Prosecution: LandBank officials’ testimony reinforces Madriaga’s claims

MANILA, Philippines — The prosecution panel in the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte said the testimonies of two former Land Bank of the Philippines (LandBank) officials strengthened the allegations made by Ramil Madriaga, who claims to have served as one of the vice president’s former aides.

Speaking to reporters after Wednesday’s impeachment proceedings, Lanao del Sur Rep. Zia Alonto Adiong, one of the prosecution’s spokespersons, said the testimonies of former LandBank branch managers Violeta Constantino and Nenita Camposano corroborated the contents of Madriaga’s affidavit, which was presented during the House of Representatives Committee on Justice hearing on April 14.

During that April 14 hearing, Madriaga alleged that Duterte instructed him to transport four large bags containing the P125 million in confidential funds on Dec. 20, 2022.

During the trial before the Senate impeachment court, Constantino said that the Office of the Vice President (OVP) personnel withdrew the cash on December 20, and placed the P125 million in four large gym bags.

“Of course yes (Madriaga’s claim was bolstered), because in the presentation, it seems the two bank managers and Madriaga do not know each other. But their statements have similarities, whether it’s the description of how the money was contained, what kind of bag, how many bags were used, and the date that led to the release of the cheques, there are similarities,” Alonto Adiong said.

“I don’t think this is a made-up story agreed by these three individuals, right? So it would definitely give credence and credibility to the testimony of Madriaga,” he added.

In an earlier press briefing, prosecution spokesperson and former Surigao del Norte Rep. Robert Ace Barbers also said this “striking coincidence” is another unusual matter — referring to Constantino and Camposano’s observations that the OVP and Department of Education (DepEd) transactions were unusual.

“It is also unusual for the testimonies of Ramil Madriaga and our first witness, who is the bank manager, to match each other. They said the same things — four bags used to contain the cash, three P30 million and one P35 million. And now this was confirmed through the testimony of our bank manager today,” Barbers said in Filipino.

“This was mentioned last April by Ramil Madriaga. So again, there’s a striking coincidence, perhaps, we may call it, that there is this kind of information shared by our bank manager today, which Ramil Madriaga shared last April when he faced Congress,” added Barbers.

Early in the trial, the prosecution presented Constantino — department manager for LandBank’s Shaw Boulevard branch — as its first witness for Article I of the Articles of Impeachment, which deals with the alleged misuse of CF within Duterte’s offices.

Part of Constantino’s testimony centered on the OVP’s encashment of the P125 million cash in December 2022, where three to four gym bags were used to carry it from the LandBank branch in Shaw Boulevard.

Madriaga, meanwhile, told the House committee on justice that Duterte ordered him in December 2022 to coordinate with Col. Dennis Nolasco about delivering cash to allies in San Pablo, Laguna; a comedy bar in Quezon City, and the Office of the Ombudsman parking lot as a way of “returning a favor.”

According to Madriaga, four large duffle bags were unloaded from the vehicles, three of them were dark and one was light-colored — containing around P30 million to P35 million each.

Madriaga claimed that he liquidated the P125 million CF in one day, and not the reported 11 days.

Both Constantino and Camposano admitted that OVP and DepEd’s transactions were unusual.

Constantino said this when Senator-judges Erwin Tulfo and Risa Hontiveros asked her whether OVP’s decision to withdraw P125 million in one swoop is unusual.

After Tulfo’s questioning, Hontiveros asked whether Constantino, in her 32 years of banking experience with the LandBank, had seen such a transaction. Constantino said it was her first time.

Camposano, when asked by Senator-judge Imee Marcos, also said that the DepEd’s withdrawal of its P37.5 million CF was also unusual as it was the biggest transaction made by the agency.

The P125 million withdrawn by OVP in December 2022 refers to the CF that was allocated to the agency under Duterte, despite the original budget not having any entry for such purposes.

The original OVP budget was crafted during the time of then-Vice President Leni Robredo, who participated during the budget deliberations in 2021.

Since Robredo left office in June 2022, Duterte inherited a budget crafted by her predecessor.

This issue became the smoking gun for House lawmakers to look into the CF allocations obtained by OVP under Duterte.

In August 2023, former ACT Teachers party-list Rep. France Castro said Duterte violated laws when funds were realigned for CFs in 2022, as there was no item for this purpose in the 2022 budget. /gsg

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