by Miriam G. Desacada
Tacloban City–A writ of preliminary attachment is a court order that attaches a person’s property to secure payment of a debt or performance of a duty.
The DBSN Farms Agriventures Corporation, of the Oñate family, on Thursday (Dec. 28) filed a case in court against former Palompon (Leyte) mayor Myra Georgina Arevalo and former municipal planning and development coordinator Jerome Pastor seeking to recover from them business damages, amounting to more than P195.25 million.
Palompon incumbent Mayor Ramon Oñate, accompanied by his family and lawyer, filed the case before the Regional Trial Court-branch 14 in Baybay City, with “prayer for a writ of preliminary attachment” against the properties ofthe defendants as guarantee for payment of the damages caused by the same respondents.
DBSN counsel, Atty. Gerentstain Banzon said the loses of the farm’s business started in January 21 2021 when then mayor Arevalo denied the renewal of DBSN’s business permit for its chicken breeder farm at Barangay San Joaquin in Palompon.
Then on 19 February that same year, Arevalo issued a cease-and-desist order, through Pastor, against the operation of the breeder farm, which translated into millions of loses in business revenues.
Banzo cited the complaint’s statement that “such actions of Arevalo and Pastor have caused DBSN to suffer from tremendous financial loses,” including millions of pesos in penalties imposed by the farm’s client.
Due to the denial of renewal application of business permit, made worse with its business stoppage order, DBSN “was not able to deliver the live or hatching eggs to other facilities owned by San Miguel Corporation,” the farm’s major client, said the lawyer of Oñate.
SMFI, penalized DBSN and obliged to pay P111 million in penalties for failure to deliver the ordered products. DBSN paid the penalties and suffered loss of income amounting to over P84 million, added Banzon.
The lawyer explained to the media that Eastern Visayas’ total chicken meat requirement is about 64,000 tons but, because of DBSN’s failure to deliver the stocks to SMC, more than half of this meat demand was sourced outside of the region instead of from DBSN, the supplier in the region.
The acts of Arevalo and Pastor later turned out to be illegal or without basis when, upon review, the RTC-branch 17 in Palompon issued a temporary restraining order with preliminary injunction against Arevalo’s cease-and-desist order and its implementation by Pastor.
Two years after, or this year to be exact, DBSN decided to file the case against Arevalo and Pastor seeking the recovery of more than P195.25 million in actual and compensatory damages, with P200,ooo in attorney’s fees and litigation expenses.
Meanwhile, the Oñate family has also paid before the Court the amount of P3,947,025 Million for the filing fee of this case.–Miriam G. Desacada