This refers to the news item titled, “Tillers file plunder raps vs Villars.” (Philippine Daily Inquirer, 9/29/08) The subhead stated “Couple: Charges a rehash of dismissed case.”
Allow us to clarify that the two claimants referred to in the article as a “farmers group,” namely, Gina Jarvana and Valentina Amador, are (and were) not farmers in the disputed farmlands. In fact, they belong to a group being used to stop the genuine farmers’ groups from filing a case against spouses Sen. Manuel Villar and Rep. Cynthia Villar in connection with the farmlands in question.
When Rep. Joker Ar-royo of the first con-gressional district of Makati was robbed of the speakership in June 1998, he asked some investigative journalist to dig deeper into information he received about an alleged land-grabbing incident in the hilly town of Norzagaray in Bulacan, right beside the foothills of the Sierra Madre. He had information that behind the supposed land-grabbing was the Villar couple, Manuel, soon to be proclaimed Speaker of the House by the grace of the newly-elected president of the land, Joseph Ejercito Estrada, and his wife Cynthia.
On August 17, 1998 Joker Arroyo spoke before his peers and charged the new Speaker with violations of the Constitution and the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act, or R.A. 3019, in all of ten specific instances. The fourth charge of corruption stated by Arroyo was about the Capitol Bank’s receipt of financial accommodations from the Bangko Sentral between 1992 and 1998, when Mrs. Cynthia Villar was its CEO, and her husband Manuel was a congressman from Las Piñas, and now, Speaker of the House.
MANILA, Philippines—A farmer’s group has filed a plunder suit before the Ombudsman against Senate President Manuel Villar and his wife, Las Piñas Rep. Cynthia Villar, for their alleged failure to repay a P1.5 billion loan with the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) which led to the loss of their farmlands in Norzagaray, Bulacan.
The farmers claimed the transfer of the farm lands from Capitol Development Bank, formerly owned by the Villars, to the BSP was illegal. The contested Norzagaray property also includes a controversial sanitary landfill project that had been put on hold.
Villar’s camp was quick to refute the charge as a rehash of a similar case filed by another group of farmers on the same property which was dismissed by the Ombudsman for “lack of merit” two years ago.
A plunder complaint was filed Friday against Senate President Manuel Villar, his wife Las Piñas Rep. Cynthia Villar, and three others before the Office of the Ombudsman in connection to an alleged unpaid loan from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) by a bank the Villars own.
The plunder complaint was filed by a group of farmers whose ownerships of some 484 hectares of agricultural lands in Norzagaray, Bulacan are being disputed by the BSP before the Malolos Regional Trial Court.
