CANDIDATE Rodrigo Duterte faced some public relations issues just as penultimate surveys indicated that he would win the presidential elections in 2016.
Sen. Antonio Trillanes presented documents showing that Mr. Duterte held several joint accounts with his daughter Sara, seven accounts of which were maintained with the Bank of Philippine Islands in Pasig City. These BPI accounts received deposits purportedly totaling P1.7 billion from 2006 to 2015.
How these amounts could have been accumulated on a mayor’s salary posed a serious question that blunted the candidate’s anti-corruption and anti-criminality platform.
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The bank accounts were investigated by former deputy Ombudsman Melchor Arthur Carandang.
Duterte had initially denied their existence but later on admitted that they were active accounts that contained less than P200 million.
In mid-2018 Duterte ordered Carandang’s dismissal from the service despite a previous Supreme Court decision that nullified a President’s disciplinary authority over deputy ombudsmen.
The gist of the Court’s ruling is that the anti-graft body is independent from government officials that it is likely to investigate.
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Carandang was removed from office for betrayal of the public trust when he allegedly supplied Trillanes with details of Duterte’s hidden wealth.
Former Ombudsman Conchita Carpio-Morales tried to resist enforcement of Duterte’s decision but pro-Duterte lawyers threatened to bodily remove Carandang from office.
The office of the overall deputy ombudsman consequently became vacant.
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In November 2020, while the COVID pandemic was raging, Duterte replaced Carandang with Warren Rex Liong – his legal consultant in Davao City from 2010-2013. He is also reported to have headed the legal department of the PhilHealth regional office in Davao in 2016.
Liong was also part of the Davao contingent at the procurement service office of the Department of Budget and Management (PS-DBM).
Liong was procurement director of PS-DBM when the Duterte government awarded more than P11 billion worth of healthcare supply contracts to Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corp. – then a newly created business venture capitalized with only P650 thousand.
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Early this year Liong suffered the embarrassment of getting preventively suspended by his own agency where only one official is ranked higher – the Ombudsman himself.
Last March, the Ombudsman issued a six-month suspension order against Liong along with 32 other former and current officials of PS-DBM.
The order is based on “overwhelming evidence” of corruption that attended the execution of the Pharmally supply contracts with PS-DBM then headed by another lawyer from Davao – Lloyd Christopher Lao.
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The Ombudsman spared the former President and the others from the agony of a prosecution for plunder.
Former senator Richard Gordon had drafted a committee report that recommended the filing of plunder charges against Duterte, but he failed to get a majority of his colleagues to sign it.
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These are major unfinished issues against Mr. Duterte who is currently facing the prospect of being investigated by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.
Does he have what it takes to clash head-on with the sitting President and the Speaker of the House of Representatives?/PN
