Manny Villar Jr. a Philippine Presidentiable Controversy Collections.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

THE VILLAR EMPIRE Dream homes on farmlands

Dream Homes On Farmlands
Author: Jerry Esplanada
Source: Philippine Daily Inquirer
Date Published: 7/24/98


IN ADDITION to 450 hectares of prime land near the Ninoy Aquino International Airport, real estate tycoon and Las Piñas Rep. Manuel Villar has acquired some5,500 hectares (equivalent to 55 million square meters) in mostly agricultural lands in various parts of the country.

The Villar flagship Camella & Palmera Homes Inc. and its affiliate firms have been
developing the landholdings into housing projects marketed as "Dream Homes in a total California setting," "Slice of Europe," "Queen City's crown jewel," and country homes with the "Charm of the Caribbean," among other come-ons.

Documents obtained by the Inquirer, however, revealed that the conversion of many Villar landholdings from agricultural to residential use was made without the required clearance from the Department of Agrarian Reform.

Villar, the wealthiest member of the House of Representatives (with assets of $2 billion in 1996, according to Forbes magazine) has, at this writing, yet to respond to this paper's request for an interview.

Premature or illegal conversion is a criminal act as mandated under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law and the Agriculture and Fisheries
Modernization Act.

Administrative sanctions are also spelled out in DAR Administrative Order No. 7 (Series of 1997) which states that petitions for conversion covering lands which have been prematurely converted shall be disapproved and the subject lands automatically placed under CARP coverage.

On many occasions, C & P Homes insiders said, Villar companies disregarded laws on land conversion and outrightly converted acquired landholdings into subdivision projects. .

"Armed with the respective municipalities' preliminary approval for locational clearance (PALC), the municipal council's development permit (DP), mayor's permit, and the environmental clearance certificate from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, we simply went ahead developing the properties into existing housing projects," a source close to Villar confided to the Inquirer.

Disregarding DAR clearance

C & P Homes insiders insisted "there's no need to secure a DAR clearance because we already have substantial compliance (with the other requirements). All we do is strengthen secondary documentation, not the primary one which is the DAR clearance."

Land reclassification is the function of local government units but a developer must have a conversion clearance if it is done after the enactment of CARP (on June 15, 1988).

Another source close to Villar admitted that in DAR surveys "(Villar landholdings) were in fact agricultural at the time the CARP law was enacted" and that "in real property tax declarations filed prior to June 15, 1988 by the original landowners, the Villar housing projects were previously declared as agricultural."

The same source also said that as early as 1996 "nag-scenario thinking na kami, how we would meet the challenge if someone comes knocking at our door and ask for DAR permits. Pera lang ang katapat niyan."

Going around the law

"We made it a point to complete the documentations, like the waivers of farmers.
Kung wala nang tenants, in effect wala naring complainants," the source added.

Another executive of a Villar firm said they had devised a number of sophisticated schemes that "allowed us to go around the laws."

One of them is by executing a deed of absolute sale (DAS) with the original landowner but leaves blank the exact date of the transaction. The document will neither be notarized nor presented to the Register of Deeds for registration and issuance of the land title.

Either the landowner or an attorney in fact (usually a Villar lawyer or a senior company official) will file with DAR an application for conversion of the particular land. Once the conversion order is secured, the DAS is brought out, dated accordingly and presented to the Register of Deeds for the corresponding transfer
certificate of title or TCT.

Or securing the "cooperation" of the municipal assessor, municipal planning and development officer and the town's register of deeds in changing the description of the agricultural property and declare it instead as residential, commercial or industrial, and pay the corresponding real property tax.

In the Visayas and Mindanao where C & P Homes Inc. is called Communities Philippines Inc., the Villar real estate empire is slowly flexing its muscle with several housing projects.

'On safe side'

Interviewed at the company's regional office in Cebu City, lawyer Pamela Gako, CPI marketing manager, declared that "as much as possible, we go through the process."

Asked if their development projects had land conversion permits from DAR, Gako said the Villar firms "try to comply with government requirements."

"Generally speaking, we try to be on the safe side," Gako told the Inquirer. Whatever that means.

She pointed out that some of their projects were "located within zones classified as
residential by local government units." She did not elaborate.

