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The Philippine government recently won a landmark decision in the
United States when the US Supreme Court ruled against the close to
10,000 victims of human-rights abuses during the reign of former
strongman Ferdinand Marcos in a dispute over ownership of the
$35-million Arelma account kept at Merrill Lynch’s New York
office.
Manila, through the Presidential Commission on
Good Government, or PCGG, and the human-rights victims, who were
represented by American lawyer Robert Swift and local counterpart
Rod Domingo Jr., had engaged in a protracted tug-of-war for
possession of the Arelma account.
PCGG Commissioner Narciso Nario on Friday said
he welcomes the decision of the US Supreme Court, mainly because it
removed all hurdles to the Philippine government’s claim to the
money. He added that the Arelma account could reach as high as $37
million now.
Once the decision will have been made final and
executory in a few days, Nario said, the PCGG expects the swift
turnover of the sum to Manila by next month.
He added that the Arelma account would be a big
boost, especially to the controversial Comprehensive Agrarian Reform
Program, which has been extended to December 2008.
In a joint statement, Swift and Domingo said the
decision marked an unprecedented surrender of federal court
jurisdiction.
“The US Supreme Court ruled that the
Philippine government’s declared sovereign immunity prevented
United States courts from adjudicating entitlement to funds which
have been there for 35 years,” they pointed out.
Domingo said that despite the passage of 22
years since the Philippines learned about the asset, the US Supreme
Court opted to give Philippine courts a chance to rule, supposedly
even in the absence of evidence that the money belongs to the
Philippine government.
He added that the case also marked the first
time that the US government surrendered the jurisdiction of its
courts to a foreign country. In this instance, Domingo said, it did
so to a Third World country like the Philippines, which, he added,
was not known for its not being corrupt.
Contrary to the belief of the PCGG that the
money will be turned over next month, Swift warned that it will not
be that easy.
“We are disappointed that there will be
another delay in distribution of the money to the Filipino victims.
Still, the money will revert to Merrill Lynch and remain in the
United States. It will not go to the Philippine government,” he
said.
Swift said the US Supreme Court ‘s decision
was not really that decisive.
He argued that the decision did not touch on
other issues, such as that the Philippine government is not entitled
to the money since no evidence at all was introduced.
Swift said he is not losing hope for the victims
of human-rights abuses to be compensated as they have trained their
eyes on another Marcos account that they are disputing with the
Philippine government, this time in Singapore.
“We have other options and remedies,” he
added. Swift also cited a pending case of interpleader in Singapore
where the victims have gained the upper hand and where it was ruled
by the High Court that the sovereign immunity of the Philippine
government is unavailing because the asset is in Singapore.
He also mentioned cases in Texas and Colorado
against the close relatives and cronies of the late Jose Y. Campos
and a case against the estate of the Marcoses in local courts.
In September 2000, Merrill Lynch asked the US
courts to decide on the dispute.
In presenting its argument, the Philippine
government invoked sovereign immunity, the doctrine that bars a
legal proceeding against a government without its consent. Lawyers
for Manila argued that invoking sovereign immunity represented an
automatic rule for dismissing the US case.
The human-rights victims were using a decision
by a US court in 1995, that ceded to them a $2-billion award against
the Marcos family for suffering torture, summary execution and
involuntary disappearance during the martial-law years of 1972 to
the 1980s.
During the first hearings, the US federal judge
and the appeals court ruled in favor of the victims. The US Supreme
Court, however, issued a majority opinion, written by Justice
Anthony Kennedy, that agreed with the Philippine government.
The decision was a victory for Manila, which had
argued that the dispute over the money must be dismissed from the US
court system and should be settled in Philippine courts.
Such argument swayed the justices as they
overturned the California US appeals court’s decision that had
sided with the victims, as they decided that the case must be
dismissed.
Marcos, who ruled the Philippines for two
decades until his overthrow in a “people power” uprising in
1986, and his family are accused of stealing up to $10 billion from
the Philippines. Only a fraction of that amount has been recovered.
The dispute over the Arelma account involved a
New York brokerage account at Merrill Lynch & Co that Marcos set
up in 1972 in the name of a suspected dummy corporation with a
$2-million deposit.
The amount in the account has grown to more than
$35 million. The shares of the suspected dummy corporation have been
held in escrow by a Philippine bank.
The lawyers for the human-rights victims argued
that they should get the $35 million as part of the $2-billion
judgment.
Marcos, a key ally of the US in Asia during Cold
War fears of expanding communism, died in Hawaii in 1989.
-- Francis Earl A. Cueto
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