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Finance
Secretary Margarito Teves plans to coordinate with the
Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG)
regarding the hundreds of millions of pesos worth of
properties of former President Joseph Estrada that have
been forfeited in the government’s favor.
At the
sidelines Wednesday of an economic briefing and
infrastructure forum that Teves cohosted with the other
members of the economic team, he said the broad aim at
this point was to sell the properties at a public
auction after final judgment by the Supreme Court.
“The
numbers we’re hearing is more or less P500 million. We
have to coordinate the property valuation with the PCGG,”
he said.
According to Teves, the anticipated proceeds will form
part of the government’s nontax revenues next year when
the books of the national government shall have
balanced.
He said
conceptually the so-called Erap mansions would be placed
under the Privatization Management Office whose main
task is the disposition of assets while their economic
values can be exploited for maximum impact on the
Treasury.
“We have
people at the Department of Finance who can evaluate the
various properties before they may be sold,” Teves said.
Asset
sale proceeds has thus far exceeded government
expectations, the year-to-date proceeds having actually
totaled nearly P47 billion, or far more than last year’s
proceeds of only P25.3 billion.
Teves
previously directed the various government-owned or
-controlled corporations (GOCCs) to take an inventory of
assets that could form part of the overall program to
bridge the year’s P63-billion budgetary shortfall.
Teves
acknowledged having little grasp of the universe of
assets the GOCCs own at this point having focused his
efforts on only the so-called big-ticket items as the
remaining equity stake at San Miguel Corp., Meralco, the
Philippine National Oil Co.-Energy Development Corp. and
the Food Terminal Inc.
He said
the most promising asset sale so far this year was the
one involving the PNOC-EDC sale under which government
retains 40 percent and sell the other 60 percent via an
initial public offering in the fourth quarter.
Teves
said he remains committed to enhancing revenue flows by
all means necessary short of pursuing new taxes over the
medium term.
Assets
sale proceeds are one of them, Teves said. |
