THE Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) shall continue to exhaust available remedies under existing laws with regard to the proposed merger with the Landbank of the Philippines.

On May 18, DBP formally submitted its appeal memorandum to the Office of the President, which contains, among others, the extensive discussion of responses and counter arguments of the bank to the justifications raised by the proponents of the merger, principally the Department of Finance (DOF). The “perfected appeal” shall now be subject to reglementary review mechanisms under Administrative Order (AO) No. 22 (s.2011), which prescribes the rules and regulations governing the appeals to the OP.

Under Section 9 of AO No. 22, “…execution of the decision/resolution/order appealed from is stayed…” until OP makes its decision final and executory. We believe this provision of AO covers all forms of issuances pertaining to the merger including those from the DOF and the Governance Commission on GOCCs.

We strongly aver that the provisions of AO No. 22 are consistent with and underpins DBP’s unequivocal stand on the need for an independent body that would thresh out all possible issues, concerns and ramifications with utmost impartiality and equanimity in order to formulate a viable solution that advances the welfare of both financial institutions and the banking and finance community as a whole.