Sources in the Chamber of Real Estate & Builders Association in Cebu claimed the Villar group was developing more than 100 hectares of prime agricultural lands in the outskirts of the city.

Gako neither confirmed nor denied the disclosure. Instead, she said "some areas which are located near existing projects are under study." She declined to comment further.

Without referring to the Villar firms, Elmo Bañares, DAR Director for Central Visayas,
explained that premature conversion is against the law because "it diminishes the mass of agricultural lands which can be distributed to qualified agrarian reform beneficiaries."

"They are called agricultural lands simply because they are intended for agriculture. It is DAR, not LGUs, which has exclusive jurisdiction over what lands can be or cannot be converted into non-agricultural uses," Bañares emphasized.

Before his transfer to Cebu, Bañares had denied a Villar application for conversion involving an 11.6-hectare agricultural property in Barangay Abilay Norte, Oton, Iloilo.

In land conversion applications, developers are usually represented by former owners of the subject lands. In this particular case, the Villar firm
Camella Homes was represented by landowners Apolonio Gallantes, Domiciano Gampay, Jesus Casuela, Panfilo Guelos, and Juanito Embecido.

Bañares said he disapproved the application "because the (seven) parcels of land were irrigated lands. They were supposed to be non-negotiable. We stuck to our findings which included the existenceof an overflowing irrigation canal in the area."

Reversal

To DAR-Region 6 staff's surprise, the National Irrigation Authority issued a certification saying the subject landholdings were "not irrigated lands within the areas programmed for development under the NIA Irrigation Development Program."

The NIA ruling, among other reasons, prompted the DAR central office to reverse the regional office's decision. "Of course, we know better than that. We're not born yesterday," said a DAR staff member.

On April 16, 1998, DAR-Region 6 disapproved anotherapplication for land conversion by a group of Oton, Iloilo, landowners, again representing the Villar group of companies.

In a two-page decision, a copy of which was obtained by this reporter at the DAR central office in Quezon City, regional director Dominador Andres said: "The regional Center for Land Use, Planning and Policy Implementation investigating team and executive committee recommended that the conversion (of 30.2 hectares in agricultural lands) to residential use be denied pursuant to AO No. 20, which states that irrigated or irrigable lands are non-negotiable for conversion."

Interviewed in Jaro, Iloilo, Andres asserted "there is no way for the DAR regional office to recommend for its approval. We're talking here of irrigated land which is non-negotiable. We've done our part. Trabaho lang ito, walang personalan."

At the DAR headquarters, Prof. Jose Domingo, outgoing director of the Presidential Agrarian Reform Council, said checking if the Villar firms (or any other land developer for that matter) had secured DAR permits for heir housing projects was not an easy task.

"In the first place, there has never really been a meticulous act on the part of the
department to look at all into communities where land conversions were made," Domingo admitted.

Villar empire

At least 50 of the ongoing housing projects of the Villar group, covering some 16.6 million square meters, are in the provinces of Bulacan and Cavite, the same documents disclosed. The landholdings are covered by 1,217 titles.

Land conversion projects in Bulacan, with an area of 10,264,715 sq.m., are classified by C & P Homes Inc. as "North" projects.

The "South" projects, on the other hand, have a total land area of 6,319,587 sq.m. Aside from Cavite, some of the landholdings are located in Laguna and Batangas.

DAR officials call the three provinces the agency's "(land conversion) problem areas" in the Southern Tagalog region, in addition to Bulacan in Central Luzon.

The Villar firms have also acquired land-holdings in Iloilo, Bataan and Cebu, among
other provinces.

In the municipality of San Jose del Monte, Bulacan, alone, Villar companies like Palmera Homes Inc. and Crown Asia have at least 40 ongoing development projects covering a total land area of 1,326,110 square meters.

