Facade of Philippine Women’s University at Taft Avenue, Manila. NIÑO JESUS ORBETA/INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
Tanco-led STI Holdings Inc. has initiated asset foreclosure proceedings against the Benitez family, asking a Manila court to allow its takeover of two campuses of Philippine Women’s University—one on Taft Avenue and another on Indiana Street.
In a statement on Wednesday, STI said it resorted to foreclosure proceedings due to PWU’s failure to pay almost P1 billion in accumulated loans, interest and other expenses. It added that foreclosure proceedings for the Quezon City and Davao properties of PWU would follow.
STI said the filing of foreclosure proceedings would protect the interest of STI and its shareholders. “We were supposed to be have been paid in shares of stock way back in 2011 but even now, more than three years later, the first required step of increasing the authorized capital stock of Unlad Resources, PWU’s sister company that would absorb the school’s assets, was never taken by the Benitez group,” STI president Monico Jacob said.
The Benitez family, which controls PWU, in a separate statement on Wednesday, assailed STI’s move, saying the petition for extrajudicial foreclosure filed before a Manila court filed had no basis.
Lydia Benitez-Brown, PWU media director, said the family already filed a case before the Manila regional trial court last month challenging STI’s declaration of default. “STI’s latest move is a legal matter and will be dealt with in the proper legal forum,” she added. “We’ve always said that we will honor all our commitments to Eusebio Tanco and STI, and we will. But only under fair and just terms. Their demand that we pay P923 million for obligations of P448 million is exorbitant and unacceptable.”
Last Dec. 22, 2014, STI declared the Benitez family in default of its loan to STI.
STI’s Jacob said the three nominees to the Unlad board were ousted by the Benitez group in a shareholders’ meeting last month, noting that this was “a very clear sign they are rejecting the omnibus agreement they signed.”
“We waited for three years. All we got instead were baseless and false allegations in public that STI was the one pushing for the commercial development of PWU’s Quezon City property that they themselves actually approved even before STI bailed out the Benitezes from sure foreclosure in 2011,” he said.
Jacob said STI had received two letters from the Benitez group supposedly offering to pay, the first one of which was signed by the PWU president. However, he said the family did not state any amount nor interest rate.
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