By Modesto P. Sa-onoy
For all these months of digressing the feud in the family left behind by Ricardo B. Yanson, we can already sense the patterns from all the flying claims and counterclaims not just in the courtrooms but in media of all sorts. The proliferation of the divergent views however provided sufficient ground to consider that the root cause of the family feud is not just the billions of family possessions but the trampling of rights.
Indeed, more people in the world richer than the Yanson family have differences in opinions and interest but their conflicts have not impacted injury to their holdings and personal relationship because the common owners respected the rights of the others. When divergence is beyond communal resolution, they appeal to the courts, conceived under civilized rules of personal and societal behavior as an impartial judge.
Discarding the civilized way of resolving conflict through the courts always end up in bitterness on the protagonists. Of course, there is no conflict that cannot be resolved or injurious acts that cannot be forgiven as people learned from the world wars they went through.
But even then, what is right is always right. Things can be twisted and mangled to suit personal or societal interest but in the end what is right prevails.
The news headline last September 17 says that the “Yanson Four, siblings involved in a family dispute for control of Vallacar Transit Inc. (VTI), has scored another legal victory with the Office of the Regional Prosecutor affirming the dismissal of a trespassing case filed against them by their own mother, Olivia Yanson.” The resolution issued on June 3, was cited by the Yanson 4 lawyer, Carlo Joaquin Narvasa in a statement issued on September 9.
Narvasa said that “The Office of the Regional Prosecutor held that there was no reason to reverse the findings of the City Prosecutor of Dumaguete City, and noted that the purpose of preliminary investigation is to secure the innocent against hasty, malicious and oppressive prosecution.”
Oppressive prosecution is an act of violence against other people’s rights. Even the Ten Commandments condemn false witnessing. I am certain Olivia’s complaint was done under oath.
“This is another legal victory of the Yanson siblings, Roy, Ricardo Jr., Maria Lourdes Celina and Emily,” Atty. Narvasa said.
We have discussed several of the cases filed against the four in Bacolod but not the Dumaguete case. However, it is similar as that in Bacolod which involves the supposed “takeover” of the Yanson 4 of the Ceres terminals of VTI. That was also dismissed.
In the Dumaguete case, Olivia accused the siblings of trespassing into a property that she and her husband, the late Ricardo Yanson Sr., owned. There is no contest in that claim but at the time she filed the complaint that conjugal ownership has long been equitably divided among the children as heirs to this particular corporation and to which Olivia agreed. She had her share as the sole owner of other family properties.
It seems the intention of Ricardo Sr. was for Olivia to keep her hands off the transportation company and leave that to the children. That is the only explanation I can surmise for her exclusion for the shares of the stocks of the transportation company.
In fact, only when the conflict among them erupted in late 2019 that she claimed, not just part ownership, but the majority of it.
She proved she was not an heir in VTI when she filed a case to discard the family amicable agreement – years after she signed it. This column dissected this issue last year. However, the case is in court where the final decision awaits although I believe this case, considering the amounts involved, will reach the Supreme Court. The lawyers will see to that.
Nevertheless, as all documents show, Olivia is not even a part-owner of the VTI. She does not hold a share according to the records of the Securities and Exchange Commission that has jurisdiction over all corporations in this country. On the other hand, the six siblings are owners with equitable shares in the company, but the four have most of it.
Correctly the case of trespassing failed. One cannot be a trespasser when he enters his house or office.
Continued tomorrow.*
