Trees company

The dispute over the multibillion-peso property development project in Baguio City, right there in that most prime area called Camp John Hay, seems to be worsening.

Embroiled in the fight are government agency BCDA [Bases Conversion Development Authority] and private firm CJHDevco [Camp John Hay Development Corp. belonging to the Fil-Estate group].

In the heydays of privatization in the 1990s, 15 or so years ago, the BCDA and CJHDevco entered into a partnership to develop Camp John Hay. The property had been turned over by the US military to the Philippine government. In effect, BCDA was the landowner; CJHDevco, the developer.

They have already been filing court cases one after another against each other.

BCDA also tried to evict CJHDevco out of the facility by filing a “squatting” case against the company, claiming that the company failed to pay “rent” for the property amounting to P3 billion.

But CJHDevco also filed an “arbitration” case, claiming damages of about P11 billion, due to the alleged failure of BCDA to fulfill its part of the agreement with the company.

One of them was that BCDA would take care of all the needed government permits for the development project, particularly the ECC [environmental clearance certificate].

You needed the ECC to clear a big area such as Camp John Hay for an ambitious property development project.

To return the favor to BCDA for its filing the “squatting” case against CJHDevco, the firm obtained a TRO from the court to prevent BCDA from taking over control of the facility.

To top it all, both sides have put their dispute into the open, constantly skirmishing in media. Recently, for example, BCDA leaked out information that, as part of its development plan, CJHDevco wanted to cut down more than a thousand trees.

Such a news item, particularly since it came from the BCDA as a premeditated media leak, obviously aimed to stir some emotions among environmentalist groups.

Actually, the need to clear up large areas for construction has been the biggest problem that stalled the Camp John Hay project.

Some environmentalist groups have already started a protest movement to protect the trees in the area. These groups have also gone to media to air their objection to the cutting of even just a single tree.

Anyway, CJHDevco had to get back at BCDA, saying in its own media statement that it was in fact the other way around, that it was the BCDA master plan that proposed to cut down those more than a thousand trees.

In effect, according to CJHDevco, BCDA was lying. CJHDevco executive vice president and COO Alfredo Yñiguez III also said the BCDA even imposed such a plan on his company.

Now, only last year, both sides were in the thick of negotiations, as CJHDevco was trying to restructure its P3-billion debt with BCDA, representing the unpaid “rental” of the facility.

At that time, according to Yñiguez, the company pointed out to BCDA that its “master plan” would entail the cutting down of more than a thousand trees. Thus, CJHDevco proposed an alternative plan that would in effect save more than half of those trees.

The company also claimed that BCDA refused to act on the application of CJHDevco to cut down the trees for almost two years now. What could be the reason?

Yñigues, who used to be a finance executive working abroad, has a simple explanation. He said such “inaction” by BCDA was its way of crippling the operations of CJHDevco.

“It is only in the Philippines that you see a government agency deliberately attempting to wreck the business of a legitimate private investor,” he said.

The question is, in whose favor is the BCDA doing that?

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Last week, we wrote about the refusal of the DENR to issue ECC for the Tampakan mining project. It seems that Environment Secretary Ramon Paje deferred to the ban imposed by the provincial government on “open pit” mining, which was the method proposed by mining firm Saguittarius.

The very next day, we received a letter from an employee of the DENR, which is the agency tasked to issue ECCs, although the letter qualified that it was an “official” response from the DENR. The letter said:

“Every ECC application requires social acceptability and that is in the form of barangay certificate, mayor’s clearance, Sanggunian resolutions.

“Small projects only require the barangay certificate, but larger projects require clearances from the LGUs in the municipal and/or provincial levels.

“It is a basic requirement ever since I got a job in the DENR office where ECC is issued in the Calabarzon.

“The purpose is that once the project was applied for an ECC at the Environmental Impact Assessment Division (EIAD) of the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB), the ECC is the evidence that the project was acceptable to the LGUs and the constituents represented by the LGU officials.

“This is to avoid complaints.

“NGOs funded by individuals or corporations always try to kill potential big tax collections. It is the job of the company to manage the situation.

“It is always about money using the environment and moral issues as a cover of the true intention.

“This is the information from somebody who worked inside.”