MANILA, Philippines—A former executive of the Road Board whom Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago wanted to be charged with plunder for the alleged misuse of billions of pesos of the road user’s tax owns yachts, expensive cars and luxury condominiums.

But Santiago made it clear that her bid to bring to court Rodolfo “Dodi” Puno, a brother of Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno, had nothing to do with the latter’s tirade against her that she was allegedly “pursuing a program of personal vendetta.”

“No. Mr. Ronnie, don’t flatter yourself,” the senator said in her sponsorship of Senate Resolution No. 1413, which urges the Ombudsman to prosecute Dodi Puno and other Road Board members, including former Public Works Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane, a presidential aspirant.

“I am conducting an infinite vendetta against all crooks in the country,” she added.

Dodi Puno could not be reached for his side as of press time. He is in the United States.

There has been bad blood between Santiago and Puno, whom she accused of being behind the cheating during the 1992 presidential election which saw Santiago losing to Fidel Ramos.

Dodi Puno served as executive director from 2005 to the first half of 2008 of the Road Board. He was succeeded by Danilo Valero, who Santiago said happened to be an assistant secretary of Ronaldo Puno at the Department of the Interior and Local Government.

Apparently angered by Dodi Puno’s television interview in which he claimed that Santiago’s attack on him had to do with personal vendetta, the senator dared Puno to continue to attack her.

“Now you can attack me about this but I will name your girlfriends so that their paramours will catch them,” Santiago said in Filipino, eliciting laughter on the floor.

Santiago said Puno was a married man with children but he was courting actresses and beauty queens who were also married.

Santiago cited the Daily Tribune column of former senator Ernesto Maceda and that of Philippine Daily Inquirer columnist Ramon Tulfo on the alleged lavish lifestyle of Dodi Puno.

Maceda said in his Oct. 1 column that Puno owned two yachts, expensive cars, luxury condominiums and “gives expensive parties and has been totally indiscreet in his moneyed pursuit of movie stars and beauty queens.”

Maceda said Santiago was right in saying there was prima facie case of plunder against Puno as he cited Road Board records released by former Nueva Ecija Gov. Tomas Joson showing that P3 billion was released for aluminum road guards that would otherwise cost P1 billion. The project was awarded to two contractors without public bidding.

Tulfo’s column did not identify Dodi Puno but noted that a brother of a high government official who used to be a public servant himself bought a huge house in Boracay for P250 million.

Tulfo said the brother “earned billions of pesos from motor vehicle owners when he was still in government.”

The columnist also said that he saw the yacht owned by the brother at the Manila Yacht Club and noted that “from the size of the yacht, it must cost him a fortune.”

“This man doesn’t know how to hide the fruits of his corruption,” Tulfo said in his Nov. 5 column.

Santiago said that a provincial administrator of Iloilo had written her in September that during Puno’s watch at the Road Board he had released P12 million in road projects for the municipal government of Pavia compared with the P5 million received by the Iloilo provincial government.

This prompted Santiago to say: “One thing you can say about the Puno brothers, they don’t allow the facts to get in the way of their ideology.”