Tiñga warns public vs con men

MANILA, Philippines - Taguig City Mayor Sigfrido Tiñga is warning businessmen to beware of callers who claim to be working for him in order to ask for financial favors.

Tiñga said he suspects the modus operandi could be the handiwork of his political rivals.

He said a bogus caller, in separate incidents last week, attempted to deceive Del Monte Philippines and the Mini Cooper car dealer in Global City.

Last Jan. 22, a certain Amado Pineda, posing as a staff of Tiñga, called Del Monte Philippines president and chief executive officer Joselito Campos Jr., asking for money on behalf of the mayor. A staff of Campos confirmed that the call was a hoax.

On Jan. 15, the caller asked the Mini Cooper car dealer’s marketing communications manager, Margarita Baybay, for a discount on a car that Tiñga intends to buy. The impostor even asked Baybay to tell her boss to return call regarding the transaction. The cost of a Mini Cooper ranges from P1.8 million to P3 million.

Believing that it was uncharacteristic of the mayor to ask for such a favor, Baybay verified the call with a staff of Tiñga and found out that the caller was indeed an impostor.

“I call on the business sector to be vigilant against anyone who would use my name or my office to ask any favor, and more so, solicit funds. There is an obvious organized move to besmirch my name, all part of dirty politicking made by my political opponents as the 2010 election nears,” Tiñga said.

He stressed that all transactions between the city government and the business community are done in an official and formal manner, and not through personal calls asking for favors.

The mayor advised business owners who will receive such calls to immediately report incidents of this nature to the city’s emergency hotline, 1623.

On several occasions last year, a person pretending to be the mayor also attempted to solicit cash donations from Taguig-based business establishments: Henry’s by Good Earth; Encore (formerly Embassy Bar); Chef Roland Laudico, owner of Bistro Filipino; Megaworld Corp.; Enderun College Fort Bonifacio Campus; and a factory at the RSBS Industrial Park in Barangay Western Bicutan.