DITO Telecommunity Corporation (DITO) issued a 7 October 2022 statement responding to the media coverage of PLDT Inc.’s 6 October 2022 mandatory disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) reporting DITO’s defaulted Php430 million obligation owed to PLDT. DITO has resorted to squid tactics to mislead the public about this unpaid obligation.
The facts are simple:
· DITO requested PLDT to build transmission facilities for it, and which DITO would then lease.
- PLDT had no duty to do so and could have refused if it wanted to reduce competition.
- But PLDT agreed to build and lease the transmission facilities to DITO, while also providing interconnection services to benefit both DITO’s and PLDT’s own subscribers.
· PLDT built, delivered, and leased the transmission facilities for DITO on schedule, while DITO repeatedly delayed in paying PLDT the contracted milestone payments for the facilities in the hundreds of millions of pesos.
- PLDT has finished the transmission facilities and DITO continues to use the facilities to provide services to its subscribers. But DITO has now refused to pay the final Php430 million balance it owes PLDT for building the facilities.
- Instead of paying, DITO has responded to PLDT’s mandatory PSE and SEC disclosures about DITO’s material nonpayment by trying to confuse the public and referring to and mischaracterizing the issues involving DITO’s other unpaid obligations to SMART Communications Inc. (SMART), a separate company with a different agreement with DITO.
- PLDT understands that SMART is unable to give DITO any additional bandwidth until DITO agrees to compensate SMART for illegal overseas call traffic that is coming from DITO and which defrauds SMART and the government of legitimate income, and compromises interconnection to the prejudice of the legitimate calls of both SMART’s and even DITO’s own subscribers.
- This has nothing to do with DITO’s refusal to pay an overdue obligation to PLDT for transmission facilities that DITO has asked PLDT to build and which DITO has leased from PLDT and which, to repeat, DITO continues to use.
Accordingly, PLDT reserves all of its remedies in case DITO does not cure its latest major payment default within the applicable 30-day cure period, including the suspension or termination of services under the parties’ service agreement.
