The curious case of Napoles

 It is sickening, if not revolting, to learn how pork barrel funds were lost to corruption in the government. What makes it worse is the purported involvement – whether wittingly or unwittingly – of certain lawmakers. We have been hearing lately denials or claims about their signatures being forged. Some point the blame to their staff in Congress for not exercising due diligence.

These allegations on the misuse of Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF), or the pork barrel funds of members of Congress showed sheer greed by those people in and out of the government who enriched themselves at the expense of Filipinos. The nefarious trade was allegedly perpetrated by people who transacted funding assistance for projects purportedly for the constituents of these members of Congress.

A number of senators and congressmen, many of who still walk the halls of Congress, are now having “sleepless nights” as Department of Justice (DOJ) Secretary Leila de Lima said yesterday at the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee public hearing on the ongoing investigation into the alleged pork barrel scam.

We got a glimpse of how the alleged pork-barrel scam went on through these years undetected because almost everyone involved were into it. This we heard from the principal whistleblower in the pork barrel scam, Benhur Luy who pointed to his cousin, businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles as the mastermind.

Incriminating pictures have been surfacing in media, showing certain senators posing with Napoles and her family. But those pictures cannot establish “guilt by photography” as the Malacañang Palace spin masters put it. It turns out even President Benigno “Noy” Aquino III has his own photos with Napoleses.

More presidential photos with the Napoleses came out but these were actually official releases by the Palace yesterday as preemptive strike against those who may have agenda to pin down P-Noy also on the pork-barrel scam. This was a day after an Instagram photo of Jeane Napoles posing with P-Noy suddenly emerged in the social media.

The presidential photos were taken supposedly when P-Noy obliged with “photo-ops” during one of his sorties in Cebu in November last year. The Palace spin masters were now decrying supposed attempts to redirect the public outrage to a very popular President like P-Noy.

President Aquino is not spared from suspicions on this pork barrel scam. After all, P-Noy served for three consecutive terms as Tarlac congressman and for three years as senator. P-Noy’s hands may be clean but suspicious minds would hear none of it. This was made worse by the fact that Napoles — who turned fugitive to escape arrest for Luy’s serious illegal detention case earlier — surrendered to P-Noy at the Palace last month.

Under oath before the Senate hearing, Luy testified for five hours yesterday under intense grilling by the senators. Luy narrated in detail how the entire scheme of funneling PDAF to fictitious non-government organizations (NGOs) were set up to commit this heinous crime.

In the third hearing of the Senate on the pork-barrel scam, Luy was brought to the senators by De Lima whose office is providing security for him under the government’s Witness Protection Program (WPP). In her opening statement, De Lima admitted they merely stumbled into the pork barrel scam after Napoles and her brother Reynald were charged with serious illegal detention of Luy. 

These culprits, once unmasked as direct beneficiaries of this pork barrel scam, deserve to be sent to the gallows for life. We don’t have death penalty anymore here in our country. That’s the maximum penalty for plunder because the public funds involved here amounted to more than P50 million. That is if these allegations are proven true and they get convicted in courts. But speaking with reality, we know it will take years before this would happen, perhaps even long after President Aquino’s term of office is over in 2016.  

In his testimony, Luy claimed Napoles entered into agreements of sorts with the legislators that 50 percent of their PDAF releases to her NGOs would go back to them as their share. Luy claimed the balance of 50 percent was divided as follows: 10 percent for the implementing agencies as “SOP” (standard operating procedure) and 40 percent to Napoles.

Napoles had to go through the chiefs of staff of some legislators, with whom Luy did not have direct contact. In such cases, Luy said that Napoles would haggle to bring down the 50 percent share of the legislators and whatever rate reduction they agree on would go to the chiefs of staff.

Napoles would give the NGOs a share of one percent only, which was divided further to 0.5 percent for the presidents and 0.5 percent to the incorporators. Luy confessed he was one of them and the rest to his fellow pseudo NGO officials, some of whom have also decided to turn whistleblower like him against Napoles. 

In his first public appearance, Luy said he worked for Napoles since 2002 during which time he heard her regularly talking to politicians over the phone about their PDAF.  

According to him, Napoles and her trusted people have dealt with Department of Budget and Management (DBM) on projects and programs that may be funded by the PDAF and the government implementing agencies (IA) that are authorized to handle those projects.

However, before the funds were actually transferred to the legislators, Luy explained Napoles would ask for the endorsement letters from the senators and congressmen for her NGOs as recipients of the PDAF.

These were the endorsement letters that were earlier presented by Commission on Audit chairman Grace Pulido-Tan during the first public hearings of the Senate on the pork barrel scam. In the COA review of the use of the PDAF from 2007 to 2009, Tan testified some of these legislators identified the NGOs that will receive their PDAFs.

Luy said that they would make it appear that the one to five percent would be for the payment of tax for their receipts. It’s no wonder Bureau of Internal Revenue commissioner Kim Henares is having difficulty finding any evidence to pin down Napoles and her NGOs.

The Napoles pork barrel scam is getting curiouser and curiouser, as Alice in Wonderland says. Let’s wait for the next chapter of this story.