Manila, July 22 - A farmers' group has asked the Philippine Supreme Court to allow the sale of a contested 24 percent stake in San Miguel Corp for 56.5 billion pesos ($1.3 billion).
COCOFED, which represents more than 1 million coconut farmers, has been battling the government for over 20 years for control of the stock in Southeast Asia's largest food and drinks group and the anti-graft court has yet to give a final ruling on ownership.
In its July 18 petition to the Supreme Court, the farmers' group said the decline in San Miguel's stock price and the financial burden on its members from soaring inflation and the declining dollar had forced the group to propose a sale.
"COCOFED, et al, are compelled to agree to efforts to break the impasse by the proposal that the share of stock in San Miguel Corp subject of this case be sold and the entire proceeds be constituted (in) a permanent trust fund," the group said in documents filed with the court which were seen on Tuesday.
Finance Secretary Margarito Teves, who has been trying to forge a deal with COCOFED on the stake, was not available for comment.
The farmers' group said that Top Frontier Investment Holdings, a Manila-based group, had offered to buy the stock at 75 pesos a share, an 82 percent premium plan to its A shares and B shares, currently trading at 41 pesos and 41.5 pesos respectively, in an all-cash deal.
The proceeds would go to an industry trust fund whose net earnings would be used for the benefit of the coconut farmers.
San Miguel's A stock, open only to domestic investors, and its B shares, open to all, finished flat on Tuesday in an index <.PSI> 0.27 percent weaker.
The shares have shed 45 percent and 50 percent respectively over the past 12 months, underperforming a 36 percent drop in the index amid confusion over the company's strategic direction.
The government had been trying to agree a compromise deal with COCOFED and other claimants to the San Miguel stake to fast-track the sale of the shares and help reduce Manila's budget deficit this year.
Teves has proposed the creation of an industry fund similar to the COCOFED proposal, but the talks did not prosper.
The government's anti-graft agency Philippine Commission on Good Government (PCGG), which currently holds the stake, said it has not received any offer.
"We have not received any offer for the San Miguel shares," PCGG chairman Camilo Sabio told Reuters, adding that he had not heard of Top Frontier Investment.
Efforts to contact Top Frontier Investment were unsuccessful.
The government seized the San Miguel shares in 1986 after the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos was ousted, along with a separate 20 percent stake held by current San Miguel Chairman Eduardo Cojuangco, on suspicion that the shares were acquired using an illegal levy collected from coconut farmers.
Japanese brewer Kirin holds a 20 percent stake in San Miguel.
The legacy of the Marcos era continues to hang over the Philippines' corporate sector in numerous drawnout legal battles which have made foreign investors wary of pouring money into the Southeast Asian country.