CUSTOMS fixer Mark Taguba apologized to President Rodrigo Duterte’s family Friday, saying that talk of their involvement in corruption at the Bureau of Customs was based on hearsay.
In a statement, Taguba said he never testified on the supposed involvement of Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte and lawyer Manases Carpio in the shipment of illegal drugs or the “tara” system of bribery at the Bureau of Customs.
“I am making this statement to clear Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte and Attorney Mans Carpio of any involvement in the shipment of illegal drugs into the country, and any anomalies in the Bureau of Customs,” Taguba said. “I also hereby apologize to Vice Mayor Duterte, Attorney Carpio and to the first family for the proliferation of fake news arising out of my testimony at the Senate yesterday.”
In his testimony before the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee, Taguba said he served as the broker for the shipment of shabu worth P6.4 billion that slipped through Customs, but denied that he knew the cargo contained more than 600 kilos of the illegal drug.
Taguba said he dealt with the Davao Group of “Tita Nanie,” “Jack,” and “Small.” Small was later identified by Senator Antonio Trillanes IV as Davao City Councilor Nilo “Small” Abellera, Jr.
The said group, Taguba said, collected bribes as a way to smooth shipments out of the BOC without being alerted.
On Thursday, Trillanes again asked Taguba to read the exchange of text messages between him and ‘Tita Nanie.’
In one of the messages, Tita Nanie mentioned the names “Paolo” and “Pulong,” the vice mayor’s nickname. The message in January said Jack will “arrange a meeting” with Paolo.
Taguba said he met Abellera in a restaurant in Davao City, to personally handed over a P5-million “enrollment fee.”
Trillanes also asked Taguba about a text message he received from Tita Nanie on March 17, which mentioned a certain “Mance.”
When Trillanes asked who Mance was, Taguba said he was the husband of Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte.
But in his statement, Taguba said he never met Paolo or Carpio.
“As I had repeatedly stated before Congress and the Senate, the alleged involvement of the aforementioned individuals are hearsay in nature,” Taguba said.
“At no time have I met either Vice Mayor Duterte or Atty. Carpio in person, much less discuss any illegal transaction at the Bureau of Customs with them,” he added.
Trillanes has asked the Blue Ribbon committee to invite Paolo Duterte and Manases Carpio to the hearings, but the panel chairman, Senator Richard Gordon, said he was not inclined to invite the two because the allegations against them were based on hearsay and not by proof.
Trillanes said Taguba had been pressured into clearing Paolo Duterte and Carpio.
A party-list representative, meanwhile, warned his colleagues in Congress that the legislative immunity granted to Taguba might soon be withdrawn because of inconsistencies in his testimony.
In a statement, PBA party-list Representative Jericho Nograles said he noted inconsistencies when Taguba testified at separate inquiries of the House of Representatives and the Senate on the illegal entry of P6.4 billion worth of shabu from China.
“The testimony of Mark Taguba in the House and in the Senate have material differences and because of that, I cannot accept his testimony in good faith,” Nograles said.
“There is a legal precept: falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus. Mr. Taguba has not told Congress the whole truth and it may cost him his congressional immunity,” he said.
On Friday, resigned Customs commissioner Nicanor Faeldon admitted that he had met the President’s son-in-law Carpio once in his office to discuss legal problems over the designated examination area of one of his clients.
Faeldon said the case had already been in court for several years.
Faeldon also denied protecting Carpio from allegations hurled against him by Senator Antonio Trillanes IV who accused him of smuggling.
He said he and Carpio were in the same fraternity, so they used to play basketball in Davao even before Duterte was elected President.
He said that after President Duterte assumed his post, they only met once since then.
Faeldon also denied that Paolo Duterte was his backer at the Bureau of Customs.
“They are my friends. I’ve known them as early as 2012 because I’ve been going to Davao. We’ve met, we’ve dined together several times prior to the election,” the former BOC added.
In Davao City, President Duterte said any allegations or evidence coming from Trillanes was trash.
He said if there were proof that member of his family were corrupt, he would step down—as long as the evidence did not come from Trillanes.
He also defended the younger Duterte and Carpio, saying that the latter was was just doing his job as a lawyer.
He said if anyone could show him video of his son accepting a bribe, he would step down.