Parañaque mayor Olivarez sued over P450-M ‘undue’ tax amnesty; firm says city benefited from partnership

A former barangay kagawad on Wednesday filed plunder and graft complaints against Parañaque Mayor Edwin Olivarez for granting over P453.37 million in real property tax (RPT) amnesty for one of Aseana City's developers.

The complainant, Jonathan Bernardo, filed the complaint against Olivarez in violation of the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act and the Plunder Law before the Office of the Ombudsman.

Bernardo, a former Barangay San Dionisio official, said Olivarez gave undue benefit to the Wenceslao Group in November 2013 for several construction projects in the mixed-use reclaimed area in Parañaque City.

He claimed Olivarez and the city council approved the lowering of the RPT assessment per square meter from P12,000 to P6,000 despite the company's pending case in the city government.

"Binigyan ng pabor ng city government ng Parañaque ang isang kumpanya, o yung Wenceslao Group ng tax credit to the amount of approximately P500 million. So ang nangyari dito, yung P12,000 per square meter assessment dun sa kanilang RPT ay binaba to P6,000," Bernardo said.

In his petition, Bernardo said the Municipal Assessor's Office issued corresponding tax declarations for the Wenceslao Group with an assessment of P12,000 per square meter.

However, the company paid its RPT in 1998 under protest claiming that the assessed value should only be pegged at P6,000 per square meter as the lands were not yet fully developed.

The city council then forged a compromise with the Wenceslao Group in November 2013 approving the lowered RPT "with bad faith and with precipitate haste," passing a resolution for only three days without any public consultation.

Bernardo said this proved Olivarez favored the Wenceslao Group's chairman, Ding Wenceslao, who was his godparents. He also claimed Wenceslao was a campaign contributor of Olivarez in the May 2016 elections.

"As far as I can see, until now they are friends and patrons of the mayor. I could not say directly, but as of now I don't have that document. But it's an open secret that they are patrons of the mayor," he said.

City benefited

GMA News Online has repeatedly tried reaching the camp of Olivarez through the city's official website and contact numbers. Calls, however, have yet to be returned.

Sought for comment, Wenceslao's legal counsel Paul Quinto, for his part, said Parañaque City has in fact benefited from the compromise agreement with the Wenceslao Group — a company Quinto claims is consistently lauded as one of the city's largest taxpayers.

"In so far as the compromise agreement between  Paranaque City and the Wenceslao Group, it was the City who benefited from the same as we overpaid around 390 million pesos in real property taxes," Quinto told GMA News Online.

"The same compromise agreement was approved by the City Council and was even approved in 2014 by no less than the Supreme Court itself which ordered the parties to strictly comply with the said agreement," he added.

Quinto vowed that the company will respond to the complaint as soon as their camp receives it to ensure that the firm's reputation is protected "against any baseless and malicious statements."

Bernardo has appealed for the temporary suspension of Olivarez and the members of the city council.  — MDM, GMA News