Sara Duterte camp: ‘Suspicious transaction’ doesn’t equate wrongdoing

MANILA, Philippines – “Suspicious transaction does not equate to any wrongdoing or unlawful activity.”

This was how Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment counsel responded to the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) report that banks flagged billions worth of suspicious transactions linked to her and her husband, Manases Carpio.

During the House committee on justice’s impeachment hearing on Wednesday, AMLC Executive Director Ronel Buenaventura said 33 suspicious transactions and 630 covered transactions worth P6.7 billion involving Duterte and her husband were flagged by banks.

READ: Over 600 transactions of Sara Duterte worth P6.7B flagged by AMLC

Atty. Michael Poa, spokesperson for Duterte’s defense team, meanwhile argued that the bank’s suspicious transaction report contains “suspicious transactions,” which does not immediately equate to “unlawful.”

“Perhaps the bank thought or tagged it as suspicious, so it went to the AMLC, there was a suspicious transaction report. Now, it doesn’t mean that it was immediately illegal or that there was money laundering or that there was a crime,” Poa, speaking mostly in Filipino, said in a press conference on Thursday.

“In fact, it was just a trigger for the AMLC to see if they wanted to investigate, investigate. And that’s what happened,” he added.

Poa also said that Duterte’s defense team browsed the document and noticed on the attachment of the suspicious transaction report that its basis was media reports on the vice president’s confidential funds issue.

“That could be the trigger for the bank. That’s what the bank was based on. That’s why there’s a suspicious transaction report. But again, I don’t want to speculate on that. That’s all we’ve read. So we don’t have time to give you the full picture yet,” the counsel said in Filipino.

READ: Sara Duterte won’t appear at April 29 House impeachment hearing — Poa

“But at least I want to establish, we want to establish that a suspicious transaction does not necessarily mean or does not automatically equate to any wrongdoing or any unlawful activity,” he reiterated.

Poa also said the billion-peso figure was seen to be “bloated” and appears to be “shocking” since all the deposits and withdrawals were added up over a span of 18 years.

“It is the aggregate of all, ang tawag nila, ay inflows and outflows. Lahat ng deposit, lahat ng withdrawal, ina-add nilang lahat yun. At least yun yung posisyon namin, pananaw namin o pagkakaintindi namin sa reports ng AMLC, na ina-add lang nila lahat yun over a span of 18 years,” said Poa. 

He clarified that he does not say that the AMLC’s report was wrong but noted that the public must be cautious “on how to take those figures.”

In an earlier statement, Duterte denied having billions of pesos worth of transactions in her bank accounts, saying that her service record is “clean.”  /jpv