Why Patricia Bautista sought Duterte's help over row with Comelec chief

The estranged wife of Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Andres Bautista on Tuesday said she sought President Rodrigo Duterte's help since her husband has influential connections, noting that the Chief Executive is someone who is "beyond corruption" who will understand her situation.

"So I only want what is legally mine as a wife of 17 years with four children, so my main concern was to basically find what really is our finances, which belongs to us and which don't. I wasn't getting any straight answers from Andy," Patricia Paz Bautista said in an interview on ANC.

"That's why I decided the person who will understand all of this should be somebody beyond reproach, beyond corruption and all of that and we went to President Duterte," she added.

Mrs. Bautista is claiming that her husband has unexplained wealth amounting to nearly P1 billion.

She met with Duterte five days before she submitted an affidavit detailing her claims to the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI).

She told the President about bank passbooks and other documents she discovered detailing accounts and real estate properties in the name of her husband and some relatives.

Justice Vitaliano Aguirre II said he has already directed the NBI to look into the claim of Mrs. Bautista.

Duterte, for his part, said that he will take a "hands off" approach to the case of Bautista. He also asked the Comelec chief to fix the the trouble he had with his wife.

Mrs. Bautista said she experienced being turned away by big law firms upon learning that the case would be against Chairman Bautista.

"The reason is remember even in my entire experience of this, I was constantly told that he is friends, especially the Ombudsman, he's very close to the Ombudsman and I know that, she's very close to my mother as well... the Ombudsman, Justices, Senators," she said.

"My own experience going to the big law firms, like Romulo and all of that, they refused to catch it. So I was of the opinion that he was probably right, so I have to go to somebody who is not corruptible," she added.

She also pointed out that Bautista is not the victim in the situation.

"Like I said, I don't think in the situation Andy is at all powerless. This is a media war already and something that I would be the last person to participate in, but you can say it is," Mrs. Bautista said.

"So please let us not, pretend that he is a victim. Let us not pretend that he is powerless because he is not. He has a lot of money and funding behind him, he has his connections, he has his friends," she added.

Bautista earlier said he was a victim of infidelity, a claim denied by his wife. —Marlly Rome Bondoc/JST/KVD, GMA News