MANILA – Detained-Senator Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr. closed 11 of his 43 bank accounts between years 2009 and 2014. Of these, six accounts were closed on July 28, 2009 and five others were closed when the multi-billion pork barrel scam scandal was exposed.
The six accounts first closed were at the Asiatrust Bank. With the other five, two accounts were closed on August 11, 2014 at the Asia United Bank and three were closed on October 9, 2013, September 30, 2013 and September 16, 2013 at the CTBC Bank.
The Sandiganbayan was able to secure a meager P291,205.62 of Revilla’s P224.5 million in assets and bank accounts. The garnished monies were taken from five accounts: the biggest containing P190,145.57 at the Bank of Commerce, followed by P72, 195.17 at the Land Bank of the Philippines, P24,606.94 at the Asia United Bank, P3,319.92 at Metrobank, and the smallest P938.02 also at Metrobank.
The total amounts secured were Revilla’s alleged commissions from the pork barrel kickbacks. However, the senator apparently withdrew funds from two other accounts before the garnishments. He reportedly had accounts at the Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC) and at the Philippine National Bank but both accounts showed zero balance at the time of the garnishment order.
With the prosecution’s request for a preliminary writ of attachment or garnishment granted while proceedings were ongoing, Revilla has then no longer been allowed to dispose his wealth as his assets and accounts were under a temporary freeze order.
“The accused is not an ordinary person. He has the means and capacity to conceal, remove or dispose of the monies and properties he unlawfully acquired. It may well be observed that the accused has abused the ordinary Priority Development Assistance Funds (PDAF) processes to cloak with a mystique of legality their nefarious scheme of siphoning public monies for their own,” the prosecution said.
The garnishment, however, was only temporary until the court issues its final ruling in the case.
Aside from Revilla’s bank accounts, his 28 real estate properties and 15 vehicles were also ordered by the court to be temporarily frozen as they were allegedly part of his ill-gotten wealth from the scam.
The real estate properties were in Ayala Alabang, Cavite, Muntinlupa, Rizal and Tagaytay. The cars, on the other hand, were from automobile brands BMW, Hyundai, Isuzu, Lexus, Mitsubishi, Nissan and Toyota.
Revilla then faced plunder charges in connection with the pork barrel scam and was detained at the Philippine National Police Custodial Center. Also linked to the scam were alleged mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles, senators Jinggoy Estrada and Juan Ponce Enrile, and representatives Rizalina Seachon Lanete and Edgar Valdez.