by Diego Morra
Behind every great man is a crime, an idiom that is as relevant as the tail wagging the dog, when a powerful force is controlled by sinister factions. Now that a whistleblower has materialized from the shadows to spill the beans on Sara Zimmerman Duterte Carpio’s financial operations during her vice presidential campaign, it is best to examine just how serious the allegations are, particularly now that the country has been swamped by a sea of claims from dubious, as well as credible, witnesses and key players in the flood control projects scam and the financial impunity in handling the privatized budgets of the Office of the Vice President (OVP), the Department of Education (DepEd) and much of the bureaucracy.
With Ramil Lagunoy Madriaga coming out, executing a sworn statement and accusing Duterte Jr. of using funds from Philippine overseas gaming operations (POGOs) and drug kingpins to finance her vice-presidential campaign in 2021 to 2022, Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla will now have his work cut out for him. Madriaga claimed that in 2020, upon “instruction” of then Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte, he helped organize a group called Inday Sara Duterte Is My President (ISIP) together with several of Duterte Jr.’s former classmates at San Sebastian College of Law, which Madriaga said was also his alma mater. Sen. Rodante Marcoleta and Sara’s husband also graduated from the same law school.
Madriaga claimed that ISIP Pilipinas became the national support network for Duterte’s presidential bid, with him serving as its national convenor. The group initially received funding from Mayor Sara and other groups. After Duterte won in 2022, Madriaga said he was tasked to help form the Vice-Presidential Security and Protection Group (VPSPG.) He recommended Col. Dennis Nolasco to head the unit. Nolasco later tapped Col. Raymund Dante Lachica to lead the VPSPG. From July 2022 to April 2023, Madriaga said he worked directly under Nolasco and Lachica. Aside from this line of work, Madriaga apparently operated in the most sensitive part of the Duterte Jr. scheme—the distribution of dirty money. He disclosed that he transported huge sums of money in different Metro Manila areas upon orders of Sara Zimmerman Duterte Carpio, the way her finance officers defied the laws of physics to distribute funds from the DepEd to various regional offices within 24 hours.
According to the affidavit, part of his work involved transporting large sums of money to different locations upon the alleged orders of Vice President Duterte. The statement differs from the continuing video series of resigned Ako Bicol Rep. Elizaldy Co, who claimed to have been the maleta man for Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Ferdinand Martin Romualdez and who delivered billions of pesos to the duo from the P100-billion insertions that Co made possible. Co was actually furious when he lost the chairmanship of the appropriations committee at the Lower House. In the case of Madriaga, we have yet to know whether he has an axe to grind against Duterte Jr. or if, upon discernment, he finally realized that having Duterte Jr. as president will be a curse on the Filipino people.
To put icing on his cake, Co claimed that Ilocos Norte Rep. Sandro Marcos was aghast over the inadequate insertions and his reduced share of the loot. The only difference is that is that Madriaga’s cash came from POGOs and drug kingpins while Co’s merchandise was the plundered taxpayer money. Both narratives require corroboration and Co, who claimed he did not get a dirty centavo from the entire operation, is somewhere in Portugal, the Pyrenees, Paris, certainly not in Gaza, where bullets are the cure to any ailment. The better angels of our nature tell us to withhold judgment in the cases of proffered testimonies, particularly in the case of Co, who has refused to repeat his video claims under oath. In the case of Madriaga, he should present himself and testify on the correctness of his allegations in the light of the notoriety of Duterte Jr. in creating her own version of reality. Bad hen, bad egg.
Madriaga claimed one of his cloak-and-dagger operations was in the Timog area, where a duffle bag filled with cash was delivered to a comedy bar owned and frequented by SSC-Law alumni. In that bar, he saw OVP spokesperson Reynold Munsayac, once a classmate of Duterte Jr. The bag was brought upstairs as Munsayac ordered, and kept in an office there. In yet another instance, Madriaga brought a vehicle containing cash to the Ombudsman’s parking lot. Curiously, a guard told him to park at a reserved slot. He then left the car keys on the left front wheel saw someone retrieve the keys and drive off.
On another occasion, Nolasco handed him a white Toyota Vios allegedly carrying about P80 million in cash and instructed to leave in the parking lot of SM Megamall using the same “drop-off” method. The surreptitious deliveries of money apparently started earlier. Madriaga claimed that in February 2020, a M/Sgt. Canlas, a PSG officer he met in Davao, instructed him to retrieve a Toyota Super Grandia from Jollibee Kamuning in Quezon City and bring it to a car wash along Daang Hari in Muntinlupa. He was later told to proceed to Katarungan Village, where he turned over the keys to two men inside a black Honda Civic.
Madriaga’s disclosures dovetail with the Duterte style of using trusted cohorts in distributing money for rewards to assassins involved in political assassinations, as in the case of Jun Pala in 2003, and the dispersal of cash through henchmen, including military officers not authorized as budget officers to handle confidential funds and intelligence funds. Carrying oodles of cash is the standard method of criminal syndicates and drug kingpins and the Dutertes, by their close ties with Chinese businessmen like the ex-presidential economic adviser and Chinese citizen Michel Yang, as well as suspected drug lords, elevated the practice to both the Office of the President (OP) and the OVP. No wonder that in both cases, tails wag the dog and the barking dog holds the gullible country in thrall.
Statement of Kapatid on news reports about Alice Guo’s “special treatment” at the CIW:
These reports are nothing new to us. Families of political prisoners have long observed how “VIPs”—Very Important PDLs—receive conveniences routinely denied to those who are poor with no influence or resources. At the NBP Maximum Compound, even basic amenities that we brought for political prisoners—one water dispenser and two rice cookers for shared, economical cooking and safe drinking water—have been impounded for over a year now. Hindi ibinibigay sa matatanda at maysakit na political prisoners na nag-request nito.
And BuCor also still has to explain the transfer of convicted kidnapper former Gen. Jovito Palparan from the Maximum Security Compound to Minimum Security. Some prisoners are clearly more equal than others. More than high time for a full investigation into these glaring disparities. – Fides Lim, Kapatid spokesperson
