Firm linked to VP Sara’s spouse under BIR probe
MANILA, Philippines — The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) has placed Cale88 Foods Corp., owned by Vice President Sara Duterte’s husband Manases Carpio, under formal tax investigation, an agency official told the Senate impeachment court yesterday.
Lawyer Anne Loraine Garcia-Marquez, chief of staff of the BIR’s Office of the Commissioner, disclosed that a letter of authority (LOA) has been served against Cale88.
An LOA is intended to function like a search warrant when tax payments appear questionable.
Marquez revealed the issuance of an LOA against the company linked to Carpio when asked by Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian about the P208 million in sales declared to BIR and the P700 million in total remittances flowing into the company as revealed earlier by the Anti-Money Laundering Council.
While Marquez noted that inflows outside sales could possibly be loans or donations, she stressed that the funds should have been declared in the company’s mandatory submissions.
Marquez said Cale88 could face civil cases for tax deficiency and criminal cases for tax evasion if it was proven that there were undeclared sales.
She also confirmed it was possible that Carpio remains the legal owner of Cale88 in the eyes of the BIR since there’s no electronic certificate authorizing registration for the transfer of shares from Carpio to Pikimong Philippine Corp.
Sen. Risa Hontiveros pointed out that the Vice President still declared Cale88 as a business interest in her 2025 statement of assets, liabilities and net worth.
Meanwhile, Marquez said it is impossible that Cale88, which supposedly manufactured and exported banana chips, only had two employees.
Sen. Joel Villanueva scrutinized the firm’s 2024 audited financial statements, which reported P150 million in sales alongside P6.13 million in losses.
He said the company had zero employees in 2023 and 2024 before declaring two workers in 2025.
Illegal compensation?
The tax agency is also auditing Duterte after a BIR Form 2316 (Certificate of Compensation Payment/Tax Withheld) attached to her records revealed that she received compensation income from the city government of Davao in 2023, when she was already Vice President.
During yesterday’s hearing, Sen. Erwin Tulfo asked Marquez if the Vice President’s signature on the tax form served as an acknowledgement that she received the payment.
“Yes. The BIR Form 2316 is signed by both employer and employee,” the BIR official testified.
“After the conduct of audit, we will know if there is actually a violation of the NIRC (National Internal Revenue Code),” she told Tulfo.
Likewise, Sen. Raffy Tulfo asked the witness about the figures, noting the records showed Duterte received a gross compensation income of P82,327.45.
The prosecution described the amount as payment for legal activities.
Tulfo cited Article VII, Section 13 of the 1987 Constitution, which prohibits the President, Vice President and Cabinet members from holding another office or practicing a profession during their tenure unless provided by law.
Livestream removed
Meanwhile, the Senate deleted the morning session livestream of yesterday’s impeachment hearing after unredacted documents flashed onscreen showed the names of BIR personnel, sparking data privacy and security concerns.
Presiding officer Francis Escudero issued the order after Marquez pointed out that copies of LOAs presented during the hearing displayed the names of revenue officers publicly.
The LOA was flashed during the cross-examination conducted by defense counsel Kristine Ferrer.
Undeclared income
According to a forensic financial analyst, Duterte and Carpio did not declare assets and wealth amounting to P817.87 million from 2022 to 2025, the first four years of her vice presidency.
Certified public accountant and lawyer Alexander Cabrera was presented yesterday as witness by the prosecution, meant to bring together the bank, tax, corporate and asset records presented in the impeachment trial.
Upon direct examination of House prosecutor and Akbayan party-list Rep. Chel Diokno, Cabrera said the P817.87-million total includes undeclared income linked to Cale88 Foods Corp., Metro City Chow Foods Corp. and GenCorp Industries Inc., businesses associated with the couple.
Of this amount, P190.6 million were from 2022; P167.3 million from 2023; P264.2 million from 2024 and P195.6 million from 2025.
To conclude his analysis, Cabrera said he found that Duterte’s SALN from 2022 to 2025 were “untruthful with a substantial amount of assets found to be unreported.”
This, he said, “established a pattern of constitutional violations year-on-year.”
Foreign ties
In her interjection yesterday, Hontiveros disclosed that a Ukrainian company allegedly facing a multimillion-euro fraud and money laundering probe in Kyiv was among the foreign entities that remitted funds to Cale88.
She said Arkmen LLC, which is registered in Tsybuliv, was among the companies that contributed to the P776 million in suspicious and covered inflows to Cale88.
Citing research conducted by her office, Hontiveros said criminal proceedings involving 1.225 million euros were opened against the company in May 2025.
Palace: VP Sara must explain
Now that state auditors have affirmed with finality the notice of disallowance issued on her office’s confidential fund expenses worth over P73 million, Duterte must explain how the money was spent, Malacañang said yesterday.
Palace press officer Claire Castro said Duterte’s camp cannot always claim ignorance about the issues linked to the Vice President.
“If COA (Commission on Audit) saw the need for her (Duterte) to return the funds, that means they were not properly liquidated and the funds may have been used in ways other than their intended purpose,” Castro said at a media briefing in Singapore. — Daphne Galvez, Alexis Romero
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