Billionairess Alice Guo’s privilege / DepEd Usec bares Sara ‘payola’
Billionairess Alice Guo has privilege. Feigning Tuesday to be a POGO victim, she made senators agree to a closed-door hearing.
Senators broke their rules. Executive sessions are held only if national security or public order is at stake. None of that in Guo’s case.
Only senators and the witness may join. Staff are forbidden. But Guo’s lawyer participated via Zoom.
Since May 7th Guo lied to senators countless times. They unearthed her 45 crimes. She isn’t even Filipino, but Chinese. Yet they trusted her.
She fled abroad, during which she faked a court affidavit. Captured and repatriated, she gave senators only three stock replies: “Hindi ko po alam,” “I invoke my right against self-incrimination,” “May death threats po ako.” That wore them down.
Only last week they said a closed-door session would violate the public’s right to know. Tuesday, Guo offered to name the POGO mastermind who “victimized” her. They granted her a secret session.
What made them relent – “marites” craving, or to curry Guo’s favor, or fear that she might link them to the capo di tutti capi?
Now, per executive session rules, senators are as tight-lipped as Guo. Shut out, the public won’t ever be able to tell them if what Guo uttered was true or not.
Is the POGO overlord Filipino or Chinese? Is he a politico to whom senators owe fealty? Or an alien who contributes to election campaigns?
Tuesday’s hearing was the penultimate. After five months of factfinding, senators must summarize. Guo’s closed-door blah-blah will prevent their naming the POGO boss. Can it help legislation?
Wednesday, committee head Risa Hontiveros claimed that they’ve long suspected a gangster to be the mastermind whom Guo identified. Can that remark make the report credible?
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In contrast, the public took part in Wednesday’s live-streamed House hearing. It thus became credible.
Topic: DepEd procurement fraud in 2023. Ex-Usec. Gloria Jumamil Mercado revealed monetary “influencing” by then-secretary Sara Duterte.
Instantly, viewers texted members of the committee on good government and public accountability about her sterling credentials. Namely, on Rep. Dan Fernandez’s ascertaining, that Mercado was a:
(1) Public servant for 40 years;
(2) Career Executive Service Officer;
(3) PhD in Chinese Studies;
(4) Development Academy of the Philippines ex-SVP and dean;
(5) Advisory committee chairwoman, Phl Public Safety College;
(6) Pioneered the Master’s in Public Management and Security, AFP Command and General Staff College (for aspiring colonels and generals);
(7) Scholar, Grade I to Doctorate;
(8) Recruited by minister Vicente Paterno, 1983, when she was a college senior, aged 19;
(9) MASICAP (Medium and Small Scale Industries Coordinated Action Program) field worker in Mindanao;
(10) Rose up the ranks to assistant secretary by merit;
(11) National Security Agency officer under Sec. Norberto Gonzales;
(12) Grounding in social democracy, dominant European ideology;
(13) Recruited by Presidential Adviser on Yolanda Rehab Panfilo Lacson to develop new town-planning course for 179 devastated municipalities;
(14) Navy reserve officer, rank of commodore.
On VP Sara’s endorsement, President Bongbong Marcos designated Mercado undersecretary in July 2022. A month later Sara made her DepEd Usec. for Human Resources. They had met at DAP when Mercado was Sara’s masteral thesis adviser.
In February 2023 Sara named her concurrent Head of Procuring Entity. For nine months till September, Sara’s head executive Asec. Sunshine Fajarda summoned her to the Secretary’s office to hand a white envelope marked “HoPE.”
One time, special disbursement officer Edward Fajarda, Sunshine’s spouse, inquired about their officemates’ bank accounts. Mercado overheard that regional directors “also received” payolas.
Uncomfortable, she never opened the nine envelopes. She kept them in a pouch in her office until she was driven away.
She donated the nine envelopes to an NGO. Contents, P50,000 in each, were counted in her presence. They receipted her P450,000. She submitted the envelopes and receipt to committee chairman Joel Chua.
A run-in with Procurement Asec. Reynold Munsayac induced her removal. Computer purchases for public schools were delayed then. Before three other officials, Munsayac allegedly told bidders to just divide the contract among themselves “so the 2022 funds won’t go to waste.”
Mercado objected, insisting that they obey procurement rules.
In October 2023, Sara’s OVP chief-of-staff called for Mercado. Usec. Zuleika Lopez told her to resign. Mercado knew it had to do with her strictness. She instead retired.
Munsayac, present at Wednesday’s hearing, denied any wrongdoing.
In her office Sara belittled Mercado’s testimony as “lacking in documentary evidence.” She called her a “disgruntled employee who was let go for lost trust and confidence.”
“She solicited P16 million from a company on paper using my name without authority. She assigned a provincial teacher as her executive assistant, an injustice committed as HR Usec. I didn’t let pass that second point.”
Rep. Gerville Luistro’s complaint about undelivered computers to teachers in her Batangas province prompted the inquiry. She had raised it Sep. 2nd at the House appropriations committee hearing on the OVP’s 2025 budget, which Sara snubbed.
Ako Bicol Party-list Rep. Jil Bongalon also questioned DepEd’s failure to procure computers, smart TVs and other e-learning devices. That’s despite its P11.36-billion budget in 2022 and again in 2023.
Congressmen are also looking into:
• Sara’s 11-day use up of P125-million confidential-intelligence fund on Dec. 21-31, 2022, including Christmas and Rizal Day;
• DepEd’s 2023 Feeding Program waste of P5.7 billion: spoiled milk, infested bread, ghost and delayed deliveries, unsanitary packaging, deficient weight;
• Only 3.01 percent, or 192 of 6,379 classrooms, built in 2023;
• Only 2.75 percent, or 208 of 7,550 classrooms, repaired.
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