Investors continue to visit the Organico Mandaue City office to look for management representatives to talk to. /Rosalie O. Abatayo
MANDAUE CITY, Philippines—For two days now, John (not his real name) has been visiting the Organico Agribusiness Ventures Corp. office in Barangay Cambaro, Mandaue City hoping to talk to a management representative who will be able to advise him on how he can recover his investment of P36, 000.
But there is no one to talk to. The office located at the ground floor of the Copenhagen East Building located along A.C. Cortes Avenue has been closed since Monday. A note “closed for renovation” was posted near its main entrance.
John is giving Organico until Thursday to give him feedback on how he can recover his investments before he will visit the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) Central Visayas office for assistance.
“Dili baya sayon pangitaon nang kwartaha. Maayo man og pila ra na. Pwerte baya natong paningkamot ana. Mangyawat unta ta,” he said.
(It is never easy to earn cash. That (P36,000 investment) is still a big amount. I worked hard to earn that money. I decided to investment (my money on Organico) with hopes of earning revenues.)
Several Organico investors have been visiting their Mandaue City office since Monday after they heard news of the office’s closure.
John came for a different reason. He was supposed to collect his first cash out of P60, 000.
But when he visited the Organico office on Monday morning, it was already closed and there was no one to talk to. He decide to return to the area around 9:30 a.m. today, June 1. Still, there was no one to talk to on his concerns.
Two office security guards merely told him and the other visiting investors to list down their names and contact numbers so that management could call them for instructions on how to recover their money.
“Ingon to ang gwardiya nga tawagan lagi mo karong adlawa (Monday). Pero tibuok adlaw wala gyuy nitawag. Mao na nga nibalik mi karon, mao lang gihapon palistahon anang papel,” said a disgruntled John.
(During my visit on Monday, I was told by the security guard to write my name and contact so they can call us. But no one called me on Monday. I returned today and was still told the same thing.)
John, who works as a security officer in one of the buildings at the Cebu IT Park in Cebu City, said he invested P36, 000 from his savings on Ogranico. He was promised a cash out of P60, 000 after 90 days. He was supposed to collect his first cash out on June 9, but since it was a Sunday, he decided to visit the Organico Mandaue City office on Monday, June 10.
After he could have collected his cash out, John said that he would have wanted to add the said amount to increase his principal investment to a total of P42, 000.
Read More: CIDG-7 raids Organico regional office in Cebu City
While management has remained mum on the closure of their Mandaue City office and their regional office in Barangay Kasambagan, Cebu City some Organico investors received private messages this morning, June 11, to assure them that their investments remain intact.
“Team, our environment is very clouded! The management has found out that someone had accessed our system. As a security measure, we have temporarily halted all our operations. We will wait for the investigations to cool down and until we get instructions from SEC on how we can preserve both our company and our members,” said a message that was sent to Organico investors using the chat group B’s Club.
The message added that their operational concern “was already raised to the national level with direct orders from the President.”
“We cannot go against it. We will comply. We will not wait for what happened to Kapa. Getting a cease and desist order and freezing our accounts and assets are the worst that could happen. So it will be better for us to wait until this settles down rather than not being able to continue our business because of (the) closure order.”
“Rest assured that our legal team, our accounting team, IT team and the rest of our staff are there to safekeep our records and secure all our transactions. Thank you for your understanding,” says the private message sent to Organico investors.
The message also mentioned of two possible options on how investors could recover their money.
One is for Organico to “continue pay outs until we get caught and they confiscate the funds and the company will never operate again” while the other is to “stop all operations until the coast is clear and continue with the advocacy when they are no longer in danger.” /dcb