Businessman Leandro Antonio L. Leviste who created a vast amount of wealth from renewable energy is now the single largest shareholder of sugar firm Roxas and Co. Inc. with the purchase of 188.89 million RCI shares equivalent to 7.55 percent of the company.
RCI share price surged the past week, its closing price of P0.59 on 11 March rising more than four times in 19 March to P2.19 a share, driven by what market participants said was buying by a large investor.
As a result, Leviste’s 188.89 million shareholding is valued at P413.66 million.
RCI operated the 97-year-old Central Azucarera Don Pedro sugar mill in Nasugbu, Batangas which ceased operations in February and terminated the services of its employees a month later. Over 13,000 farmers and sugar mill workers lost their livelihood.
Some 50,000 farmers have protested a recent Department of Agrarian Reform order 1,322 hectares of RCI’s Hacienda Palico, Hacienda Banilad and Hacienda Caylaway to agrarian reform beneficiaries and another 1,619 hectares to RCI.
Farmer groups have asked the authorities to reconsider the RCI award and revoke the DAR order for a more equitable settlement of the haciendas.
This RCI-farmer entanglement over the haciendas has lasted nearly four decades.
Countryside Investments Holdings Corp., a company wholly-owned by Leviste, recently said it will invest over P5 billion in a renewable energy enterprise to help boost the development of rural Batangas.
Countryside is heading this venture with another Leviste company, Solar Philippines Power Project Holdings Inc.
“The strategic focus of the investment is on sectors that promise high-impact benefits for the local economy, including energy, industrial and commercial projects,” the company said.
The initiative is designed to create jobs and address the urgent need for employment following the recent closure of the Central Azucarera Don Pedro sugar mill in Nasugbu, Batangas owned by Roxas Holdings Inc.
