DFA rejects proposal to sell Philippines’ four real estate properties in Japan

September 15, 2020

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) Monday rejected any proposal to sell the Philippines’ four real estate properties in Japan the country acquired as part of World War II reparations.

Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. said the DFA has sent a position paper to Congress repudiating the sale as he revealed of another bid to have the country’s real properties in Japan auctioned.

“There is another plot to dispose of four of our Japan properties,” Locsin said in his Twitter post. He did not disclose the property.

Locsin said that “the plight of our poor veterans, so few of them left, have been invoked by every gang of officials who’ve run through the budgets of their own agencies.”

“There are other ways to help Veterans – BCDA ( Bases Conversion Development Authority) was sold for them but proceeds were stolen. We already sent our position to Congress opposing it,” he tweeted.

“I will fight this to their end,” Locsin vowed.

Locsin said efforts to sell the Japan properties “usually happens toward the end of a term. Retirement fund of last resort.”

The Philippine government acquired the four properties in Tokyo and Kobe under the war reparation agreement with Japan on May 9, 1956.

Of the four properties, the Roppongi property in Tokyo is considered one of the most expensive piece of real estate.

There were several attempts to sell the 3,179 square-meter Philippine property on 306 Roppongi St. 5-Chome Minato-ku, Tokyo either by sale or long-term lease.

During the administration of the late President Corazon Aquino, the Roppongi property was offered for sale for $225 million, or nearly P6 billion at the time, with a big chunk of the purchase price reportedly going to payment of taxes to the Japanese government.

Vice President Salvador Laurel opposed the sale, which he described as “priceless” because it was “monument to the bravery and sacrifice of the Filipino people in the face of an invader.”

Laurel petitioned the Supreme Court which issued a permanent injunction on Feb. 20, 1990, after ruling that any sale of the property needs a law passed by Congress.

The Philippines' three other war reparation properties in Japan are: the 2,489.96 sq.m. Nampeidai property at 11-24 Nampeidai-machi, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo; the 764.72 sq.m.-Kobe commercial property at 63 Naniwa-cho, Kobe; and the Kobe residential property at 1-980-2 Obanoyama-cho, Shinohara, Nada-ku, Kobe. DMS