Justice Secretary Leila de Lima INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—Justice Secretary Leila De Lima is not keen on conducting lifestyle check of those implicated in the pork barrel scam for now.
She explained that the Department of Justice and the National Bureau of Investigation’s current focus is the vetting and verification of those government officials identified by businesswoman and alleged pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim Napoles.
“Insofar as the DOJ/NBI is concerned our focus now in this whole PDAF/Napoles issue is the vetting and verification of the truthfulness and veracity of Mrs. Napoles’ allegation in her two affidavits,” De Lima said Monday in a text message.
“We want such process to be as factual, objective and thorough as possible in our search for the truth,” de Lima added.
Aside from a lifestyle check, there are also calls for the opening of the bank accounts of government officials whose names were included in the ”Napolist” as well as the resignation of Cabinet secretaries tagged by Napoles in her affidavit.
Among the Cabinet officials tagged by Napoles were Budget Secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad and Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala and Technical Education and Skills Development Authority Director General Joel Villanueva.
Napoles also listed 20 senators and 100 congressmen, as well as their agents, in her affidavits submitted to the Senate and has offered to become a state witness in the case.
Napoles’ children James Christopher and Jo Christine allegedly forged the signatures of ghost beneficiaries of the P900 million Malampaya Fund.
Her youngest daughter, Jeane, on the other hand faces tax evasion charges after she emerged as the owner of a condominium unit in Los Angeles, California despite having no visible source of income.
Several senators, including Cynthia Villar and Bam Aquino have already said they will oppose any move to spare Napoles’ children from prosecution.
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