A Philippine court has nullified an extrajudicial settlement (EJS) of the estate of Ricardo B. Yanson, reaffirming majority ownership and control of the Yanson Group of Bus Companies (YGBC) under matriarch Olivia Yanson, according to a court decision.
In its ruling dated Jan. 21, 2025, the Regional Trial Court of Bacolod City, Branch 45, declared the EJS null and void, citing that it misrepresented the terms originally agreed upon by Mrs. Yanson and her six children following the death of Mr. Yanson.
The EJS was intended to settle Mr. Yanson’s estate out of court, with Mrs. Yanson agreeing to waive her one-seventh share in favor of her children while retaining her conjugal share. However, annexes added to the EJS after signing suggested she had also transferred her conjugal share, including her stake in the bus companies, to her children.
The court said in a seven-page decision that the annexes altered the EJS’s meaning, no longer reflecting the family’s original agreement. “Since Mrs. Yanson did not consent to the resulting agreement, the court nullified the EJS and set it aside,” the decision stated.
The document was the basis for ownership claims over YGBC by four of Mrs. Yanson’s children—Ricky, Roy, Celina, and Emily Yanson—who had cited the EJS in various legal complaints against their mother and siblings, Ginnette and Leo Rey Yanson.
The court declined to issue an injunction preventing the four from using the EJS, noting that its nullification rendered it ineffective. The ruling solidifies Mrs. Yanson’s majority control of YGBC, alongside Ginnette and Leo Rey.
Attempts to reach Ricky, Roy, Celina, and Emily Yanson for comment were unsuccessful. According to a company statement, the four remain fugitives from justice, facing non-bailable warrants of arrest for offenses including carnapping and qualified theft.
YGBC, one of the largest bus companies in the Philippines, operates several major routes in the Visayas and Mindanao regions.
BusinessNews.ph
