In the age of electronic financial transactions, there are Filipinos who remain attached to cash. They carry real money around with them, by the bundle. And they seem aware that there could be something irregular about having large piles of cash on hand, because they don’t declare the actual amount in their possession to foreign authorities.
You’d think Filipinos would have learned from the family of retired military comptroller Carlos Garcia. The two-star general was indicted for plunder after two of his sons were ap-prehended at the San Francisco airport in 2003 for failing to declare $100,000 in their possession. Garcia’s wife Clarita, in a handwritten statement submitted to US immigration and customs authorities to save her sons, explained that her husband earned more than the average Philippine soldier because of the perks that go with being a comptroller.
Five years later, eight ranking officials of the Philippine National Police led by comptroller Eliseo de la Paz, along with several spouses of top PNP officers, were held at the Moscow International Airport for failure to declare 105,000 euros in their possession. The group was leaving Moscow after attending the International Police Conference. The officials now face graft charges in Manila.
In the latest scandal, the wife of a Philippine senator is wearing an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet after her arrest last month at the Las Vegas airport in Nevada. Marissa Lapid, wife of Sen. Lito Lapid, reportedly declared only $10,000 in cash upon entry in the US but omitted declaring $40,000 more in her possession when she flew to Las Vegas on Nov. 27 last year. She reportedly told US authorities that the money was for a house payment, but her husband the senator said in the Philippines that the money was for her medical treatment. How often she has traveled with $50,000 in cash may not be known. But if found guilty of dollar smuggling in the US, she could be sentenced to five years in prison.
Individuals attached to cash could learn lessons from this latest incident, but old habits can be hard to break. Cash may be cumbersome to carry, but it is still preferred particularly by those who don’t like leaving a money trail.