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Infographic: The Binay web of connections
The Senate scrutiny over alleged anomalies involving Vice President Jejomar Binay and his family has evolved from a hearing about an overpriced parking building in Makati City into a broader probe, including a sprawling real estate in Batangas.
Among other things, the televised hearings have revealed connections that the family supposedly kept in order to maintain certain properties and positions in government and the private sector.
A special report by GMA News' Sandra Aguinaldo illustrated these connections, as culled by GMA News Research using documents from the Securities and Exchange Commission:
The vice president and his wife, Elenita, were listed as incorporators of Agrifortuna Inc. in 1992, but their names would no longer appear in the documents years later, the report said.
Binay's camp said he sold JCB Farms, his piggery business, to Agrifortuna in 2010.
However, as pointed out by former Makati Vice Mayor Ernesto Mercado, a number of people close to the Binays remain part of the company.
Among them is Tomas Lopez Jr., Agrifortuna treasurer since 2008. He was appointed president of the University of Makati in 2000, during Mrs. Binay's term as mayor. In 2010, Lopez was appointed to the Pag-IBIG Fund Board of Trustees, which VP Binay chairs.
Mrs. Binay, who served as Makati mayor from 1998 to 2001, is facing graft charges for the purchase of allegedly overpriced equipment and office furniture for Ospital ng Makati.
The graft and malversation charges in connection with the purchase of P43-million worth of hospital equipment was reopened by the Ombudsman early this year, two years after she was cleared of liability over the said transaction.
The P13-million graft case for the purchase of office furniture, on the other hand, is still pending before the Sandiganbayan Fourth Division.
Omni Security
READ: Makati supplier also Pag-IBIG contractor
Meanwhile, a couple of Agrifortuna officials are also part of Omni Security Investigation Inc., another company that the vice president allegedly co-owns through a "close friend" named Gerry Limlingan.
Since 2013, Omni Security was able to bag nine security services contracts worth P296.8 million from Makati City. Data collected by GMA News Research showed that the company also secured contracts with PAG-IBIG Fund worth P1.365 million.
The four security contracts – spread from January to May 2013 and October 2013 to January 2014 – supposedly did not go through bidding, Aguinaldo's report said.
According to PAG-IBIG president Darlene Berberabe, the transactions had to be done immediately to protect officials from "job-related" threats.
Berberabe admitted in an interview with Aguinaldo that it was Vice President Binay who recommended Omni Security, but clarified that the latter did not use his position of authority to push for awarding contract.
Two officials for both Agrifortuna and Omni Security – Hirene Lopez and Bernadette Portollano – were named as campaign donors to Binay's vice presidential bid in 2010.
'Hacienda Binay'
The focus of the ongoing investigation by the Senate Blue Ribbon subcommittee, however, is now on a 350-hectare property in Rosario town in Batangas, which Mercado said belongs to the vice president.
In his presentation before the subcommittee Mercado said the property, estimated to be worth P1.2 billion, has a British palace garden, a mansion with resort pool, a 40-car garage and a staff house, as well as an imported orchid farm, an air-conditioned piggery, a fighting cock farm, and a man-made lagoon.
In a subsequent hearing, Senator Antonio Trillanes IV presented the Binays' connection to the Rosario farm, claiming the family's legal counsel, Martin Subido, is a dummy being used by the vice president, along with businessman Antonio Tiu:
Appearing before the subcommittee last October 22, Tiu said he bought the property from Laureano Gregorio, who was introduced to him by Subido, his best friend and college classmate.
Gregorio owns the company Agrifortuna, to which VP Binay sold his piggery business in 2010.
Tiu said Gregorio has yet to produce the transfer certificate title for the property, adding, however, that he has usufruct or limited real rights to it that allow him to develop the land for his agribusiness company AgriNurture whose shares are traded on the Philippine Stock Exchange.
Asked if he thought Gregorio was a dummy, the businessman said he did not do a background check on him and was more concerned about the interest of the company.
Meanwhile, Subido is a senior partner at Subido, Pagente, Certeza, Mendoza, and Binay (SPCMB) Law Office, where Makati Rep. Mar-len Abigail Binay, the vice president's daughter, was a partner.
Subido and Tiu have denied that they were dummies for the vice president.
Tiu affirmed during the hearing that his brother, James, made a donation to VP Binay's 2010 campaign.
The vice president's Statement of Election Contributions and Expenditures (SOCE) shows that James and his wife, Anne Buencamino, gave a total of P15 million to the campaign -- each of them donating P7.5 million in two occassions in March 2010, collectively making them the biggest contributors then. – Rose-An Jessica Dioquino/Graphics by Analyn Perez/VS, GMA News Online
Sources: GMA News Research, Securities and Exchange Commission, and GMA News Online archives.
