DBP executives vindicated on Ongpin deal

For our special presentation in our talk show Straight from the Sky, we bring you the folks who can help in the growth and sustainability of your family corporation. Indeed almost all businesses in this country, even the big conglomerates like Ayala Corp. Robinsons Land, Filinvest Land or Aboitiz Corporation are family-owned businesses that didn’t just grow overnight but slowly mutated from small family business concerns into multi-national corporations that they are today. With the proper business tools and sheer determination, you too can let your family business grow into a conglomerate.

So tonight we bring you Prof. Ned Roberto, the guru of management and a former professor at the Asian Institute of Management and Mr. Virgilio “Nonoy” Espeleta who left the super successful company, Julie’s Bakeshop, to open his own consultancy firm dubbed FAMCOR, whose aim is to handhold small and medium scale businesses in a ladderized management system that would enable them to move away from the usual family business problems (like sibling rivalry and putting the wrong person to be manager because he is a member of the family but knows next to nothing about management) and become a professionally run business conglomerate.

So watch this very educational talk with Prof. Ned Roberto and Nonoy Espeleta on the challenges of making a family business enterprise grow into a big business corporation on SkyCable’s channel 61 at 8:00 p.m. with replays on Wednesday and Saturday same time and channel. We also have replays on MyTV channel 30 at 7:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday. MyTV is also shown in Cagayan de Oro on PARASAT channel 28th.

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There was a news item that came out last Thursday, which has a huge implication to my good friend and golf crony, former Danao City Vice-Mayor and Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) Board of Directors member Ramon “Boboy” Durano III. That news report was about the decision by the third division of the Sandiganbayan last Wednesday on May 28th that dismissed the charges of graft and corruption against former Trade Minister and businessman Roberto “Bobby” Ongpin, chairman of Alphaland Group of Companies. I never had any doubt that the case brought before Ongpin was due to the vindictiveness of the Aquino regime.

What few people know was that, three of my friends, DBP president Rey David, Boboy Durano, and fellow Philippine Star columnist Alex Magno were implicated in that case vs. Ongpin. I didn’t write anything about this case in the past because we know too well the vindictiveness of the Aquino supporters — they could easily file a case of subjudice against me because this case was already in the Sandiganbayan.

But what I do know is that, all the respondents in this case, members of the board of directors of DBP under the presidency of Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo who were implicated in this case had their bank accounts frozen and whenever they needed to go abroad, they had to file a request for permission to the Sandiganbayan. Boboy Durano told me that this was a huge thorn in their necks.

The beauty of this dismissal is that the Sandiganbayan admonished the pro-Aquino investigators assigned in the Office of the Ombudsman for their failure to gather enough evidence to justify their allegations of “Corporate Layering” that they threw against Ongpin. That charge against Ongpin and DBP president Rey David and the DBP board came from the two loans of Ongpin amounting to P660 million. This is why the DBP president and members of the board were also hauled to court. In dismissing the case vs. Ongpin, the Sandiganbayan also dismissed the cases vs the DBP executives.

This is just another one of the many cases that the loyal yellow dogs of the Aquino regime filed against the people under the former president and ended up getting dismissed for lack of evidence. I had no doubt that DBP president Rey David was replaced by Jose Nuñez, Jr. under the orders of Malacañang; he hastily filed a case of graft and corruption against Bobby Ongpin and the former DBP executives. Worse of all, the yellow propaganda machinery churned outright lies of this supposedly highly corrupt deal.

This is a clear vindication not only of Bobby Ongpin, but including my friends, Rey David, Alex Magno, and Boboy Durano. Now the only case pending in the DBP is the case filed by concerned officers and employees of DBP against DBP chairman Jose Nuñez, Jr. also for graft and corruption for abusing his authority using the private planes of his former boss Buddy Zamora who has a pending loan with the DBP for trips to Mindanao and a golfing trip to Batangas. When this case will stick, you can guess who really is going to jail for graft and corruption. It is called “Karma.”

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