The Government Service Insurance System wants the Supreme Court to step into the dispute in the Court of Appeals among justices claiming jurisdiction over a case involving the GSIS and Manila Electric Co. (Meralco).

GSIS chief legal counsel Estrella Elamparo said the protest by two appellate court justices over the manner by which the case ended up being decided by a division other than the one that originally heard it showed there was a serious problem in the Court of Appeals.

The case stemmed from a Meralco petition to void a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) order blocking the election of Meralco directors during a stockholders meeting last May. The SEC order was issued upon the plea of the GSIS.

The patriarch of the Lopez family Tuesday came out swinging at the Arroyo administration and its officials, saying that with what had been happening, it was as though Ferdinand Marcos’ dictatorship had not ended.

Oscar M. Lopez, who chairs Manila Electric Co., also accused Winston Garcia, president and general manager of the Government Service Insurance System, of trying to orchestrate a takeover of the Lopez family’s flagship firm in a “reverse privatization.”