Hacienda Luisita’s SCTEX toll fee anomalous — Anakpawis

“Despite motorists and farmers’ collective outrage over the illegal Luisita toll fees, the President himself appears powerless against the abuses of his own relatives,” the peasant leader said. He went on to say that the congressional probe should not be limited to the alleged non-issuance of receipt and tax evasion of the Cojuangcos but must extend to their violation of farmers rights to the land.

The TRB should have immediately issued an order stopping the Cojuangcos from illegally collecting toll fees alongside its so-called investigation,” Ramos added.

The more than 6,000-hectare Hacienda Luisita was covered by agrarian reform and the agrarian dispute is now pending before the Supreme Court.

Overprice SCTEx controversy revisited

This is not the first time the SCTEX interchange passing through Hacienda Luisita came to the public’s notice.
In January 2010, 7th District of Cavite Rep. Jesus Crispin Remulla made the assertion that the Aquino family should pay the government for the construction of the HLI interchange. Cost estimates were then pegged at P170 million.

Remulla had said that the family of then senator Aquino should refund the government for the purchase of what he alleged to be the overpriced right-of-way property for the SCTEx road project. He claimed that regular government procedure mandates the landowner should give the property to the government at zero cost.

(Photo courtesy of Libotero.com / bulatlat.com)

“Interchanges in private properties have to be paid for by the private property owners. He should donate the right-of-way. The Aquinos still have the industrial land,” Remulla said. Remulla also asserted that the SCTEx road controversy is “bigger” than the C-5 road extension project scandal against senator Manuel Villar.

Philippine National Construction Corp. President Maria Teresa Defensor also gave her views on the matter in 2010, saying that the the government does not ordinarily pay private landowners for right-of-way properties in government projects because the private landowner presumably benefits from the construction of a national road.

In a congressional investigation on the issue, Defensor testified that the TRB which processes applications for interchanges in major road projects, does not normally pay for the construction of interchanges in private lands. She said that there was a a process where private landowners apply for the construction of an interchange and, if approved, shoulder the full cost of construction. “This is also because the value of the land will presumably increase, and the landowner benefits from the rise in property values resulting from the infrastructure project,” she said.

Remulla said even then that then senator and now president Aquino should be held accountable for the anomaly.

“It’s the uncle. It’s just one family you are dealing with. And he is a direct beneficiary. He cannot control his family. It’s as if he has nothing to do with it when his family is involved. But he benefits from it,” he said.
Remulla also made the assertion that the SCTEX overpricing issue also affects taxpayers because they will inevitably shoulder the cost of the loan.

(Photo courtesy of Libotero.com / bulatlat.com)

Remulla noted that while all private entities have to pay expressway management a huge amount of money for the right to have an interchange constructed leading to their properties, the SCTEx management constructed the interchange leading to the Cojuangco-Aquino-owned Hacienda Luisita on top of an P80 million remuneration for the right of way (RoW) for 83 hectares of the property.

“At Slex (South Luzon Expressway), Asia Brewery and Greenfield had to pay PNCC (Philippine National Construction Corp.) P241 million (US$ 5,604) each for the right to have an interchange. The same goes for Southwoods and Mamplasan. They had to build the interchanges themselves at their own cost. They had to donate eight hectares which is standard area for an interchange,” Remulla said. According to him, the Cojuangco-Aquinos benefiting a total of P250 million from the aggregate cost of the interchange and the right of way.

The SCTEx controversy began in November 2009 with Remulla’s allegations that President Aquino’s family benefited from the allegedly overpriced sale of the right-of-way property. The property was sold for P100 (US$2.32) per hectare. Remulla questioned it because the zonal value was only P8 (US$0.186) , he said. The controversy then became connected to other charges of irregularities: the Aquino’s family allegedly failed to fairly distribute to the farmers their share in the sale of the right-of-way property; the irregularity in the construction of the interchange itself inside the Hacienda Luisita; the Cojuangco family’s alleged failure to pay government royalty fees for the quarrying activities inside Hacienda Luisita.