EDITORIAL - Arrested, soon freed

Remember Lloyd Christopher Lao? The former executive director of the Procurement Service of the Department of Budget and Management gained notoriety over the transfer of P41.4 billion in funds from the Department of Health to the PS-DBM for the procurement of COVID-19 supplies at the height of the pandemic.

Yesterday morning, Lao was arrested by the police Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Davao City where he is a resident. Lao, however, is expected to be freed shortly. The Sandiganbayan, which ordered his arrest, also allowed bail of P90,000 since the charge filed by the Office of the Ombudsman was only for graft instead of non-bailable plunder even if the case involved billions in public funds.

Lao signed nine contracts worth P8.68 billion that were awarded to Pharmally Pharmaceuticals for the supply of personal protective equipment, face masks, face shields and RT-PCR test kits to the Department of Health. Last year, Lao and former DOH secretary Francisco Duque, along with Pharmally executives and other PS-DBM officials, were charged with graft by the Office of the Ombudsman under Samuel Martires.

The threshold amount for a plunder indictment is P50 million. Why were the Pharmally executives and former government officials charged only with graft? The ombudsman also spared Michael Yang, the economic adviser of then president Rodrigo Duterte who reportedly brokered the award of the sweetheart deal to Pharmally, a newly incorporated firm with a paid-up capital of only P625,000.

A thorough inquiry was conducted by the Senate Blue Ribbon committee chaired by Richard Gordon. But the panel’s draft report failed to make it to the plenary because only nine senators signed it: Gordon, Franklin Drilon, Risa Hontiveros, Panfilo Lacson, Leila de Lima, Manny Pacquiao, Francis Pangilinan, Koko Pimentel and Ralph Recto.

Eleven senators refused to sign the report, mostly because Gordon recommended the inclusion of then president Rodrigo Duterte among those who should be indicted: Sonny Angara, Pia Cayetano, Sherwin Gatchalian, Bong Go, Lito Lapid, Imee Marcos, Grace Poe, Bong Revilla, Francis Tolentino, Cynthia Villar and Migz Zubiri.

Today an ongoing joint investigation by four committees of the House of Representatives has linked Michael Yang to a complex scheme of using funds from his suspected drug trafficking activities, later reportedly augmented by dirty money raised from Philippine offshore gaming operations, to finance an alleged reward system for suspects killed by police during Duterte’s bloody crackdown on illegal drugs.

Yang, however, is reportedly no longer in the Philippines. Lao and his co-defendants in the Pharmally mess may also vanish, perhaps by yacht like Alice Guo, or by private jet from Davao City as siblings Mohit and Twinkle Dargani of Pharmally tried to do in November 2021. After all, they can easily post bail for graft.