P67-M for Cavite Marine base missing

A Marine captain testified before the Senate yesterday that P67 million in taxpayers’ money intended for road and hospital construction projects in a Marine base in Ternate, Cavite had disappeared.

In a one-page affidavit, Capt. Yuri Pesigan, a civil engineer, said that as a plans and programs supervising officer assigned in Ternate in 1996, one of his duties was to supervise projects at the base.

He said the projects he was personally involved in were road widening and asphalting, canal rip-rapping and the construction of a hospital, for which a total of P67 million was appropriated.

"The budget of P67 million was supposed to cover the cost of the above-mentioned projects. However, the projects remain unfinished to date and the budget of P67 million was totally depleted but never accounted for," he said.

Pesigan’s lawyers told reporters that the Marine officer brought the alleged irregularities to the attention of his superiors but that these were never looked into.

Earlier, Marine Capt. Danilo Luna, in an affidavit, said he personally witnessed the selling of two trucks of ammunition to Muslim rebels in Mindanao in 1997.

The alleged irregularities that the two officers have exposed happened during the administration of former President Fidel Ramos, who was a soldier for most of his public life.

Luna and Pesigan have approached opposition Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr. to help them expose the alleged anomalies. The two young Marine officers, who are Reserve Officer Training Corps integrees, are recipients of several medals awarded to them by their superiors in the course of doing their job.

Pimentel said the two have decided to come out and reveal their personal knowledge of some irregularities because they felt that the July 27 mutineers’ complaint of corruption in the organization they belong to was being glossed over.

"They wanted to refocus the issue, which they said was being buried in the charges and counter-charges brought about by recent events," he said.

He said the two made their revelations at great risk to their lives.

He added that Luna and Pesigan are not among the officers and soldiers who participated in the failed mutiny.

But Armed Forces officials claim the two are among the mutineers.

Lawyers of Pesigan and Luna said their clients have been detained at Fort Bonifacio in Makati City shortly after they appeared with Pimentel in a press conference on Monday.