Plunder complaint filed vs VP Binay

MANILA, Philippines - Two former barangay chairmen in Makati City have filed plunder complaints against Vice President Jejomar Binay and his son Mayor Junjun Binay before the Office of the Ombudsman against for the alleged overpriced construction of a new parking building.

Lawyer Renato Bondal, former barangay chairman of Palanan and Nicolas Enciso VI, ex-barangay chief of Olimpia, claimed in their complaint that the New Makati City parking building was overpriced by P1.3 billion.

The construction of the 11-storey building located along F. Zobel Street, Poblacion, Makati City, started in 2007, funded through the first appropriation ordinance which was proposed and approved by the Vice president.

The complainants claimed that the actual cost of the building according to the National Statistics Office data should have be only at P245.5 million. The final contract price for the building was pegged at P1.56 billion.

They said that the initial appropriation of P400 million approved by the older Binay was overpriced by P154 million.

Binay's son, along with the members of the city council, approved six more appropriation ordinances for the construction of the building, amounting to P1.160 billion.

"The overpricing of the building project could not have been committed without a deliberate, systematic, and unconscionable raid of public funds designed by the Binays and the other respondents to defraud the people of Makati and gain personal profit in the process.

"This parking building has become the most expensive parking building in the country, if not the entire world, and the Binays and the other respondents, should be held responsible for this act of wanton misuse and plunder of public funds,"  the complainants said.

The project was turned over to the city government of Makati last 2013.

Aside from the Binays, the charge sheet also include all of the former and incumbent city councilors and Commission on Audit resident Auditor Cecile Cag-anan for "failing to exercise her sworn mandate to protect the city treasury of Makati from abuses."