Three days after the freeze order on Vice President Jejomar Binay’s assets was issued, the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA) on Thursday challenged the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) to prove its fairness by looking into the bank accounts of Liberal Party’s (LP) high-ranking members and officials involved in scams.
In a statement, UNA interim president Toby Tiangco claimed many allies of the Aquino administration linked to monetary scandals such as the pork barrel scam and the Disbursement Acceleration Program mess were still free to access their bank accounts.
“If the AMLC is not really allowing LP to use it as an instrument, then AMLC should prove that they are also probing bank accounts of administration allies,” Tiangco said.
The Binay camp has openly accused LP of scheming AMLC’s petition to freeze the Vice President’s bank accounts amounting to P600 million, which the Court of Appeals granted on May 11.
• Court freezes Binay assets | Binay lawyer decries freeze order as ‘defective,’ ‘harassment’
“High-ranking members of the Liberal Party have been involved in a string of multibillion-peso under-the-table deals since President Aquino assumed office in 2010 but the administration has not lifted a finger to file and pursue cases against them,” the UNA statement read.
Tiangco specifically cited the cases of Budget Secretary Florencio “Butch” Abad, whose name was tagged in the pork barrel and DAP mess, and Representatives Edgar Erice and Eric Gutierrez, whose mining companies reportedly practiced massive nickel shipping despite small-scale permits.
“Did they look into the bank accounts of these people?” he said.
The UNA statement also said the Aquino administration was using the issues involving Binay as a “smoke screen” to divert the public from “their allies’ wrongdoings.”
“I respect the judiciary. What we are saying here is that LP is behind AMLC, and LP is relaying inaccurate information to the media,” Tiangco said, adding some people were “twisting the issue” to sabotage Binay’s presidential bid in 2016.
The Vice President on Thursday broke his silence on the freeze order issue, saying he had no “hidden wealth” and denying the 242 bank accounts linked to his name.
• Binay: I don’t have hidden wealth
The AMLC reportedly submitted a report to the Court of Appeals, which revealed that bank deposits under Binay’s name, including his son and alleged dummies, have reached P11 billion.
• AMLC: Binay, allies deposits reach P11B