Here’s another scam for Brillantes to abet

What is it in the Comelec chairmanship that turns good men bad? There was Benjamin Abalos with the abominable MegaPacific, ZTE, and Virgilio Garcillano. Jose Melo left soiled by the unsecured precinct count optical scanners, and overpriced ballot-secrecy folders. Today’s Sixto Brillantes is abetting not only the worsened PCOS voting machines, but also new scams.

Brillantes has bought for billions of pesos the once leased 82,000 PCOS units — with no software license. He has yet to explain retaining the “Garcillano boys,” Comelec insiders who rig polls for highest bidders. He has kept mum about Senate exposés of a P7-million overprice in refurnishing Comelec mansions in Baguio City, and P2 million in voter-registration ink in Muslim Mindanao. There are also the P40-million overprice in warehousing of PCOS units, and P11.3 million in PCOS memory cards.

Add to all this an impending Comelec scam for Brillantes to abet — the multimillion-peso purchase of indelible ink for the May 2013 election.

Here’s the story, told to the Ombudsman by former Comelec legal aide Melchor Magdamo:

A joint venture of Centurian International Corp. and Jedaric Chemicals is about to bag the ink deal. It anchors its claim of supply capability to a “single largest similar completed contract” worth P20 million, with a certain PhilTint & Color Specialist Inc.

A quick check by Magdamo of this PhilTint’s background yielded intriguing details. For one, the paper supply firm is only two years old. As of its last report to the Securities and Exchange Commission dated May 2012, it had zero material inventory in 2010-2011, and P16,774,988 in 2011-2012. So Magdamo asks: “What then is that mysterious P20-million deal with PhilTint, if any?”

PhilTint’s incorporation papers raised more questions. It turns out to be closely related to OTC (One Touch Carbon) Paper Supply — the very firm that Magdamo exposed in 2010 for the P800-million ballot-secrecy folder scam.

To recall, OTC had proposed for that year’s election to supply five folders per polling precinct. These purportedly were to cover the ballots being filled up by voters seated side by side. Such folders can be bought for P3.80 apiece in office supply shops, but OTC quoted P380 for each. There was no public bidding, only secret negotiation. The P800-million price tag had so enraged the public that the poll body’s commissioners were forced to scrap the deal. They also fired Magdamo as Chairman Melo’s special aide.

OTC is a single proprietorship of Willy Kwok Young, with brother Henry Kwok Young as manager. Its office is on 451 De La Cruz St., Santa Quiteria, Caloocan City.

 The folder scam was but one of dozens of overpriced and needless “emergency election purchases” made by the Comelec in 2009-2010. A cabal of nine suppliers cornered all. On April 18, 2012, the Ombudsman and the Commission on Audit listed the procurements among the ten priorities for investigation.

PhilTint was formed about the time of the folder scam, Magdamo says. Its president is Henry’s wife, Dr. Mae C. Syki Young of the Makati Medical Center. Vice president is Willy’s wife, Catherine Sheng Young. Two sisters are treasurer and director: Julie Kwok Young Garcia and Anna Kwok Young Sy. Niece Joanna Ku Young is corporate secretary. PhilTint’s listed address is the same as OTC’s.

The Comelec was set to “test” PhilTint’s ink yesterday. Such tests are usually only for show in rigged biddings.

Last November, Magdamo exposed a P78-million Comelec sleaze. The agency had approved the packing and sealing of ballots for 76,000 precincts at P1,000 per bunch. It was double the true cost, Magdamo cried. In the October 2010 barangay poll Magdamo, still attached to Melo, had exposed the same scam, four times overpriced at P175 million. The deal went to Noah’s Paper Mills, which bid again in 2012.

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Weeks ago I reported that barangay councilmen have sued Mayor Annaliza Gonzales-Kwan of Guiuan, Eastern Samar, for graft and abuse. Allegedly she abetted the deforesting of coastal mangroves by contractor Cosme Tiu Sonco of Al’s Enterprise & Construction, father of her political ally. The project was to give way to a resettlement, which the National Housing Authority had retracted and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources halted. The filling materials for the ruined marine reserve allegedly came from land recently bought by the mayor’s two brothers.

Mayor Gonzales-Kwan e-mailed her side, claiming it as truth. Excerpts: “I am honest. I am only being dragged into this issue because I am running for Congress. A provincial, I am not used to this. No case has been filed against me; I only read about it in the papers. Not all the complainants are barangay officials. I have nothing to do with the NHA project, bidding was done in Manila, it was identified as a resettlement before I became mayor, and it is at the center of town. I never gave any permit relative to it. If there are violations, why blame me?”

Documents show otherwise. A case was filed against Gonzales-Kwan as far back as November 29, 2012, with the Environmental Ombudsman, also the Deputy Ombudsman for Luzon. Complainants are Norma Loyola, Roger Lagramada, Dominadora Odeña, Nicolas Dagsa, Eleanor Lo, and Paz Dimaangay. All except Dimaangay are barangay councilmen of Campoyong, Guiuan.

Eight years earlier the NHA had told the mayor to form a “local interagency committee” to implement the resettlement. But the barangay officials swore they were never informed. Surprised last year at suddenly being blamed for Al’s Construction’s deforesting, they were referred to the mayor’s office. They witnessed trucks from the mayor’s brothers’ land delivering filling material to the destroyed mangrove preserve.

Thrice the barangay men wrote the mayor and twice they passed resolutions begging her to stop the destruction of the food source. The DENR too ordered a halt due to absence of environment clearance; the NHA stated that it had not awarded the works or notified any contractor to proceed. All these were ignored. The deforesting was ongoing at the time the case was filed. The complainants attached dozens of photos, showing the area to be unsettled, therefore not the town center.

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E-mail: jariusbondoc@gmail.com