The SM Group like many Chinoy businesses is not known for taking City Hall to court, especially when the mayor not only happens to be the former president whose political reach still extends to the Senate and, of course, neighboring San Juan.
This little-known side of SM has emerged after the Manila City Council, at the behest of Mayor Joseph Estrada, increased beginning 2014 the local business tax rates to as much as three percent of annual gross sales from only 0.2 percent under the long reign of Estrada’s predecessor, Alfredo Lim.