Isko: PHL may lose P200 billion in Marcos estate tax if Bongbong wins

The Philippines will lose more than P200 billion in taxes levied on the estate of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos if his family returns to power via Eleksyon 2022, Manila Mayor Isko Moreno said on Wednesday.

According to Chino Gaston's report on "24 Oras", Moreno's party Aksyon Demokratiko also criticized presidential candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr. for saying there was "some fake news" as regards the family's ill-gotten wealth.

The party said the issue was backed by public documents. 

“Today is 2022. Kapag na-elect ang pamilya na 'yun at tatakbo sila nang anim na taon, mababalewala na yung P200 billion,” Moreno said.

Moreno's remarks came after both the Presidential Commission on Good Government and the Bureau of Internal Revenue rebuffed the Marcos' camp's claim that the pieces of property subject to the estate tax were still under litigation.

Marcos' camp said the BIR and the PCGG had an agreement that the agencies would wait for the court cases to be finished before the taxes were collected.

The PCGG in its response to Aksyon Demokratiko had said that the BIR “already executed its final assessment” on the properties as early as 1993 and that “as early as 1997, the judgment on the tax case had become final and executory.”

BIR commissioner Caesar Dulay in a separate reply said the present leadership of the bureau had written the Marcos heirs a demand letter in December 2021.

The High Court in 1997 denied the petition filed by Marcos Jr. to reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals (CA).

In 1994, the CA ruled that “the deficiency assessments for estate and income tax made upon the petitioner and the estate of the deceased President Marcos have already become final and unappealable, and may thus be enforced by the summary remedy of levying upon the properties” of the late dictator.

Moreno previously vowed to go after the Marcos family’s estate tax debt if he gets elected saying he would utilize it for additional subsidy and for the establishment of 17 world-class regional hospitals in the country.

At a news forum, Marcos on Wednesday said there was "a lot of fake news involved" in the issues regarding his family's ill-gotten wealth.

"There's a lot of fake news involved there, let's leave it to the lawyers to discuss it because the so-called facts that they quote are not facts at all," Marcos said during the Kapihan sa Manila Bay forum when asked to comment on the ill-gotten wealth issue.

He was also asked specifically on the real estate tax debt.

"They are just presumptions, they are not familiar with the cases or they choose not to be familiar with the case so yeah, it’s in the courts," Marcos said.

Marcos said he would abide by whatever the court will order in connection with the case. "Whatever the court orders me to do, I will do," he said. —Sundy Mae Locus/NB, GMA News