A BACOLOD city court has declared as null and void the extrajudicial settlement of the estate of businessman Ricardo Yanson, effectively affirming his wife’s majority ownership and control over the Yanson Group of Bus Companies (YGBC), the largest bus company in the country, and other family businesses.
In a seven-page decision dated January 21, 2025, the Bacolod City Regional Trial Court Branch 45 affirmed Mrs. Olivia Yanson’s majority ownership and control over the YGBC and other businesses that she and her late husband have established.
Records of the case showed that after Mr. Yanson’s passing in 2015, his wife, together with their six living children, executed the extrajudicial settlement in an attempt to settle the estate of the late businessman out of court.
As agreed by all, Mrs. Yanson was to waive her one-seventh share in the estate of her late husband in favor of her children, but would retain ownership over her conjugal share.
With this understanding, Mrs. Yanson signed the extrajudicial settlement but without any annexes.
She later found out that the annexes that were belatedly attached to the extrajudicial settlement stated that she gave her conjugal share to her children, including her shares in the bus companies, contrary to what was agreed upon.
Among other things, the bulk of the most valuable properties, including the shares of stocks in the various corporations which is a significant portion of her share in the conjugal partnership of gains, were made to appear to form part of the estate of her husband only and, thus, among those which Mrs. Yanson appeared to have waived.
This prompted Mrs. Yanson to seek court redress, asking the court to nullify the deeds of the extrajudicial settlement. The complaint named four of her six living children – namely Roy, Emily, Ma. Lourdes Celina Lopez and Ricardo Jr., or the “Yanson 4,” – as respondents.
Her two other children, Ginette and Leo Rey, sided with their mother.
The Bacolod RTC, in its ruling, held that the resulting extrajudicial settlement which Mrs. Yanson was made to sign did not accurately reflect what she agreed to.
“As testified to by the plaintiff and her witnesses, it was never the intent of Mrs. Yanson to give, waive, donate or otherwise dispose of any part of her conjugal share to her children, including her conjugal share in the bulk of the high-valued properties and her shares of stocks in the Yanson Group of Bus Companies. In the preparation of the extrajudicial settlement, it was the desire of Mrs. Yanson to keep her 50 percent share in the conjugal partnership of gains and waive only the 1/7 share in the estate of Mr. Yanson,“ stated the ruling penned by Presiding Judge Phoebe Gargantiel- Balbin.
“Like any other contracts, parties in an extrajudicial settlement are given wide latitude to stipulate terms and conditions they feel are fair and not prejudicial to another. Mrs. Yanson felt defrauded and prejudiced when she was asked to sign the extrajudicial settlement without informing her that she was deprived of her 50 percent share in the conjugal partnership of gains. This vitiates her consent to the extrajudicial settlement and annexes,” the court added.
The court also stressed that the belated attachment of the annexes completely changed the meaning of the extrajudicial settlement and no longer conformed to what the heirs had intended.
With this, the Bacolod RTC nullified the extrajudicial settlement and set it aside.
“With the above findings and evidence presented, the Court finds the extrajudicial settlement and amended extrajudicial settlement null and void. Thus, the Court will no longer play a role in the prayer of injunction in the complaint of the plaintiff,” it said.
But in the same ruling, the court also said it found no legal and convincing proof to award damages to Mrs. Yanson since the extrajudicial settlement and annexes were not yet declared null and void when the four defendants used them to file cases against their mother.
The case is part of the long-running feud of the Yanson siblings over the control and management of the YGBC, which includes among others, Vallacar Transit Incorporated (VTI) bus empire that ply routes in the Visayas and Mindanao regions.
Established in 1968, VTI is the country’s largest bus transit company operating more than 4, 000 buses, with 18, 000 employees, and more than P15 billion in annual revenues.
