15 Marcos paintings seized; no masterpiece in haul?

MANILA, Philippines – Agents of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG) seized yesterday 15 paintings from the Marcos residence in San Juan City in compliance with an order from the Sandiganbayan.

The chief of staff of former first lady Imelda Marcos, however, said only minor paintings were seized.

Filadelfo Diaz said the NBI and PCGG agents apparently were not able to recover any of the eight expensive paintings ordered seized by the Sandiganbayan.

The government agents held off bodyguards of the Marcoses who arrived with the family’s lawyers apparently to document the seizure proceedings.

Diaz said the paintings seized from the San Juan house of the Marcoses did not include the eight covered by the seizure order issued by the anti-graft court.

He said the 15 paintings that were confiscated were “minor paintings”and the government agents did not recover any artwork from the office of Mrs. Marcos at the House of Representatives.

Diaz said only tarpaulin replicas were displayed at the House office used by Mrs. Marcos as an Ilocos Norte congresswoman.

Authorities said they would have to verify the authenticity of the 15 artworks.

“The total should have been 16 but one of the paintings was very big, almost as big as a door measuring about 4 x 8 feet,” said NBI-Reaction Arrest and Interdiction Division (RAID) acting chief Eric Isidoro.

There are about 140 paintings mentioned in the Sandiganbayan’s order.

The NBI escorted the Sandiganbayan sheriff and representatives of the PCGG and the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) in bringing the paintings to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

Isidoro said it was not yet certain if all the seized artworks were original.

“This would still be validated. It would be difficult to say at this time since these would still have to go through a series of examinations,” he said.

He cited as an example three copies of the “Madonna and Child” that they found at the Marcos residence located along Don Mariano Marcos Street corner P. Guevarra in San Juan.

“There is a possibility that all the three ‘Mother and Child’ paintings are replicas, or maybe one is genuine and the two others are replicas,” Isidoro said, adding that verification would take time.

“There was no commotion but we had to stop the bodyguards because they were already meddling, they were taking pictures of those who served the order. We talked to them and told them to stop and they listened,” he added.

The NBI arrived at the area at around 10 a.m. The Marcos lawyers came late in the afternoon.

It was the role of the NBI to provide security and maintain peace during the implementation of the order. The marking and transporting of the artworks were left to other members of the composite team.

They left the Marcos house at past 5 p.m.

The NBI dispatched teams to four known addresses of the Marcoses in Metro Manila to assist the PCGG in implementing the writ of attachment issued by the Sandiganbayan for the artworks.

“Of the four known addresses that we visited, it was only in the house in San Juan where we were able to find paintings,” said NBI Anti-Organized and Transnational Crime Division (AOTCD) head agent Rommel Vallejo.

“The information I got is that the paintings recovered from the house were big paintings,” he added.

A fifth address identified by the Sandiganbayan is in Batac, Ilocos Norte.

The AOTCD agents divided themselves into two teams and proceeded to 34 Penthouse Plaza Condominium along Ayala Avenue in Makati and at the penthouse at One McKinley Place on 3rd Avenue corner 26th Street, Bonifacio Global City.

The Death Investigation Division (DID) went to Mrs. Marcos’ office at Room NB-218 of the House of Representatives.

NBI-DID chief Joel Tovera said their operation turned out negative because the artworks found in Marcos’ office in Congress were reproductions while others were not paintings.

The NBI operatives who joined the operation assembled at the PCGG early yesterday morning for the briefing before they proceeded to the sites.

The paintings ordered seized include the Madonna and Child by Michelangelo Buonarroti, Femme Couchee VI (Reclining Woman VI) by Picasso, Portrait of the Marqueza de Sta. Cruz by De Goya, and Still Life with Idol by Gauguin, the LaBaignade Au Grand Temps by Pierre Bonnard, Vase of Chrysanthemums by Bernard Buffet, Jardin de Kew pres de la Serre 1892 by Camille Pisarro, and L’Aube by Joan Miro. – With Helen Flores