VARIOUS bank accounts held by Vice President Sara Duterte and her husband are now under the intense scrutiny of the Senate impeachment court.
Charges of ill-gotten wealth are among the articles of impeachment that the House of Representatives is trying to prove to against the impeached VP.
The VP’s husband Atty. Mans Carpio is repeatedly mentioned because his assets are conjugally owned and are required to be reported in his wife’s statement of assets despite not being a public official.
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For example, the Anti-Money Laundering Council revealed yesterday that one particular day in August 2024, Atty. Carpio made six bank withdrawals totaling P41 million.
Intra-account transfers were also made in March 2014 totaling more than P173 million. This was objected to by the defense because VP Sara was not yet an impeachable officer at the time.
The prosecution’s position is that wealth generated “pre-term,” meaning that which was earned before Sara’s tenure as vice president, will violate the law if they are not reported as part of the impeachable official’s assets upon his or her assumption as such.
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Yesterday’s proceedings likewise confirmed then senator Sonny Trillanes’ 2016 claim that Sara had been maintaining a joint bank account with her father – the former President Rodrigo R. Duterte.
In the weeks prior to the 2016 presidential elections, when the trend was clearly favoring Duterte, Trillanes announced that the joint account held at least P227 million that Duterte did not declare in his SALN when he was mayor or congressman of Davao City.
AMLC executive director Ronel Buenaventura has confirmed the existence of the account, from which P9.1 million pesos were withdrawn in a single transaction in 2013.
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Rodrigo Duterte refused to submit a formal waiver of bank secrecy way back in early 2016.
Some voters decided to deposit token amounts in the bank account, all of which were accepted by the bank.
A deputy ombudsman was also removed from office on the perception that he might have been the source of the information linking Duterte to the joint account.
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Another confirmation is Buenaventura’s testimony that alleged drug-lord Sammy Uy had purchased manager’s checks in the amount of almost P15 million in favor of VP Sara.
These were made in October 2011 and April 2012.
In the offer of testimony made prior to Buenaventura’s presentation, the prosecution claimed that it intended to prove that almost P4.5 billion flowed through the corporations linked to VP Sara and her husband. This was on top of the P44.4 billion that flowed through the couple’s bank accounts.
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The accounts and transactions were revealed despite the prosecution having to wade through a series of objections from the defense.
Confidentiality and bank secrecy were thrown around as stumbling blocks, but they could hardly be sustained under the glare of television cameras and public opinion.
The lives of public officials are open books. Accountability and transparency go hand-in-hand at all times./PN