They include Northridge Prime Estates, 287,352 sq.m.; Northridge Heights 1-B, 24,933 sq.m.; Northridge Heights 1-C, 20,000 sq.m.; Northwinds City 1,126,203 sq.m.; Northwinds 2 (A & B), 81,111 sq.m.; Northwinds 2-C, 11,420
sq.m.; Northwinds 3-A, 164,084 sq.m.; Northwinds 3-B, 105,880 sq.m.; Northwinds 4, 40,000 sq.m.; Northwinds 4-C, 18,828 sq.m.; Northwinds 4-D, 7,555 sq.m.; Northwinds 4-E, 8,362 sq.m.; Northwinds 5, 24,731 sq.m.; Northwinds 6, 52,425 sq.m.; Northwinds 7, 101, 249 sq.m.; and Northwinds 8-B, 15,342 sq.m.

Also being developed in San Jose del Monte are the following housing projects: La Poblacion 152,054 sq.m.; La Poblacion 1-B, 20,623 sq.m; La Poblacion 1-C, 62,272 sq.m.; La Poblacion 1-D, 9,757 sq.m.; La Poblacion 2, 120,577 sq.m.; La Poblacion 3-B, 17,831 sq.m.; La Poblacion 3-C, 51,162 sq.m.; La Poblacion 3-D, 14,711 sq.m.; La Poblacion 3-E, 57,759 sq.m.; and La Poblacion 4,109,894 sq.m.

The same town is also the home of Carissa Homes projects like Carissa 1-A, 59,534 sq.m.; Carissa 1-C, 22,278 sq.m.; Carissa 2-A, 163,084 sq.m.; Carissa 2-B, 81,180 sq.m.; Carissa 3-A, 60,866 sq.m.; Carissa 4-A, 103,092 sq.m.; Carissa 4-B, 40,736 sq.m.; Carissa 4-C, 5,000 sq.m.; Carissa 5-D, 12,400 sq.m.

In Malolos, also in Bulacan, Crown Asia is developing La Ravena, covered by four land titles and with a total area of 619,895 sq.m.

In the municipality of Teresa, Rizal, Palmera Homes is developing four subdivisions--Carissa Homes East 1,161,210 sq.m.; Carissa Homes East 1-B, 24,310 sq.m.; Windhills Point, 100,988 sq.m.; and Windhills Crest, 32,956 sq.m.

In Cavite, the projects include Springville, with an area of 736,000 sq.m.; Barcelona, 273,000 sq.m.; Bacoor, 401,700 sq.m.; Sorrento, 121,800 sq.m.; and Noveleta, 57,000 sq.m.

In Laguna, there are seven new land conversion projects: WH-Main, 136,000 sq.m.; WH-2, 40,000 sq.m.; WH-Annex, 31,400 sq.m.; Bermuda I, 85,000 sq.m.; Bermuda 254,100 sq.m.; and Milan, 30,200 sq.m.

An unidentified Batangas housing project covers a lot area of 100,000 sq.m.

Other projects

- San Jose del Monte, Bulacan--Carissa North.

- Pandi, Bulacan--Willowbend and Woodbridge.

- Antipolo, Rizal--Woodrow Hills, Maia Alta, Hills of Maia Alta, Gardens of Maia Alta,
Cottonwood Heights, and Glen Oaks.

- Quezon City--Granwood Villas and La Brea.

- Kalookan City--Whispering Palms, Tierra Nova Royale 3 and Residenza.

- Novaliches--Tierra Nova.

- Imus, Cavite--Citta Italia and Nueva Imus.

- Dasmariñas, Cavite--La Mediterranea.

- Bacoor, Cavite--Springville Heights.

- San Pedro, Laguna--The Trails of La Marea, Bermuda and Milan.

- Lipa City, Batangas--Plantacion Meridienne.

- Noveleta, Cavite; Orani, Bataan; and Oton, Iloilo-- (Still unnamed)

- Lapu Lapu City, Cebu--Camella Homes Cebu, Vista Bella, Vista Bella Executives and Villa Marina.

- Talisay, Cebu City--Tierra Grande Estates.

- Talamban, Cebu City--Miramonte and Bellefonte.

- Ormoc City, Leyte--La Pradera.

- Cagayan de Oro City--Camella Homes, La Buena de Vida and Frontiera.

- Talomo, Davao City--Solariega.
--------

This was back in 1998. There might be more acquired
between 1998-present specially nagkaroon sila ng
massive expansion sa Cavite and Laguna among other
places. Whether or not conversion clearances were
provided for these properties between 1998-present
is irrelevant because these are non-negotiable
lands.

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