Bank exec confirms Dichaves transaction

An official of Equitable PCI Bank has confirmed that businessman Jaime Dichaves, a friend of jailed former President Joseph Estrada, had requested him to open savings and current accounts in the name of Jose Velarde.

In a one-page affidavit dated Jan. 12, 2001 obtained by The STAR, Romualdo Dy Tang, executive vice president of Equitable PCI Bank, said that Dichaves through a letter dated Aug. 25, 1999 requested that a savings and current account be opened in the bank’s Juan Luna branch in Binondo, Manila.

"Mr. Dichaves also requested that all banking transactions of Jose Velarde shall be coursed through him," Tang said in his affidavit.

Tang said that on the basis of Dichaves’ request, they opened savings account no. 0160-62501-5 and current account no. 0110-25495-4 in the name of Jose Velarde.

"I am executing this affidavit to attest to the truth and veracity of the above transaction," Tang said.

Tang’s affidavit virtually corroborated the insistence of Estrada that he was not Jose Velarde, and that the account containing millions of pesos belongs to his friend Dichaves.

Estrada earlier denied that he had admitted owning the controversial account in a recent interview, and accused TV network ABS-CBN of putting words into his mouth.

"Let me categorically state that I am not Jose Velarde and I do not own the controversial account," Estrada said.

Estrada said that he was simply a guarantor of a P500 million loan to his friend William Gatchalian, and that Dichaves is the real owner of the Velarde account.

The letter dated Aug. 25, 1999 of Dichaves to Tang was the same letter earlier presented in court by Estrada’s counsel de officio, former Sandiganbayan presiding Justice Manuel Pamaran.

Prosecution witness Theresa Barcelona, branch manager of Equitable-PCI in Herrera-Salcedo in Makati, earlier testified in the anti-graft court’s special division chaired by Associate Justice Minita Chico-Nazario, that a certain Baby Ortaliza made 12 inter-branch deposits in the bank’s Ortigas Greenhills branch for the Velarde account no. 0160-62501-5 maintained in Binondo.

The transactions, made from Oct. 20, 1999 to June 6, 2000 while Barcelona was still manager of the Ortigas branch, consisted of 40 checks amounting to P867,898,817.

Barcelona said she first met Ortaliza on Oct. 20, 1999 and she did not see her anymore after the impeachment trial.

Another prosecution witness, Ma. Pamela Moran, 31, branch sales manager of Security Bank in San Juan, said Ortaliza was the same person who made the deposit transactions for Estrada’s three bank accounts in Security containing more than P12 million.

The prosecution panel said that Barcelona’s and Moran’s testimonies laid down the basis for their claims that Estrada and Velarde are one and the same person.