In an 85-page petition for special civil action for certiorari, the the HDMF contested a January 30 and December 11, 2012 ruling of Makati Judge Eugene Paras favoring Globe Asiatique.
Earlier, HDMF had terminated its agreements with Globe Asiatique after a post-audit of the realty firm revealed that it “fraudulently fabricated hundreds of loan applications, using fictitious applicants/buyers and spurious loan documents.”
In Paras’ rulings, however, he ordered the HDMF to enforce the terminated agreements again and release more large sums of money to Globe Asiatique.
The petitioner said the judge only conducted “summary proceedings, without the benefit of a full-blown trial, all in the face of the massive and wholesale fraud perpetrated by GARHC against HDMF and its member-contributors.”
The HDMF insisted that the termination of the agreements was “just and warranted” under Article 1191 of the Civil Code of the Philippines.
The particular article states: “The power to rescind obligations is implied in reciprocal ones, in case one of the obligors should not comply with what is incumbent upon him.”
The HDMF asked the appeals court to issue a “temporary retraining order and/or a writ of preliminary injunction enjoining Respondent Hon. Eugene S. Paras and Respondents Globe Asiatique Realty Holdings Corporation and Delfin Lee, as well as any of their representatives, agents and signees from enforcing the 30 January and 11 December 2012
Resolutions.”
The HDMF also asked the CA to eventually annul and set aside Paras’ contested rulings.
The HDMF or the Pag-Ibig Fund said Makati Judge Eugene Paras committed “grave abuse of discretion, amounting to lack of jurisdiction” when he issued the assailed resolutions.
Consequently, the petitioner also asked Judge Paras to inhibit himself from the case, saying the rulings he issued “negatively reflect on his competence, integrity and independence” in violation of Canon 1 of the Code of Judicial Conduct.
“Indeed, one contentious order or resolution may arguably not amount to sufficient basis to move for the voluntary inhibition of a judge. However, when a court, through a string of orders or resolutions as shown above, fails to properly apply the law and settled legal precepts (whether inadvertent or otherwise), a perception of bias and impartiality is unavoidably created in the minds of the parties such as in the case of defendants herein,” HDMF said.
GA lawyer Roni Garay, meanwhile, told reporters on Tuesday he doubted the HDMF’s claim that the Pag-Ibig fund lost P6.5 billion in damages.
“We’ve been saying that they are flaunting in the media that they incurred P6.5 billion damages. Sinasabi namin sa hearing, nasaan iyon?,” Garay said when asked to recount what he said during Tuesday’s hearing at the Court of Appeals in Manila. — BM, GMA News
