THE GOVERNMENT should take possession of the properties of a real estate firm involved in the P3.6 billion worth of illegal drugs recently busted in Pampanga because its owners had allegedly falsified their Philippine documentation.

The House Dangerous Drugs Committee on Wednesday found that the Chinese owners of a real estate firm acquired 291 titles for parcels of land throughout the country by way of falsifying their Filipino identities.

“If these three are not Filipinos, they are not allowed by law to own lands in the Philippines, neither is [the real estate firm] for not being 60% Filipino-owned” Surigao del Norte Rep. Robert Ace S. Barbers told the House panel. “Land acquisitions by the corporation and by these three Chinese individuals must be invalidated and forfeited in favor of the government.” 

An anti-narcotics sting by the National Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Customs, and the National Intelligence Coordinating Agency busted the smuggling and delivery of 530 kilos of methamphetamine hydrochloride, valued at P3.6 billion, through Subic Bay Port to a warehouse in Mexico, Pampanga.

The Chinese nationals were found to own 55% of the tagged real estate company, in violation of the 60-40 foreign ownership equity under the 1987 Philippine Constitution.

The land owned by the real estate firm and the Chinese nationals “have amassed [291] titled lands… amounting to hundreds if not thousands of hectares in Nueva Ecija alone,” Mr. Barbers said.

The panel found one of the owners had fabricated his Filipino identity. The rest of the company’s owners had questionable Filipino identification as most of them had registered their birth certificates late, he said.

One of the Chinese owners of the real estate firm already fled the country, according to a file presented by Mr. Barbers. — Kenneth Christiane L. Basilio

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