LTO operations disrupted by IT contractor's corporate dispute

For more than eight hours on Thursday, the operations of the Land Transportation Office (LTO) were disrupted by a tension-filled corporate dispute involving Stradcom Corp., LTO's information technology (IT) contractor. Before dawn on Thursday, armed men aboard three jeepneys tried to break into Stradcom's office in Quezon City. The police held at least 30 of the armed men for questioning. However, after the policemen left, the armed men reportedly managed to enter the Stradcom office. LTO head Virginia Torres said the tension at the Stradcom office made LTO's database inaccessible on Thursday morning. Radio dzBB, however, reported that as of noon on Thursday, the LTO had taken over the database. LTO operations were expected to go back to normal as of 1:00 p.m. The Quezon City police reportedly secured the Stradcom office to ensure that LTO's operations can go unhampered. Transportation Secretary Jose de Jesus said their main concern is to safeguard the LTO database handled by Stradcom. "That is an internal matter. Ang aming interest (Our interest) is to make sure our database is protected," he said in an interview on dzBB. Dispute on ownership The tension at the Stradcom office was reportedly caused by a dispute on the ownership of the company. According to Torres, the LTO will wait for the Supreme Court (SC) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (DEC) to determine which faction is the rightful owner of Stradcom. In the meantime, she said the LTO may have to waive penalties for motorists whose transactions were affected by the incident. Torres said the LTO tried to take over the database Thursday morning but could not do so due to the lack of technicians. "Sana we are taking over this kanina pero wala ang technician nila, I only found three of them, hindi kakayanin. Tatawagin namin technical nila pero umuwi na," Torres said. (We tried to operate the computerized records ourselves but their technicians already went home. I found three technicians but they could not handle the job by themselves.) Predawn drama Quezon City police Station 10 head Superintendent Constante Agpaoa said they had to bring in a Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team to the office of Stradcom as two groups engaged in an armed standoff there before dawn Thursday "Rumesponde kami. Noong nag-normalize bumalik kami sa istasyon, tapos nagkairingan na, nagtutulakan na, tinututukan ang mga gwardya. Napilitan ang SWAT bumalik at kinumpiska," he said in an interview on dzXL radio. (We rushed to the scene, and the situation calmed down. But when we left, the tension rose again and the men even poked firearms at the security guards. So we had to bring in the SWAT to seize their firearms.) As of 8:30 a.m., the dzBB report said Quezon City police had deployed a team from the Civil Disturbance Management (CDM) unit to the site. Agpaoa said they confiscated firearms from at least 30 of the armed men. "Narito ang mga armas at dadalhin namin sila sa istasyon para maimbestigahan," he said. (We collected the firearms from the men and we will take them to the station for investigation.) He said police had to return to the area four times because the tension resumed whenever the police left the area. Torres said her office's legal team is looking into whether the armed men can be charged for trespassing when they entered the Stradcom office. – VVP, GMANews.TV