Verizon workers appeal for intervention in suit

Some 50 Verizon employees trooped to the Governor’s Office yesterday to deliver their petition asking Gov. Juan N. Babauta to intervene in the lawsuit filed by the Marianas Public Lands Authority against the telecommunications firm.

In a meeting with Babauta and Lt. Gov. Diego T. Benavente, the employees took turns in expressing their concern about job losses that might result from the CNMI government’s “vendetta” against Verizon’s new owner, Pacific Telecom Inc.

Babauta assured the Verizon employees, however, that he had no personal motive to make PTI’s takeover of Verizon difficult. “My opposition to the sale of Verizon to PTI is over and done with. I’m here to help,” he said.

He stressed that the only reason he had opposed the purchase agreement was that he wanted to extract several concessions from PTI.

“I was accused of being anti-foreign investor because I was against the sale of Verizon. There are 26 reasons I wanted them to meet. It had nothing to do with their nationality. Now we got almost all we wanted and I’m happy about that,” Babauta said.

He also said that he is not in the position to intervene in the functions of an autonomous agency such as MPLA, but he nevertheless promised to talk to MPLA regarding Verizon.

Verizon spokesperson Carlene Tenorio reiterated PTI’s desire to return to the negotiating table with MPLA. The money being used to pay legal fees, she said, could be better spent on needed infrastructure at the Verizon facility.

“We’re not here to fight, we’re here to ask his support and his assistance in intervening with the MPLA lawsuit against PTI. PTI is a new investor to the CNMI and they should be given a chance. We need to go back to the negotiating table for the sake of the PTI employees and the community,” said Tenorio.

She is the daughter of Public Works Secretary Juan S. Reyes, the Republican Party’s chair who leads Babauta’s reelection bid for the Nov. 5 elections.

Tenorio said that telecommunication service would be disrupted and many local workers would lose their jobs if MPLA evicted Verizon.

Earlier this month, negotiations between Verizon and MPLA resulted in a deadlock, prompting the MPLA to file last week a civil suit against MTC and its new owner, PTI.

MPLA sought to evict the companies from their main Susupe offices and other facilities. The MPLA and its board also asked the Superior Court for still unspecified damages for Verizon’s use of public lands where the telecom firm’s cables are buried, among other causes of action. The MPLA had demanded Verizon to pay it some $2.1 million for public lands easement related to the underground cables.

The governor also asked the Commonwealth Telecommunications Commission last Friday to slap PTI with monetary fine of at least $170,000 regarding incomplete submission of certain financial documents before the deadline-at least 10 days before the company acquired MTC’s common stocks last Sept. 20. Verizon assured that it would submit all required documents and cooperate with the CTC.