Joseph Chua breaks his silence

“I want to clear our name. It’s golden,” Joseph Chua tells me.

It is a late Friday afternoon, eight days before Christmas. I am in a coffee shop and across the table is the most controversial son-in-law of taipan Lucio “Kapitan” Tan.

Joseph Chua is many things to many people – friend or foe; famous or infamous; troubleshooter or troublemaker. Some liken him to the self-proclaimed holy man Grigori Rasputin – the mystical adviser in the court of Czar Nicholas II of Russia or to Tom Wambsgans, the in-law infatuated with the Roy Family’s power and prestige, in the TV drama Succession.

In real life, Chua is the husband of Rowena, Tan’s eldest daughter. He played active roles in the taipan’s multi-billion dollar empire as president of MacroAsia and directors in many Tan-owned companies.

Things changed last October 6 when the Tan Group announced Chua was no longer part of it. And ties were officially cut one by one – with MacroAsia, Philippine Airlines and most recently, Hong Kong-listed Dynamic Holdings.

Chua did not know about the newspaper ad, he says, but was not totally surprised because he believes that some quarters wanted him out.

Real life Netflix

Chua wants me to believe him, insisting he merely wants to clear his family’s “name and legacy.” His late grandfather, he notes, is a pre-war businessman and banker, Don Chua Lamko, the name behind a building in Makati.

Allegations against him, he says, were unfounded or were a result of miscommunication.

At this point, I wished I had a bowl of popcorn because it’s as if I’m tuned in to a real-life Netflix series.

Joseph Chua had a lot of tell – from the mundane to the uncanny to the bizarre. This is his story, his truth. I listened intently and for more than two hours, I was on the edge of my seat.

Issue # 1

The last straw that broke the camel’s back was a phone call Chua made to a government official. Supposedly, Chua, in his belief that he was trying to help the empire as a “troubleshooter,” was just “inquiring” about the status of one of Tan’s companies. The phone call, however, was “misinterpreted” as Chua deliberately making the company look bad.

It’s not true, he insists and dares me to call the government official to verify. I accept the challenge.

The official – sleep deprived after an early Christmas party the night before – spoke to me in a hoarse voice, but his position was loud and clear. Chua, during that phone call, was not at all inflicting damage on the company or to anyone in the Tan empire, says the official.

“That’s not true and that’s not fair at all for Joseph,” he says.

Issue # 2

The second issue was about Tan’s business in Guam. Chua allegedly land-grabbed a property from his father-in-law for his own personal property business in Guam. Not true, he says.

Still related to the Guam business, which Chua was in charge of, Chua supposedly was blamed for the temporary closure of American Bakery in February this year, which was due to some government-imposed sanitary procedures. Some quarters insisted the closure was permanent and that it was Chua’s fault, but the bakery had reopened less than a month after, when he was still president of the Guam business, he says.

Issue # 3

Mabuhay Maritime, the flopped Kalibo-Boracay ferry service of Philippine Airlines, was rumored to be Chua’s brainchild and, therefore, his fault PAL lost money from it.

But a former PAL executive belied this, saying that Chua, on the contrary, questioned the feasibility of the project.

These were just some of the major issues that led to Chua’s situation now. There’s a lot more, including business audits he supposedly opposed, but the allegations – he insists, are unfounded and have hurt his family, especially his octogenarian mother.

Nine lives, two cats

Over coffee and fresh juice, but minus the popcorn, Joseph and I discussed just about every possible issue that might have led to his situation now.

In any case, I tell Joseph what business observers have long been saying – that he has nine lives. Maybe, there’s even a second cat, I say in jest. He has been in and out of the empire in the past, and then back again.

Thus, one day, he may find himself back in the empire, I tell him.

But he’s not clinging to his positions, he says, and is busy now with his personal business. He and his wife own the franchise of Jollibee in Guam.

He simply wants to clear his name for the sake of his family.

About Kapitan, whom he described as extremely brilliant and business savvy, he only had good words to say.

“I’m grateful for the opportunity of being trained by Lucio Tan in the past 40 years. I was hired by him and reported to him directly, and also reported directly to Washington Sycip when he was chairman of Macroasia, and to Carmen Tan in the last two years. To them, I owe my wealth of business experiences and life’s teachings for which I will be eternally grateful,” he says.

After more than two hours, we exchange goodbyes. It’s as if I just finished one season of a Netflix series.

What happens next is anybody’s guess. In the House of Tans, the twists and turns are simply unpredictable.

Iris Gonzales’ email address is [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @eyesgonzales. Column archives at eyesgonzales.com