OSG clarifies lawyers’ fees

REP. RODEL Batocabe has been quoted as saying that the legal fees spent on the NAIA Terminal 3 cases are “unconscionable.” Batocabe also faulted the Office of the Solicitor General for retaining international co-counsels: “Most of them (foreign lawyers) are not even needed because PIATCo and Fraport were represented only by local lawyers while the government was represented by a battery of international lawyers and without an end view in this controversy.”

The claim that Philippine International Air Terminals Inc. and Fraport AG were represented exclusively by local lawyers in the international arbitration cases they filed is not true. On record, between the two of them, Fraport and PIATCo employed at least nine international and local law firms for those proceedings, apart from their respective internal lawyers. The Philippines had the OSG, a leading international law firm, a revered former Philippine and international jurist and a valedictorian of the UP College of Law who is now with the Supreme Court. PIATCo and Fraport may each have paid at least as much if not more than the Philippine government for lawyers’ fees.

Also, the Philippine government was the one sued by PIATCo before the International Chamber of Commerce in Singapore and by Fraport before the International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in Washington, D.C. for an aggregate minimum amount of $1 billion. The OSG was legally compelled to take a stand to defend the Philippine government against unlawful claims and to protect the dignity of Philippine institutions—the Supreme Court, the Executive, the Ombudsman, including the Senate and the House of Representatives—before international tribunals. The costs which are minuscule compared to Fraport’s and PIATCo’s total claims should be viewed proportionately. The government won twin victories in those proceedings and prevented huge and unwarranted claims against the government.

The Philippines is currently seeking to recover the costs of the ICC proceedings from PIATCo. The costs of the arbitration proceedings are sub judice and are separately covered by confidentiality agreements. The OSG is ready to explain the reasonableness of these costs before our people and any government agency. However, it will only do so if PIATCo and Fraport will waive their rights under the confidentiality agreements. It is also worthy to note that PIATCo’s contracts were voided in 2003 by the Supreme Court in the Agan case. Finally, it is also not true that the Pasay Regional Trial Court has ruled on the expropriation case.

—FR. HILARION B. BUBAN,
chief of staff,
Office of the Solicitor General