23 years after EDSA, Marcos cronies are back

At first Malacañang declared there’d be no celebration this year of the People Power Revolt. But belatedly last Friday it suspended school today to mark the popular uprising’s 23rd anniversary. And hurriedly yesterday Gloria Macapagal Arroyo laid a commemorative wreath at Libingan ng mga Bayani. Yesterday’s ceremony and today’s special holiday are on the wrong venue and date. Past fetes have always been at the EDSA Memorial on Feb. 25, the day Ferdinand Marcos fell in 1986. The Arroyo admin seems averse to observing the EDSA Revolt. Any revelry would only point up the unpleasant truth. People Power brought down a dictator and his cronies; today Marcos’s confederates are back — as Arroyo cronies.

Juan Ponce Enrile had enforced Marcos’s martial law for 14 years, before a 1986 breakaway that sparked the civilian-backed military mutiny. As defense minister he muzzled the press and jailed dissenters. He also led the takeover of the coconut industry. Today Enrile is Senate President and one of Arroyo’s chief defenders against exposés of corruption and abuse.

Enrile and Eduardo Cojuangco Jr. were the only civilians among the “Rolex 12” plotters of military rule in 1972. They partnered to govern the coconut sector, from planting to harvesting, processing to trading. Using personal and public funds (coco levy) Cojuangco gained control of food and beverage giant San Miguel Corp. in 1984. Ever loyal, he and his family flew with Marcos to exile in Hawaii in 1986. Cojuangco returned years later and formed the Nationalist People’s Coalition. Today the party has two senators, 63 congressmen, and dozens of local officials, all aligned with the Arroyo admin. Cojuangco continues to nurture assets in the police-military establishment; the present defense chief is his nephew.

Cojuangco regained SMC in 1998 and, with sidekick Ramon Ang, grew and diversified it into mining, utilities, and infrastructures. His recent foray into energy was most intriguing. In Oct. 2008, just weeks after Ang disavowed interest, SMC bought 27 percent of Meralco, RP’s largest electric utility. The block came from GSIS, the state employees’ pension fund run by Malacañang appointees. GSIS was already in talks with Metro Pacific to unload the shares for P26 billion cash, at least 50 percent more than its worth. Vivian Yuchengco reportedly got wind of it and, through close ties with golfing buddy First Gentleman Mike Arroyo, got GSIS to entertain SMC instead. GSIS relented, and SMC ended up buying the block for the same price, but at installment of three years.

Controversy didn’t end there. A nine-month-old firm called Global 5000 bought up another 10-percent block of Meralco held by other Palace-controlled agencies: SSS, Land Bank, and Development Bank of the Phils. Global 5000 is led by Cojuangco associates: former Marcos trade minister Roberto Ongpin, SMC board director Iñigo Zobel, and partner Joselito Campos (son of Marcos crony Jose Yao Campos). It is named after the long-range executive jet sent by Ang to pick up tummy-aching Mike Arroyo in Osaka, Japan, last Nov. Securities and Exchange Commission records show that Global 5000’s telephone is SMC’s trunk line. The outfit picked up the additional Meralco shares supposedly so Cojuangco can command a total of 37 percent. Market analysts say it is preparatory to wresting control from the Lopez family, which has 32 percent and whose ABS-CBN is a thorn on the Arroyo admin’s side. The separate purchase of the 27- and 10-percent blocks effectively skirted an SEC rule that any buyer of at least 35 percent of a listed firm must offer the same price to smaller shareholders. With Meralco shares trading below P60 in Oct. 2008, compliance would have cost SMC a heavy sum.

Ongpin’s role in the Meralco deal was a dead giveaway. Only weeks before he had paved the way for Cojuangco’s entry into petroleum. First, as agent of London-based Ashmore Group, he bought for $550 million Saudi Aramco’s 40-percent block in Petron, RP’s biggest oil refiner and distributor (42-percent market share). Government owned an equal 40-percent chunk through Phil. National Oil Co., but strangely relinquished the board to Ongpin’s group. Invoking right of first refusal, Ashmore then demanded that PNOC sell its block for the same price as Aramco’s. It was a distorted definition of the option. The proper procedure should have been for PNOC to publicly bid out its 40 percent. Fetching a higher tag than $550 million, it could have told Ashmore to match it, or else lose to the better bidder. As it happened, PNOC’s Malacañang gofers meekly accepted Ashmore’s price. At the time of sale the government even lost about P1.5 billion, due to a drop in the dollar value against the peso.

While all this was going on, Ashmore negotiated to sell to Cojuangco 50.1 percent of its Petron buildup. The final deal was for SMC to pay Ashmore in two years. But SMC gave up front $10 million “consideration”, by which Ashmore granted it seats in the Petron board. Business buzz is that the amount went to certain “coordinators”.

Cojuangco’s charge into Meralco and Petron followed an attempt to buy the state’s electric transmission lines. But the National Grid Corp. of the Phils., also close to Arroyo, had beat him to it. Arroyo’s party treasurer Ricky Razon and Endika Aboitiz, whom former economic secretary Romy Neri once described as “national oligarchs,” are part of NGCP. Critics have pointed out a breach of the law that bars electric distributors like Aboitiz from going into transmission. But regulators ignored them.

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