Revilla Sr. linked to pork scam

NARDONG PUTIK. Former Sen. Ramon Revilla Sr., a former actor, is said to have fathered at least 80 children. Only 40 children are acknowledged in a book found at the MemoRevilla Gallery/Museum in Cavite.

Former Sen. Ramon Revilla Sr. and his son, incumbent Sen. Ramon Revilla Jr., gave millions of pesos from their pork barrel entitlements to one of the dummy nongovernment organizations of detained businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles for livelihood projects in Mindanao, according to documents obtained by the Inquirer.

Revilla Sr., who served as a senator for two terms, from 1992 to 2004, was earlier cited by scam whistle-blower Benhur Luy as one of the earliest clients of Napoles’ JLN Corp., which is at the center of the P10-billion pork barrel scam allegedly masterminded by Napoles.

Revilla Jr., with Senators Juan Ponce Enrile and Jinggoy Estrada, has been slapped with a plunder complaint in the Office of the Ombudsman for the alleged misuse of his pork barrel allotments from the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) in the P10-billion scam.

According to documents obtained by the Inquirer, Revilla Sr. funneled millions of pesos to People’s Organization for Progress and Development Foundation Inc. (POPDFI), one of the Napoles-linked dummy organizations headed by Merlina Suñas.

Suñas, one of the ex-Napoles employees who blew the whistle on the P10-billion scam, has executed affidavits implicating legislators, Napoles and government officials in a conspiracy to defraud the government.

Suñas’ sworn statements were among those that became the basis of the plunder complaints that the National Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Justice filed in the Office of the Ombudsman against Revilla Jr., Enrile, Estrada, Napoles and 34 others in connection with the P10-billion pork barrel scam.

In an undated letter to Nestor Rodriguez, then executive director of the Department of Agriculture’s (DA) Caraga regional field unit, Revilla Sr. named Suñas, the POPDFI president, “to be the conduit in the procurement and distribution of various farm inputs to the small and marginal farmers.”

Revilla Sr. also signed a tripartite memorandum of agreement (MOA), dated May 3, 2004, between him, Suñas and Rodriguez to implement projects in the province of Surigao.

A copy of the MOA, notarized by Henry Nicdao with PTR No. 289414-7, was given to the Inquirer by Luy and Suñas’ lawyer, Levito Baligod.

Revilla Jr. endorses POPDFI

Two years later, Revilla Sr.’s senator son would be writing to Domingo Panganiban, then acting secretary for agriculture, to also endorse POPDFI and Suñas as the “partner” of the government in implementing livelihood projects.

“It is with utmost trust that I endorse to you POPDFI, a nongovernment organization engaged in development activities,” Revilla Jr. wrote in the letter to Panganiban dated June 6, 2006.

In the letter, Revilla Jr. talked about the release of P50 million under special allotment release order (Saro) 06-023362 dated May 9, 2006, from his PDAF for the implementation of agricultural livelihood projects to be spearheaded by Suñas.

In the same letter to Panganiban, Revilla Jr. requested that the municipalities of Del Carmen, Surigao del Norte, and Esperanza, Agusan del Sur, and the Caraga region be made recipients of the funds.

More pork for Surigao

In another letter dated April 10, 2007, addressed to Ricardo Regis, officer in charge (OIC) and regional executive director of the DA regional field unit in Caraga, Revilla Jr. also endorsed POPDFI as the DA’s partner in the implementation of livelihood projects in Sta. Monica, Surigao del Norte, and Marihatag and San Miguel in Surigao del Sur. He said P25 million in funds had been released for these and other projects under Saro ROCS-07-05487 dated March 23, 2007.

“The release of financial assistance out of my PDAF is my share and recognition of your agency’s tireless efforts to deliver the promise of this administration on poverty alleviation,” he said in his letter to Regis.

In the same letter, he designated Richard Cambe his representative.

“I also would like to assign my OIC chief of staff, Atty. Richard Cambe, to represent and act [on] my behalf to pursue this purpose and objective,” he wrote to Regis.

History with Napoles

In his own affidavits, Luy said that between 2003 and 2004, the elder Revilla channeled P35 million of his PDAF to local government units—Clarin, Misamis Occidental (P10 million); San Quintin, Pangasinan (P5 million); Porac, Pampanga (P5 million); Siniloan, Laguna (P5 million); San Juan, Leyte (P5 million), and Dawis, Bohol (P5 million).

The company that was used in implementing the projects was Jo-Chris Trading, named after the eldest Napoles daughter, Jo Christine, he said.

Luy said he, Napoles and the latter’s husband, Jaime, used to call on the elder Revilla in his Senate office where he first met Cambe, who would later figure in the P10-billion scam involving the younger Revilla. Cambe was a member of the elder Revilla’s Senate staff, Luy said.

Cambe has been identified by the whistle-blowers as one of the senior congressional staff members who served as conduits for channeling the congressional pork barrel funds from lawmakers to Napoles.

In one of the transactions that the whistle-blowers’ lawyer, Baligod, furnished the media last August, it was revealed that Cambe received P9.5 million from JLN Corp. on April 11, 2007, drawn from a P20-million project of Revilla Jr. in 2008.

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 First posted 12:59 am | Sunday, February 2nd, 2014