Benitez family, STI Group OK settlement deal

THE BENITEZ family has approved an amicable settlement deal with the Tanco family-led STI Group on Philippine Women’s University (PWU), outvoting an opposition bloc which wants to continue to fight for the group’s valuable assets.

PWU media director Lyca Benitez-Brown said in a text message Monday that Unlad Resources Development Corp. —the real estate company that owns and holds the assets used by PWU—held a shareholders meeting on April 10 and officially ratified the settlement deal.

Brown said about 92.36 percent of Unlad shareholders were in attendance and “over two-thirds” approved the settlement deal.

Unlad chair Conrado Benitez II, who owns 9.5 percent of Unlad and represents 16 percent in person or proxy, attended the meeting to argue his case but failed to stop the majority of the clan from approving the deal which he deemed “unfair.”  If it were up to him, the family should not bow down to STI and instead continue to fight for PWU’s assets.

Under the compromise deal with STI, PWU will remain under the control of the Benitez family, which will, however, cede to STI the 1.5-hectare land along Edsa in Quezon City where PWU’s basic education arm Jose Abad Santos Memorial School (JASMS) currently operates. STI will also get a separate 4-hectare property in Davao.

PWU, on the other hand, will retain its campuses on Taft Avenue and Indiana Street in Manila.

JASMS can stay on the Quezon City campus only until the end of school year 2017, after which it will continue operating in a “more comfortable” site, adding that 60 to 65 percent of the parents had agreed to such relocation.

Benitez did not favor the deal, noting that it was not fair to exchange assets worth P2 billion for a loan to STI worth no more than P750 million.  He alleged “bad faith” and “collusion” between Tanco and relatives “who are trying to give him Unlad’s major assets on a silver platter.”

But for the majority of the Benitez family who voted for the deal, this is a bitter pill to swallow to save the school and allow PWU and JASMS to move forward.  Instead of risking losing everything to the irate creditor/investor, STI, it agreed to give up some of the assets. “We put a value to the school far beyond the value of the assets,” Brown said in an earlier interview.

The squabble between the Benitez and STI groups erupted in end-2014 following disagreements over a three-year-old joint venture. STI moved to seize a controlling stake in PWU, citing the Benitez group’s failure to meet obligations under a cooperation deal forged in 2011. STI also initiated extra-judicial foreclosure proceedings against PWU’s assets in Taft Ave. and Indiana St. in Manila as well as the Quezon City and Davao properties.

From the point of view of Tanco’s group, the foreclosure proceedings were meant to protect STI shareholders amid PWU’s failure to pay what the former claims to be almost P1 billion worth of accumulated loans, interest, and expenses from the soured partnership.