Pimentel: Probe Marcos account in HK

A senator investigating the existence of the Marcos wealth urged the Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) yesterday to determine if the Marcoses have a large bank account in Hong Kong.

This was after a town mayor from Isabela province claimed he saw such an account through an alleged moneyman of businessman Gregorio "Greggy" Araneta III, husband of the late dictator's youngest daughter Irene Marcos.

In a speech during the wealth-hunting body's 14th anniversary, Sen. Aquilino Pimentel advised the PCGG to check with Hong Kong authorities if the Marcoses have a multi-billion dollar bank account in Sanwa Bank.

The account came to fore when Isabela Mayor Renato Marcos Vizcarra testified before the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee earlier that the Marcoses have a $4-billion deposit in that bank.

The town mayor said he learned of such an account after he met Gregorio Cadhit, whom he also described as a gold broker of the Aranetas.

"He is the one who sells the gold belonging to Greggy and Irene. The proceeds of the sale would then be deposited in various banks in Hong Kong, New York, Australia, among others," Vizcarra said.

Pimentel described Vizcarra's revelation as a breakthrough in the Senate's search for the fabled Marcos wealth.

"At least, we can now pinpoint personalities whom we could ask about the Marcos wealth," said Pimentel, the chairman of the Blue Ribbon Committee.

Vizcarra told the committee that he met Cadhit before the 1998 presidential and local elections, when he was asked by the gold broker to include a certain Fred Tabag in his ticket as a candidate for councilor.

After winning the polls, Vizcarra said he learned that Tabag was Cadhit's co-signatory in a Metrobank bank account, where they withdrew as much as P10 million a day.

"I later learned that Cadhit was working for Greggy Araneta and he was responsible in managing the Marcos gold in Australia, Switzerland, Mexico, Hong Kong and the United States," the mayor said.

Once, Vizcarra said he accompanied Cadhit to a bank in Hong Kong, where he was shown a computer printout which indicated that the supposed gold broker had deposits amounting to $4 billion.

"Cadhit keeps a small blue book where the detailed expenses are listed," Vizcarra said.

Pimentel admitted that the Blue Ribbon Committee does not have documentary evidence to support Vizcarra's revelation.

"But the testimony is under oath and has not been sufficiently rebutted," the senator said.

The Aranetas had denied knowing Cadhit.

"At the very least, the committee will ... no longer need to press the point when it calls Greggy Araneta and/or Irene Marcos-Araneta to testify," Pimentel said.

The senator also pressed the PCGG to ask former senator and now Ambassador to the US Ernesto Maceda to send copies of the response of the US Bureau of Treasury that the late strongman has a $100 million deposit there.

"The PCGG should not take the verbal response of Maceda at face value. While the ambassador's verbal response makes for good media copy, it cannot substitute for an official US treasury bureau response," he said.

"A clear, categorical and convincing official statement ... that such a supposed note or deposits ... in the name of Marcos or any of his cronies ... are not true would greatly undermine the pernicious business of unscrupulous peddlers ... that victimize unsuspecting, credulous and naive speculators," he said.

Pimentel said the Blue Ribbon Committee will place all the witnesses and evidence at the disposal of the PCGG.

"Hopefully, a close coordination of the PCGG and the Blue Ribbon Committee will result in the recovery of the Marcos hidden wealth and those of his cronies in our lifetime," he said.

In other developments yesterday, the Department of Justice is set to file charges against Australian wealth-hunter Reiner Jacobi for allegedly forging a document that would allow him to get 10 percent of whatever Marcos money he would recover.

In a one-page order, Senior State Prosecutor Jude Romano actually thumbed down Jacobi's second petition for the justice department to review the falsification charge filed by PCGG Chairman Magdangal Elma.

"Considering that (Jacobi) has filed a petition for review of the same resolution that is the subject of the motion for reconsideration, the undersigned, in deference to the Secretary of Justice, is constrained to deny the motion for reconsideration," Romano said.

Elma filed the case in March 1999 after Jacobi and his Filipino counterpart, Crispin Reyes, claimed they had been authorized by former PCGG chief Felix de Guzman to get 10 percent of whatever amount of money they could recover from the hidden wealth.

Jacobi and Reyes even presented such an authorization letter dated Aug. 27, 1998 and purportedly signed by De Guzman.

De Guzman, however, denied issuing such a letter and claimed that the document was "not authentic."

His denial was supported by PCGG employees Lourdes Magno and Sisa Lopez, who both stated in their sworn affidavits that the letter does not exist in their records nor in the Office of the PCGG Chairman.

"All told, the legal presumptions established far outweigh the defenses raised by (Jacobi and Reyes). In a long line of decisions, the Supreme Court has consistently ruled that the possessor and user of a falsified document is presumed to be the forger," Romano said when he first recommended the filing of the case against Jacobi in 1999. -- J