Nancy Binay: They’re my hardworking pals, not fronts

Sen. Nancy Binay: Her turn. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO

Until February this year, the cakes that elderly residents of Makati City received from their local government on their birthdays came from Cups & Mugs Kitchenette and Catering Services, allegedly owned by Sen. Nancy Binay.

The cakes are now imported from Manila and the supplier is Bakerite on F.R. Hidalgo Street in Quiapo district.

But Senator Binay denies having anything to do with the cakes and says the owner of Cups & Mugs is businesswoman Erlinda Chong.

Her father’s detractors, however, claim that Chong is only a dummy for her in Cups & Mugs and for the Vice President in an 8,877-square-meter real estate property in Comembo village, Makati.

A witness in the investigation being conducted by a Senate blue ribbon subcommittee into the alleged overpricing of the P2.28-billion Makati City Hall Building II has identified Gerry Limlingan as another dummy for the Vice President, this time in a security agency that has contracts with the city government.

Speaking in an interview on dzBB last Sunday, Senator Binay lamented that ordinary people who worked hard to establish their own businesses are being dragged into a campaign to besmirch her family’s name.

‘They’re not fronts’

Binay said she knew Chong and Limlingan but they were not fronts for her family. They have their own businesses, she said.

“We don’t deny we know them,” she said. “I pity these people because on their own, they worked hard for what they have now but they’re being made out to be dummies [for us].”

She said she had warned friends that they might be targeted next and be branded as fronts, with the condominium unit of one of them, for example, being claimed to be hers.

She said she had not seen Chong and Limlingan lately. She usually sees them in social events, she added.

Binay denied she had anything to do with the birthday cakes for elderly residents of Makati, saying the business belonged to Chong, who, according to her, also runs the Makati City Hall cafeteria.

“I deny that I am the supplier of the cake. The supplier of the cake is Cups & Mugs owned by Erlinda Chong. I call her Tita Linda. They also run the canteen at the City Hall. It’s a legitimate corporation. That’s been their business for a long time,” she said.

She said she pitied Chong. “[She] worked hard for that cake [business] and then it will be attributed to me.”

Binay said the Chongs had other businesses, but did not name them.

“Financially, they can put up the cake supply business. They have the expertise,” she said.

Nowhere to be found

But where they put it up is a mystery. An investigation by the Inquirer found no Cups & Mugs at the kitchenette’s given address on Agutaya Street in Pinagkaisahan village, Makati.

Joey Salgado, the Vice President’s spokesperson, said on Saturday night that the city’s General Services Department checked out Cups & Mugs and reported that it owned a building in the area with a 7-Eleven store on the ground floor.

That’s the Kimston Building on Agutaya Street, but a member of the 7-Eleven crew told the Inquirer that he had never heard of Cups & Mugs.

The building’s two upper floors are unoccupied.

Salgado said the General Services Department told him that Cups & Mugs had another office in Guadalupe, Makati, and that he was waiting for a report from the department.

Noting the Inquirer’s finding that the offices that vetted Cups & Mugs’ business papers did not do a good job, Salgado said: “If these allegations are true, there are penalties and accountabilities for the concerned government offices and officials.”

Purely ministerial

Informed that the Vice President, when he was still mayor, was the one who signed the memorandum of agreement for Cups & Mugs to supply cakes for the city’s senior citizens program, Salgado said that the mayor usually signs contracts and memorandums of agreement after the procurement has been completed.

“The signature of a mayor is the last step and is purely ministerial,” he said.

Salgado said the allegations of corruption against the Binay family were coming from only one group, that of former Makati Vice Mayor Ernesto Mercado, the principal witness in the Senate investigation.

“This group has been maliciously fabricating stories against the Vice President and his family for the purpose of escaping their criminal liabilities to which they admitted during their testimonies,” Salgado said.

Guilt by association

Asked about allegations that the Vice President used a dummy to conceal his ownership of a security agency, Senator Binay said people were being accused on the basis of “mere association.”

“I feel like whoever is writing the script is copying the script they used for the [pork barrel scam], where by mere association [one who] is a friend or close to [a certain] family [is condemned]. So that’s the script. Let’s make it appear that these people are dummies [for the Binays],” she said.

Jose Orillaza, former president of Omni Security Investigation and General Services, told the Senate blue ribbon subcommittee that he served as dummy for Vice President Binay in the company, which had won contracts with the Makati City government.

Orillaza also alleged that the Vice President sent his close associate Limglingan to work at the company, though Limlingan’s and the Vice President’s names did not appear in the incorporation papers.

Senator Binay had a knock on the subcommittee investigation, saying the one being accused had been given the burden of disproving the allegations when it should be the accusers who must prove their accusations were true.

“[It’s clear] that what’s happening is that I accuse you, you prove to me I am wrong, instead of I accuse you and here is the evidence that proves my accusations,” she said.

Rejected COA report

Binay also criticized Audit Commissioner Heidi Mendoza for presenting at the investigation her special audit report on the alleged overpricing of medical supplies bought by the Makati City government.

She said Mendoza failed to mention that the Sandiganbayan had rejected her report.

Binay said the subcommittee was not following Senate rules and procedures.

She said the subcommittee prodded a Commission on Audit (COA) official to disclose the findings of a preliminary audit on the Makati City Hall Building II when in the past, COA Chair Grace Pulido-Tan had been careful not to release preliminary findings.

The COA’s preliminary report on the Makati building found red flags that alerted the auditors to possible overpricing.

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