REPUBLIC ACT NO. 5142 - AN ACT GRANTING PABLO S. SARMIENTO A FRANCHISE TO CONSTRUCT, MAINTAIN AND OPERATE A COLD STORAGE AND ICE PLANT IN THE MUNICIPALITY OF PARANG, PROVINCE OF COTABATO AND TO SUPPLY COLD STORAGE AND TO SELL ICE TO THE ENTIRE PROVINCE AND CITY

Section 1.     Subject to the conditions imposed by this Act, there is granted to Pablo S. Sarmiento, hereinafter referred to as the grantee, a franchise to construct, maintain and operate a cold storage and ice plant in the Municipality of Parang, Province of Cotabato and to supply cold storage and to sell ice therein and to charge and collect a schedule of prices and rates for the cold storage so furnished and for the ice so manufactured, which schedule of prices and rates shall at all times be subject to the regulations approved by the Public Service Commissions. 

Sec. 2.     The grantee shall furnish cold storage and manufacture ice up to the limit of the capacity of his plant.

Sec. 3.     All the apparatus and appurtenances to be used by the grantee shall be modern, safe, and first class in every respect, and the grantee shall, whenever the Congress of the Philippines shall determine that public interest reasonably requires it, change or alter any of his apparatus and appurtenances at the grantee's expense.

Sec. 4.     This franchise is granted subject to the provisions of the Constitution and commonwealth Act Numbered One hundred forty-six as amended, and with the understanding and upon the condition that it shall be subject to amendment, alteration or repeal by the Congress of the Philippines when public interest so requires, and that it shall be subject to the pertinent provisions of Act Numbered Fourteen hundred fifty-nine, as amended. 

The Public Service commission shall prescribe as a condition for the issuance of the certificate of convenience and public necessity to the grantee that the certificate shall be valid for a period of twenty-five years and that the violation of any of these conditions shall cause the immediate cancellation of the certificate without the necessity of any express action on the part of the Commission.

Sec. 5.     The grantee, with the approval of the Congress of the Philippines first had, may sell, lease, grant, convey, assign, give in usufruct or transfer this franchise and all property and rights acquired thereunder to any individual, co-partnership, private, public or quasi-public association, corporation or joint-stock company competent to operate the business hereby authorized, but transfer of title to the franchise or any right of ownership or interest acquired under such sale, lease, grant, conveyance, assignment, gift in usufruct or transfer shall not be effective even after such approval shall have been obtained until there shall have been filed in the Office of the Public Service Commission on agreement in writing by which the individual, co-partnership, private, public or quasi-public association, corporation or joint-stock company in whose favor such lease, grant, conveyance, assignment, gift, in usufruct or transfer is made, shall be firmly bound to comply with all the terms and conditions imposed upon the grantee by this franchise and by any and all certificates of convenience and public necessity therefor issued by the Public Service Commission, and to accept the same subject to all existing terms and conditions. 

Sec. 6.     The Public Service Commission shall have the power, after a reasonable written notice to the grantee and a hearing of the interested parties, to declare the forfeiture of the franchise and all rights inherent in the same for failure on the part of the grantee to comply with any of the terms and conditions thereof, unless such failure shall have been directly and primarily caused by an act of God, force majeure, martial law, riot, civil commotion, usurpation by a military power or any other causes beyond grantee's control. Against such declaration of forfeiture by the Public Service Commission, the grantee may apply for the remedies provided in Section s thirty-four and thirty-six of Commonwealth Act Numbered One hundred forty-six, as amended. The remedy provided herein, shall not be a bar to any other remedy provided by existing law for the forfeiture of this franchise. 

Sec. 7.     In the event of any corporation individual, association of persons, or corporation receiving from the Congress of the Philippines a similar franchise in which there shall be any term or terms more favorable than those herein granted or tending to place the herein grantee at any disadvantage, then such term or terms shall ipso facto become a part of the terms hereof and shall operate equally in favor of the grantee as in the case of said completing individual, association or persons or corporation.

Sec. 8.     This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

Enacted without Executive approval, June 17, 1967.