Photo shows part of Paskuhan Village near NLEX in San Fernando, Pampanga.
THE Court of Appeals (CA) has recognized the right of Senior Deputy Speaker and Pampanga 3rd District Rep. Aurelio “Dong” Gonzales Jr. to intervene in the “irregular” sale of the 9.3-hectare Paskuhan Village in San Fernando City, Pampanga.
In a decision rendered last May 23, the CA fourth division set aside its earlier ruling upholding the Regional Trial Court (Branch 42) of San Fernando, which determined that Gonzales had no legal standing to file a motion to intervene in the case.
The CA remanded the case to RTC-Branch 42 and ordered it to resolve “with dispatch” the Pampanga lawmaker’s motion to intervene and the reconsideration of its judgment on the compromise agreement between the city of San Fernando and Premier Central, Inc., to which the Paskuhan Village property was sold in 2017 for P939 million.
“I am happy and thankful that the Court of Appeals has recognized my right to intervene as a lawmaker, a taxpayer and a concerned citizen,” Gonzales said.
“We can now pursue the return of this cultural heritage property to the government, the province of Pampanga and the city of San Fernando. It should not have been sold in the first place, and its sale was even grossly disadvantageous to the government,” he said.
The property, located near North Luzon Expressways and Jose Abad Santos Avenue in San Fernando, used to be the venue for Pampanga’s giant lantern festival.
Gonzales’ district includes San Fernando.
In its May 23 decision, the CA said there were “glaring irregularities in the manner in which the RTC rendered its judgement.”
It said the RTC “not only delayed resolving Gonzales’ motions (for intervention); records reveal that they were not resolved at all before the judgment was rendered.”
The Pampanga lawmaker filed his original motion on Jan. 16, 2020, followed by another petition on Jan. 31, and a third on Feb. 21, also in 2020.
The CA said the irregularities “raise serious doubt about when the RTC actually decided on the case.”
“As such, the better and more prudent action would be to treat Gonzales’ urgent motion as having been duly filed before the RTC. Thus, the RTC deviated from its mandate when it prematurely decided on the case and rendered judgment without resolving a pending incident,” it said.
It said Gonzales “acted within a reasonable period in availing of the remedy of intervention to question the compromise agreement” between the San Fernando City government and the Paskuhan Village buyer.
It stressed that the “substantive issues raised by Gonzales in his petition, such as susceptibility of the controversy to compromise and the authority of the OSG (Office of the Solicitor General) to enter into a compromise agreement (in behalf of the government), should have prompted the RTC to rule upon the urgent motion instead of ignoring or sidestepping it.”
Under the compromise agreement, San Fernando would get free of charge 5,000 square meters of the 9.3 hectares sold to Premier Central, Inc. and a two-story building.
