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CDA cleared in funds requisition
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Posted on Sep 09 2004
Commonwealth Development Authority board chair Sixto Igisomar said the agency has been “cleared from any wrongdoing” by the U.S-based bond company on funds requisition for land compensation in the CNMI.
Igisomar cited that in an Aug. 9, 2004 opinion, bond counsel Roger Davis of the San Francisco law firm Orrick, Herrington, and Sutcliffe said that the Marianas Public Lands Authority should not be requisitioning any money from the bond trustee until the land claimant has accepted the offer.
In other words, Igisomar said that if the land claimant does not accept the offer tendered by MPLA, then no money should be requisitioned from the trustee until the matter is resolved and the claimant has accepted the package.
If there is complete certainty and no further changes in amounts are required, then and only then should MPLA requisition from the trustee, he said.
The trustee then cuts the check directly to the land claimant.
Igisomar said that, if the procedure had been followed, then it would have not been necessary for CDA to reduce the amount of the MPLA requisition by the same amount that MPLA still held in its bank account because the claimants had not accepted the offer made to them.
“CDA’s action in instructing the trustee to reduce the amount to be disbursed to MPLA was a reasonable step in avoiding further unauthorized disbursements to MPLA by the trustee,” said Igisomar.
The requisition issue has resulted in the suspension of MPLA commissioner Henry Hofschneider by the MPLA board for alleged insubordination.
The board chair cited that Hofschneider had allowed CDA to alter the amount of funds being transferred from $216,322 to $134, 695.91 without consent by the board.
