Publicly listed mining and real estate firm Omico Corp. on Monday proceeded with its annual meeting of stockholders and election of directors despite a cease-and-desist order (CDO) from the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The SEC had ordered Omico to stop accepting and including contested proxy votes in determining quorum and electing board members during the meet.

Omico officials said they did not receive the reported CDO and so proceeded with the meeting and the election of board members.

“The market has spoken resoundingly in our favor,” said Omico president Tommy K. Tia in a statement, citing the 33-percent surge in the company’s share price on Monday.

Omico corporate secretary Emilio Teng said company officials tried but failed to access the SEC website on which the CDO was supposedly posted during the weekend. “It says there that the site was accessible only from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. I tried opening it on Saturday and Sunday and I couldn’t open it,” he said.

Teng also said the company had not officially received any CDO.

Sources of the Philippine Daily Inquirer said that SEC representatives sent to the Makati Sports Club, where the stockholders meeting was being held, to serve the CDO were blocked by Omico staff who refused to show any identification.

The sources said the SEC lawyers had no other recourse but to “throw” the order into the room (in Makati Sports Club) where the meeting was taking place.

“How can you receive something that was thrown to you? It is not an issue of whether we recognize it. We have not received any [notice],” Teng said.

“Omico’s position is simple: there was no CDO, thus there is nothing to stop the elections. If the SEC produces the CDO, Omico will contest it,” he added.

The CDO was issued in response to a complaint filed by Astra Securities Corp. president William Ang against Omico, its president and four other members of the Omico board of inspectors.

Ang wanted proxies issued by some brokers in favor of Tia declared invalid due to alleged irregularities in the the validation of the proxies and violation of securities rules.

Tia said the proxies were voluntarily given by his allies, or the clients of brokers who did not want to hold any director position in the board and were content with his management.

Teng said that if there was really a CDO, Omico would question the SEC’s jurisdiction over the issue, which he said involved an intra-corporate dispute that should be handled by the courts.

Ang said he was prepared to question the legality of the Omico stockholders’ meeting held on Monday. With editing by INQUIRER.net