FORMER vice president Jejomar Binay and his son, dismissed Makati mayor Junjun Binay, may not leave the country after the Sandiganbayan issued a hold departure order against them along with 19 others in connection with criminal charges filed against them over the alleged anomalous construction of the P2.28-billion Makati parking building.
The anti-graft court’s Third Division said the Binays and the other respondents in the case would only be allowed to leave if they were able to secure approval from it.
The court ordered the Bureau of Immigration to include the names of the Binays and the other respondents in the bureau’s Hold-Departure List.
The anti-graft court’s Third Division said the issuance of the HDO against the respondents was to render them “at all times amenable to the writs and processes of the Court.”
Sandiganbayan Presiding Justice and Third Division chairwoman Amparo Cabotaje-Tang and Third Division members Associate Justices Samuel Martires and Sarah Jane Fernandez signed the HDO.
Aside from the Binays, also listed in the HDOs are former city administrator Marjorie De Veyra; former city legal officer Pio Kenneth Dasal; former budget officer Lorenza Amores; Former city central planning management heads Virginia Hernandez and Line dela Peña; former BAC head Giovanni Condes; Former BAC vice chair Ulysses Orienza; Former BAC Secretariat head Manolito Uyaco; former BAC Technical Working Group chairman Rodel Nayve; former city engineers Mario Badillo, Arnel Cadangan and Emerito Magat; former city accountants Leonila Querijero and Cecilio Lim III; former acting city accountant Raydes Pestaño; former city treasurer Nelia Barlis; former General Services Department officer Norman Flores, Orlando Mateo from Mana Architecture and Interior Design, Co.; and Efren Canlas of Hilmarc’s Construction Co.
The two Binays allegedly conspired with the other city officials to be able to award a contract to Mana Architecture and Interior Design Co. for the design of the Makati City Hall Building II project without public bidding as alleged.
But the camp of the Binays shrugged off the HDO, with their counsel, Daniel Subido, saying that such had no legal bearing on the cases being heard by the anti-graft court against his client.
“A Hold-Departure Order is a necessary consequence of the mere filing of an Information in the Sandiganbayan. It is applicable to all,” Subido said.