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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Anti-graft probers in for tough times

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PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte has said he would not cooperate with a special anti-corruption prosecutor’s investigation into allegations he acquired ill-gotten wealth, and told Deputy Ombudsman Melchor Arthur Carandang that he had better start praying, because if the country went to the dogs, he would go after him first.

The Office of the Ombudsman said last week it was investigating claims Duterte’s bank accounts had hundreds of millions of pesos that he failed to disclose as required by law.

Duterte responded by lashing out at the Ombudsman, calling the agency “lousy” and saying allegations against him were “lies based on baseless” information. 

“I will not submit to the jurisdiction [of the Ombudsman],” Duterte said in a curse-laden speech to lawyers Saturday night.

“Waving fabricated evidence, lying to his teeth in front of the nation and then you want me to submit to the jurisdiction of the Ombudsman,” Duterte said, referring to Carandang.

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Duterte’s remarks contradicted his spokesman’s statement last week that the President respected the Ombudsman and trusted its impartiality. 

Duterte, 72, won last year’s presidential elections on a brutal law-and-order and anti-corruption platform.

Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales

During the election campaign Duterte had said he came from a poor family and lived a modest lifestyle, which boosted his image as an anti-establishment politician representing the common folk, analysts said.

The Ombudsman probe stemmed from a plunder complaint filed before the elections by opposition Senator Antonio Trillanes IV who alleged Duterte embezzled government funds during his more than two-decade stint as mayor of Davao. 

On Saturday, Duterte said his family had properties and businesses including an ice plant and lumberyard, adding his late father was a provincial governor. 

“All in all it would not go beyond P40 million, my lifetime savings. A part of that was my hereditary—you people from Davao know this—property,” Duterte said.

“I hate to say it [but] what do you think of us, poor? That we are that poor?”

Duterte has launched tirades against the Supreme Court chief justice, the Commission on Human Rights, the Catholic Church and critical media outlets. He and his allies have then started campaigns to curb their powers or discredit them.

Duterte last week said he would create a commission to investigate corruption in the Ombudsman, a move an opposition congressman called an act of vindictiveness. 

Carandang said that he was authorized by Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales to act on Trillanes’s complaint and that he already requested the Anti-Money Laundering Council for a final validation of the bank transaction records of the first family.

He said initial bank records from the AMLC showed the flow of money through deposits and withdrawals from Duterte’s sons, Davao City Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte and Sebastian Duterte, and his joint accounts with his daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte.

He added that the accounts of Duterte’s common-law wife, Honeylet Avanceña, and their daughter, Veronica, were also included in the records.

The AMLC had confirmed receiving the request from Carandang, but denied providing him with the documents.

“We have categorically stated before that the Anti-Money Laundering Council is not the source of the documents and information attached by Senator Antonio F. Trillanes IV in his complaint regarding the alleged bank accounts of President Rodrigo Duterte,” the AMLC said in a statement.

“It has neither provided the Office of the Ombudsman with any report as a consequence of any investigation of subject accounts for any purpose,” it added.

The AMLC also said that the bank accounts in question had “wrong and misleading” amounts. 

Duterte on Saturday likened his situation to that of Renato Corona, who was ousted in 2011 for failing to fully disclose his wealth.

“What happened to Corona is happening to me,” Duterte said during the installation of new officers and induction of new members of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines Davao City Chapter.

Duterte has denied the allegations that he and his family have unexplained multi-billion pesos in banks and said these were based on lies.

In Congress, House committee on justice chairman and Oriental Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo Umali denied allegations that Duterte’s order to investigate the Office of the Ombudsman was meant to harass Morales.

He said it is within the powers of the President to order a probe of all suspected anomalies in any government agency, including the Ombudsman.

PBA Rep. Jericho Nograles, a Duterte ally, said the President’s allegations were serious.

“The Ombudsman is the public defender, and it should conduct [its business] with utmost professionalism. The practice of politically biased investigations should stop,” he said.

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