Good Samaritan returns wallet of Senate's 8th richest member

Arnulfo de Villa, a driver for a software company, was cruising along the Makati City business district on Monday afternoon when he saw a wallet lying on the pavement of Valero Street. He picked up the wallet and noticed that it was bound by an old rubber band. When he opened the wallet, De Villa was stunned to find an identification card that bore the name and picture of Manuel "Mar" Araneta Roxas II, the eighth richest senator in the Philippines. De Villa, who gets by on minimum wage of P385 a day, said he did not think of keeping the wallet even though he has to support his 14-year-old son in Caloocan City. "Di ko tiningnan kay Roxas iyan ... Nung napulot ko, isip ko agad isasauli ko sa inyo," said De Villa, who brought the wallet to GMA Network headquarters in Quezon City. When told that he could have kept the wallet and no one would have known, he said, "Hindi ko naisip ‘yan." Roxas is worth P75.8 million based on his 2005 statement of assets, liabilities and net worth made public last week. The Senator was all praises for De Villa, whom he described as a "guardian angel." "Napakabait po ninyo ... Halos abot-[Mount] Everest ang kabaitan ng Pilipino," Roxas told De Villa over GMA 7's DZBB. Roxas said the wallet contained a non-professional driver's license, two credit cards, P5,000 in bills - and an old rubber band used to bind the wallet. When told about the condition of the wallet, he laughingly said, "hindi talaga ako nagwa-wallet." He said he may have dropped the wallet near the Equitable-PCI Bank in Makati City where he attended an information technology (IT) industry function. "Siguro sa pagbaba sa sasakyan hindi ko napansin nahulog sa bulsa. Noong dumating sa Senado kinkapkap ko, hindi ko namalayan saan ko naiwan, baka naiwan ko sa gym," he said.-GMANews.TV