BUTIL Party-list on Wednesday, January 23, filed a resolution asking Congress to probe deeper into the $85-million unsecured loan granted by the Land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) to bankrupt Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction Philippines.
The group said this was a violation of the bank's original mandate and done at the expense of the credit-starved small farmers and agrarian reform beneficiaries.
The resolution was filed after Butil Party-list Representative Cecil Chavez delivered a privileged speech that decried the "overall mendacity" of the banking system and the deliberate efforts of the banks to brazenly violated RA 10000, the law that requires banks to grant 25 percent of their yearly loan portfolio to agriculture and agrarian reform beneficiaries.
Five banks, including the state-owned Land Bank, granted a total of $412 million in mostly unsecured loans to Hanjin.
"Nowhere in the original mandate of the Land Bank says that it should grant a jumbo, unsecured loan to a foreign shipbuilding entity. Done in the wake of the wanton and brazen failure of the Land Bank to grant just even token loans to small farmers and agrarian reform beneficiaries, a deep congressional inquiry to correct the banking malpractices of the Land Bank is proper and necessary," said Chavez. (PR)