Jemar Vera Cruz sits as acting City Mayor of Iligan City

ILIGAN CITY - Jemar Vera Cruz sits as the Acting City Mayor of Iligan today, Thursday, June 7, 2018, after the Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) served the suspension order against Mayor Celso Gomera Regencia yesterday.

Iligan City auctions Asia's former largest steel mill

ILIGAN City (15 Dec 2016) - Four-hundred hectares of land and properties of the foreclosed National Steel Corporation (NSC) have been auctioned by the local government due to tax delinquency.

"NSC's unpaid tax amounts to over PhP4 billion," Iligan City acting Mayor Jemar Vera Cruz said.

However, there was no bidder during the auction, which prompted the city treasurer to forfeit the properties in favor of the city government.

Two days before the auction, NSC liquidator Atty. Danilo Concepcion protested the sale of NSC properties, citing a Makati Court decision clearing NSC of real property tax liabilities after NSC's secured creditors and shareholders sold their interests in plant assets to Global Steelworks International Inc. and Global Ispat Holdings, Inc. in 2004.

NSC was once the largest steel mill in Asia but has been closed for more than two decades after it declared bankruptcy. [Roxanne Arevalo, ABS-CBN News]