, and GK provincial head Bob Magalona.

Marañon and Magalona signed the memorandum of agreement for the construction of the GK housing project.

Maranon urged the residents of Punta Roma to “nurture the academic development of your children, improve your livelihood and live a decent life.”

He also urged them to organize themselves as a “community of partnership that will build your lives and achieve your dreams for your children and your children’s children.”

Initial donors for the project are the Sagay City government, Rep. Alfredo Marañon III, the Sagaynon USA, and the British Society of London.

ADDENDUM: I was taken aback last weekend by the information that Bacolod Real Estate Development Corp. chairman Simplicio Palanca was donating to the Bacolod Diocese a prime area of 200 square meters in front of SM City bounded by Rizal Street and Simplicio Palanca Avenue for a seven-story memorial tower commemorating the visit here of the late Pope John Paul II. Although Palanca had kept it under wraps, I managed to elicit from Noli Besario that the seven-story tower will be encased in glass and will boast an elevator with four-passenger capacity. The tower will have on its top the statue of the late Roman Catholic pontiff. Soon, that project can be developed into a prime attraction in the reclamation area.