CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY, Philippines – The top official of Asia’s biggest bus company has on Saturday (Jan. 18) assured the riding public in Mindanao and the rest of the country that the service it provides is not affected by the infighting among members of the family that owns it and by the court battle that ensued.
“We are on the right track,” Leo Rey Yanson, president of the Yanson Group of Bus Companies, told shareholders and members of the press following the Mindanao Star annual stockholders’ meeting held at its corporate headquarters in Barangay Bulua in this city, on Saturday morning.
The Yanson Group of Bus Companies is the umbrella corporation of several subsidiaries operating throughout the Philippines, including the Mindanao-based Rural Transit Mindanao Inc., Bachelor Express Inc., and Mindanao Star Bus Transport Inc.
It has an estimated 4,800 buses operating nationwide and employs some 18,000 workers across the country.
Yanson’s assurance came amid the legal issues surrounding the company when four of his siblings tried to take the firm’s leadership from him last year.
The family feud has created a faction among family members, with Leo Rey in one faction together with Yanson matriarch Olivia and his sister Ginnette while opposed to his leadership are his siblings Roy, Emily, Celina, and Ricardo.
“You already knew what happened to our family, but whatever it is, I am happy because we got the support of the employees here in Mindanao,” Yanson said, as he promised further improvements in the company’s service.
Yanson credited the company’s success to its loyal and competent employees, as well as to his mother.
“Mommy [Olivia] is the only reason why I am still here. Working for a bus company is one story; working for a family corporation is different,” he added.
According to a press statement, Mindanao Star’s board of directors reelected Yanson as president, with Olivia as corporate secretary and treasurer.
Also elected members of the board were Ginnette Yanson-Dumancas, Charles Dumancas, Arvin John Villaruel, and Rey Ardo.
The Yanson Group acquired the company, which owned and operated Weena and PTC buses, from the Valdevieso family in 2015 and renamed it to Mindanao Star. The company’s buses ply the Davao-North Cotabato route.
The other Yanson Group subsidiaries operating in Visayas and Luzon are Southern Star Bus Transit Inc., Ceres Transport Inc., Gold Star Bus Transit Inc., and Vallacar Transit Inc., making it the largest bus company in the country.(davaotoday.com)
