Day: February 13, 2015

Megaworld expands township portfolio across the country

PRNEWS Leave a comment

Property giant Megaworld is aggressively expanding its township portfolio this year. The company, along with its subsidiaries Suntrust Properties, Inc., Empire East Land Holdings, Inc., and Global-Estate Resorts, Inc., is set to launch five new townships: two in Luzon, two in the Visayas and one in Mindanao, with a total land area of around 400 hectares. This will bring Megaworld’s total township land area to 3,100 hectares by year-end.

“With our adequate land bank and landholdings, the Megaworld Group is growing its townships to even more cities all over the Philippines. This means, more exciting destinations, more homes to be built, more office buildings to be offered and more jobs for Filipinos. Our vision is to build more world-class townships in every major city in the Philippines year after year,” says Dr. Andrew L. Tan, chairman and CEO, Megaworld.

These new developments will bring the company’s township portfolio from 15 to 20 by the end of this year. Last year, the company also introduced five townships in its portfolio covering almost 1,000 hectares of land. These include Woodside City in Pasig City (12.3 hectares); Southwoods City in the boundaries of Cavite and Laguna (561 hectares); Davao Park District in Lanang, Davao City (11 hectares); Alabang West in Las Pinas City (62 hectares); and Suntrust Ecotown in Tanza, Cavite (350 hectares).

Other townships include Eastwood City in Quezon City, (18.5 hectares), which holds the distinction of being the country’s first cyberpark; Newport City in Pasay City (25 hectares), which is the home of Resorts World Manila; McKinley Hill (50 hectares), McKinley West (34.5 hectares), Uptown Bonifacio (15.4 hectares), and Forbes Town Center (5 hectares), all in Fort Bonifacio; The Mactan Newtown in Cebu (28.8 hectares); Iloilo Business Park in Mandurriao, Iloilo City (72 hectares); Boracay Newcoast in Boracay Island (150 hectares) and Twin Lakes in Tagaytay (1,300 hectares) of Global-Estate Resorts, Inc. (GERI), a subsidiary of Megaworld.

“We still have more lands to develop in our portfolio. Our various groups are working hard to come up with unique concepts and ideas on how we will create more sustainable communities across the country,” adds Tan.

The Megaworld Group has around 4,000 hectares of land in its portfolio. Around 80 percent have been dedicated for LIVE-WORK-PLAY townships or mixed-use communities, the concept of property development that Megaworld pioneered in the Philippines way back in the 1990s. The townships combine the residential, office, commercial and retail components to form mixed-use communities.

Diokno: Protect witnesses & files, depoliticize Mamasapano probe

mcmangahas Leave a comment

PRESERVE all physical and electronic evidence. Document the stories of witnesses on ground and provide them protection. Appoint an independent panel of experts to conduct a thorough, objective, and “depoliticized” inquiry.

To ferret out the truth behind the Mamasapano incident, the Aquino government might do well to take these actions with dispatch, according to Atty. Jose Manuel ‘Chel’ Diokno, Dean of De la Salle University’s College of Law and national chairman of the Free Legal Assistance Group.

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By Atty. Jose Manuel I. Diokno
Dean, College of Law, De la Salle University
National Chairman, Free Legal Assistance Group

MORE THAN two weeks have elapsed since the Mamasampano operation occurred. Vital pieces of evidence from the crime scenes are being lost to to the elements, trampled, or contaminated. As the days pass, important electronic evidence in the form of text messages, e-mails, videos, and photographs may be lost, deleted or altered. Witnesses may also be harder to locate and interview.

Various government agencies, moreover, are conducting separate investigations of the incident. These include the Department of Justice, which recently created a Special Investigation Team composed of members of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and National Prosecution Service (NPS) to probe the matter; the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG), through the PNP Board of Inquiry; the Commission on Human Rights (CHR); and several committees of the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Parallel but separate investigations by government agencies, each with their own interests to protect, have in the past resulted in contradictory findings and recommendations and in agencies blaming one another. If this happens here, who will the public believe? And how will the public know the truth?

Government must not allow this to happen. Government must act now to preserve the physical and electronic evidence, protect the witnesses, document their accounts, reconstruct what happened, and evaluate the evidence gathered. This can best be done by an independent panel of experts in forensics, international humanitarian law, and military and police operations, appointed by the Senate. The experts must be well respected in their fields of specialization, and of known probity and integrity.

Appointment of an independent panel of experts will not require legislation. The Senate Blue Ribbon Committee has engaged experts in the past, to assist in investigating controversial events like the coconut levy and PIATCO cases. The Rules of the Blue Ribbon Committee, in fact, authorize the Chair of the Committee to “engage the services of consultants to assist the Committee under such terms and conditions and with such authority and duties as he may determine.” [Section 3, Article 2, Rules of the Committee on Accountability of Public Officers and Investigations (Blue Ribbon)]

Appointment of an independent panel of experts will also depoliticize the investigation and prevent legislators from using it to grandstand for the coming elections.

Time is running out. Whatever evidence remains at the crime scene and other vital evidence must be preserved. Witnesses should be provided with protection and their stories should be documented. And the process must be removed from politics by appointing a panel of experts with the knowledge, expertise, and integrity to conduct a thorough, independent, and objective investigation of the Mamasapano operation.