Syndicate at the gov’t-run home mortgage firm
WHY IS the Land Transportation Office (LTO) printing new motor vehicle plates when there’s nothing wrong with the old ones?
To paraphrase a saying, “Why fix it when it ain’t broke?”
The new license plate has four digits with the place of registration inscribed (example, NCR for Metro Manila) at the bottom; this makes it difficult for a witness in a hit-and-run to memorize the plate number of the vehicle.
On the other hand, the old plate has just three numbers—without the place of registration—making it easy to memorize.
The answer is simple: The Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) wants to earn big bucks, perhaps to be used by the administration to fund its campaign for the 2016 national elections.
***
The expected kickback from the manufacture and is- suance of new motor vehicle plates is P3 billion, according to LTO insiders who placed the number of vehicles and motorcycles in the country at 15 million.
The LTO has started issuing new motor vehicle and motorcycle plates at P450 and P120 each, respectively.
However, it has also charged car owners an additional P50 for registration stickers and P150 for the plate production fee.
But aren’t stickers and the cost of plate production inherently included in the cost of the vehicle plates?
The bid data sheet of the DOTC’s bids and awards com-
mittee (BAC) provides that “bids for each pair of motor vehicle (MV) plates should not exceed four hundred fifty pesos (P450) inclusive of stickers and plate screws and one hundred twenty pesos (P120) for each motorcycle plate with sticker and plate screws.”
Will the LTO please explain to the public why it’s collecting additional fees not included in the bid data sheet?
***
Former basketball star and Olympian Jimmy Mariano appears to be a victim of a syndicate operating at the National Home Mortgage Finance Corp. (NHMFC). How did he become a scam victim?
In 1998, he and his daughter, Joy Bernadette, pawned their house and lot in Cainta, Rizal, to the United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB) for P315,000.
The UCPB transferred the mortgaged property to the NHMFC which told the Mari- anos to redeem the property in one year.
The former basketball star and Olympian borrowed from his other children to come up with P466,000 to redeem the property through the Antipolo Regional Trial Court.
The court issued the Marianos a redemption certificate but alas and alack! When they went to the NHMFC and presented the redemption certificate, they were told the property had already been sold.
Rodolfo Erbon, NHMFC legal department chief, said a certain Rosa Rivera of Pasig City won the bid for the property.
Rivera’s name reportedly crops up constantly in auctions for property foreclosed by the NHMFC.
Erbon told the Marianos that Rosa Rivera—whose location he refused to disclose—would give back the property to the Marianos for P900,000.
This means the syndicate at NHMFC stands to gain P434,000.