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Quichocho’s land payment claim OK’d
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Posted on Feb 08 2006
The Marianas Public Lands Authority has entered into a settlement agreement with its litigation attorney, Ramon K. Quichocho, over the latter’s land compensation claim.
MPLA board chair Ana Demapan-Castro approved the settlement on Jan. 26, 2006, less than a week after Gov. Benigno Fitial publicly declared plans to abolish the MPLA.
The settlement noted, however, that the MPLA board approved Quichocho’s claim on Aug. 16, 2005, in exchange for a deed conveying title over the 148-sqm Tinian land to the MPLA. The MPLA agreed to pay Quichocho some $23,369.51 in cash compensation for the government’s taking of the land.
Based on the settlement agreement, former Gov. Juan N. Babauta certified the acquisition of Quichocho’s land for a public purpose on July 21, 2004.
Just before he stepped down from office, Babauta amended the certification to reflect the time of expropriation as May 31, 1990, the purported date when the land was actually taken by the government.
The MPLA determined that the fair market value of Quichocho’s land in 1990 was $15,000. Computed with interest at the rate of 3 percent per annum compounded annually, the amount reaches $23,369.51 by May 27, 2005.
Besides Quichocho and Demapan-Castro, MPLA commissioner Edward DeLeon Guerrero also affixed his signature on the settlement agreement on behalf of the agency.
