Duterte defends Lapeña, Faeldon

MANILA, Philippines — They were simply swallowed up by the system.

President Duterte has vouched for the character of his two former Customs chiefs, saying illegal drugs entered the country under their watch because of a corrupt system.

“They are not corrupt. I would not have appointed them if they were corrupt,” Duterte said, referring to former Bureau of Customs (BOC) commissioners Isidro Lapeña and Nicanor Faeldon.

“The illegal drugs slipped past them because they could not overturn the system. There were insiders involved and they were eaten up by the system,” the President said in Filipino during the 39th Masskara Festival in Bacolod City last Saturday.

Critics have said that Lapeña should be indicted for negligence if not direct involvement in shabu smuggling through the BOC instead of being “recycled” as head of the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority.

Faeldon is the new director of the Bureau of Corrections, which has jurisdiction over the New Bilibid Prisons where several high-value drug convicts are held.

Lapeña and Faeldon are two of the dozens of former uniformed men now occupying civilian posts in the Duterte administration. Another former military officer, Rey Leonardo Guerrero, has been appointed BOC chief.

“Kawawa naman (They are pitiful). They worked a lifetime as a soldier, fighting for this country, trying to die and succeeding to die. Then you will treat them like that?” Duterte said.

He added that it was Faeldon who informed him about the manufacturing of fake tax stamps by cigarette maker Mighty Corp., thus enabling the government to collect P40 billion from the company.

“If he were corrupt, why would he give me the tip?” Duterte asked.

Duterte, who had ordered the relief of all BOC department heads, also disputed notions that Lapeña was in cahoots with drug smugglers and justified anew his decision to appoint former military men in Cabinet, saying they obey his orders promptly.

“I am not a foolish president who will issue illegal instructions. I am a lawyer. Do not ask questions. If we turn to the bureaucracy... it would take eternity,” he said.

Malacañang also chided yesterday the critics who are calling for the prosecution of Lapeña, saying the former Customs chief could not be charged without evidence.

“The problem with detractors is they are not lawyers. You cannot just prosecute without evidence. Apart from documentary evidence, there should be testimonies. For now, they are only speculating based on circumstances surrounding it,” said presidential spokesman and chief legal counsel Salvador Panelo in a radio interview.

He pointed out that: “Just because the first lifter contained something and another lifter looks exactly the same as the first one, so it probably contained something as well. That is not admissible before the court. You need to have evidence if you intend to file charges.”

Panelo said the former Customs chief deserved the promotion because he had introduced reforms in the bureau and exceeded revenue targets. However, he clarified that the President is leaving it to the justice department or the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) to investigate the shabu shipment controversy and file charges against those involved.

Aside from the NBI, the Senate is conducting a probe on the controversy. One of the resource persons who appeared in the probe was former customs intelligence officer Jaime Guban, who admitted receiving P10,000 for hiring a consignee of the four magnetic lifters that are believed to have contained shabu.

Guban is also one of the ranking police officials mentioned in a “secret special report” about illegal drug trade. Duterte has ordered his arrest but Sen. Richard Gordon said the Senate could not turn over the custody of the former customs personnel because it is still conducting hearings on the issue.

On Saturday, Duterte clarified that the Senate could continue questioning Guban despite his “arrest order.” He explained: “the senators were mistaken. They thought I was covering up for Guban. I mean they can interrogate Guban but I want him arrested because of a crime.”

He also said that a certain “Fajardo” was unaffected by previous revamps because of “corruption.” It was not clear whether Duterte was referring to former Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency deputy chief Ismael Fajardo, who was relieved last month over his supposed “knowledge” about the multibillion-peso shabu shipment.

Not off the hook

As far as Senator Gordon is concerned, Lapeña is not yet off the hook as the Senate Blue Ribbon committee might still include him in its list of individuals who should be charged for criminal and administrative offenses, including drug trafficking.

“I’m not yet done with Lapeña, though I told him before that to me, he’s at fault. While revenue collections went up, drugs were able to slip through, and under the doctrine of command responsibility, he’s in charge but he was not able to monitor what happened,” Gordon told dzBB.

However, he clarified that he has not seen evidence that Lapeña was part of the syndicate that smuggled the methamphetamine hydrochloride or shabu using scrap magnetic lifters last July and recovered in a warehouse in Cavite last August.

The committee will resume tomorrow its hearing into smuggling and Gordon, who chairs the committee, is expected to submit his preliminary report and recommend the filing of charges against several individuals.

Among those in government he said he will likely recommend to be charged are Guban and his immediate boss, Jeoffrey Tacio; dismissed police officer Eduardo Acierto; Customs deputy commissioner Ricardo Quinto; and Fajardo, among others.

Guban, who is under the custody of the Senate, will be recommended to be included in the government’s witness protection program, he added.

Gordon said he hopes Acierto, who along with Guban is included in Duterte’s “drug list,” would tell all and reveal the masterminds in the drug smuggling so he could also be considered a state witness.

His position was supported by House committee on dangerous drugs chairman Rep. Robert Ace Barbers who said Guban holds the key to unraveling the mystery behind the huge shipment.

“He is a very vital witness. He has revealed some important pieces of information, but we feel that it is still lacking, that he is withholding information perhaps for fear of his safety and that of his family,” Barbers said.

Gordon chided PDEA chief Aaron Aquino and the Philippine National Police (PNP) for not acting fast enough and coordinating with each other so the suspected shabu in the lifters would have been intercepted.

He lamented that Aquino had some information about the Chinese individuals who extracted the drugs from the lifters but did not immediately run after them. He said it was the Blue Ribbon committee that has been uncovering evidence and doing the police work instead of the BOC, PDEA and the PNP. – With Paolo Romero, Jess Diaz