Plunder raps filed vs. Bongbong Marcos over ‘P205-M pork barrel scam’

A group calling itself iBalik ang Bilyones ng Mamamayan (iBBM) on Wednesday filed a complaint for plunder against Senator Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. for his alleged involvement in the multi-billion-peso pork barrel scam.

In an 18-page complaint filed before the Office of the Ombudsman, iBBM, led by its spokesperson Rafaela David, said Marcos, his former consultant Catherine Mae “Maya” Santos and the alleged pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles must be investigated for violation of Republic Act 7080 or the Anti-Plunder Law.

The complaint stemmed from Marcos’ alleged allocation of P205-million worth of his Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) or pork barrel to the six of the alleged fake non-government organizations (NGOs) allegedly owned by Napoles.

The complaint was filed two years after Marcos' fellow senators, Juan Ponce Enrile, Ramon Revilla Jr., and Jinggoy Estrada, were charged before the Sandiganbayan for plunder in connection with their own alleged involvement in Napoles' scam.

It came a little more than a month before the national elections, in which Marcos is running for vice president.

Later in the day, Marcos blamed the Aquino administration for the complaint filed against him.

In a chance interview with reporters at the sidelines of his campaign sortie in Las Piñas, Marcos said he was no longer surprised with the filing of the complaint as “the present administration has a long-standing tradition of selective justice.”

“Yun na nga ang problema sa atin. Everything is all about politics. Yung justice natin nagiging pulitika na rin,” Marcos said.

“Iyan naman ang ginagawa, kapag hindi ka kaalyado ay kinakasuhan. Pag kaalyado kahit sangkot [sa katiwalian] ay walang ginagawa. Kaya siguro naging biktima na tayo diyan,” he added.

P205-M in PDAF

In their complaint, the iBBM said Marcos’ P205-million worth of PDAF was released to the Napoles-linked NGOs through nine Special Allotment Release Order (SAROs) issued from October 2011 to January 2013.

The iBBM attached in its complaint the printed copies of files from the ledger of the pork barrel scam primary state witness Benhur Luy.

Luy’s ledger, retrieved from his hard disk drive, supposedly contained the records of the Napoles-linked NGOs’ transaction with several lawmakers regarding their PDAF-funded projects.

Luy’s ledger is among the primary evidence of the Ombudsman in its cases filed before the anti-graft court against several lawmakers including Enrile, Estrada and Revilla.

The iBBM said the release of the nine SAROs to the fake NGOs allegedly owned by Napoles were recorded in Luy’s ledger which was first published on May 14, 2014 on the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

“These SAROs constitute part of the Luy files which show that Marcos Jr., himself, was directly involved in stealing the people’s money,” the complaint read.

“Furthermore, due to these organizations’ status as bogus foundations intended only to launder money for the personal enrichment of particular elected officials and private individuals, this P205,000,000.00 public funds never reached the intended beneficiaries as prescribed by law in violation of RA 7080,” it added. —NB/RSJ, GMA News