Calida family’s security firm also bagged deal to secure House, solons say

Opposition congressmen on Monday said that the security agency owned by the family of Solicitor General Jose Calida had also gotten the contract to provide security services to the House of Representatives.

Magdalo party-list Representative Gary Alejano said Vigilant Investigative and Security Agency, Inc. (VISAI) had taken over from the House's "long-time security agency" Lockheed.

He showed reporters pictures of security guards with the name Vigilant on their uniforms.

Akbayan party-list representative Tom Villarin also claimed VISAI had scored a deal with the House.

"Is Calida trying to secure our government offices or the family's financial fortunes?" Villarin said in a statement.

Other government bodies serviced by the agency between 2015 and 2018 include the Department of Justice (P12.44 million), the Philippine Amusement Gaming Corporation (P83.05 million), the National Economic and Development Authority (P6.88 million), and the National Parks Development Committee (P39.61 million), according to GMA News Research.

Calida's camp has said that there was no conflict of interest between him serving as Solicitor General and his family's security agency cornering multi-million-peso government contracts.

A statement from the Office of the Solicitor General said Calida had resigned the chairmanship of VISAI in May 2016, before President Rodrigo Duterte appointed him to his post.

A general information sheet of VISAI submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on September 2016 but supposedly covering a period of April 2016 showed Calida owned 60 percent of the firm.

The remaining 40 percent was equally divided among his wife, Milagros -- who now sits as the agency's chairperson and president -- and their three children.

Villarin and Alejano said Calida should be investigated in connection with the security agency issue, which blew up over the weekend, though a complaint had been filed against the solicitor general at the Office of the Ombudsman for the same charge on May 10. —NB, GMA News