{"id":247007,"date":"2020-03-04T20:21:06","date_gmt":"2020-03-05T01:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=247007"},"modified":"2020-03-04T20:21:06","modified_gmt":"2020-03-05T01:21:06","slug":"rogue-bi-officials-face-graft-charges-over-pastillas-scheme","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2020\/03\/04\/rogue-bi-officials-face-graft-charges-over-pastillas-scheme\/","title":{"rendered":"Rogue BI officials face graft charges over ‘pastillas’ scheme"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Around 800 BI personnel have been reshuffled in compliance with Duterte\u2019s directive to revamp the bureau. (File Photo<\/a>: Bureau of Immigration, Republic of the Philippines\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MANILA<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 Malaca\u00f1ang on Wednesday said that as soon as there is probable cause, rogue officials and personnel of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) will still face graft charges for their alleged involvement in the \u201cpastillas\u201d racket at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).<\/p>\n

Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo made this remark after President Rodrigo Duterte on Tuesday bared that he is finalizing a list of BI officials and personnel he will dismiss over their involvement in the bribery scheme.<\/p>\n

Panelo said Duterte will fire them \u201cas soon as he finds probable cause for them to be removed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWala naman siyang binanggit<\/em>\u00a0(He did not mention when he will fire them) but knowing the President it will come soon. Sooner than we think,\u201d he said in an interview in\u00a0Malaca\u00f1ang.<\/p>\n

Asked of BI Commissioner Jaime Morente\u2019s possible inclusion on Duterte\u2019s list, Panelo maintained that there will be \u201cno sacred cows.\u201d<\/p>\n

Panelo earlier said that Duterte is giving Morente a chance to fix the mess hounding his department. However, he remains subject to the National Bureau of Investigation\u2019s (NBI)\u2019s ongoing investigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cKung merong ebidensiya na<\/em>\u00a0involved\u00a0siya di rin siya makakaligtas<\/em>\u00a0(If there is evidence that shows he is involved, he will not be off the hook),\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He maintained that Duterte will never tolerate corruption within the government.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Duterte said some of the officials on his list were his fraternity brothers from the San Beda University-based Lex Talionis Fraternitas.<\/p>\n

\u201cAyaw ko kasi \u2018yung iba kilala ko. Kaya lang \u2018yung iba mga brod ko. Iyong iba<\/em>\u00a0(I don\u2019t like it because some of them I know personally. But some of them are my brods. Others) were with me in \u201888 when I first ran for the mayorship, that was \u201888, \u201998,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

However, Duterte did not bare their names.<\/p>\n

He earlier ordered the relief of around 19 BI personnel after receiving reports and finding probable cause to remove them from the bureau due to their supposed unlawful money-making activity.<\/p>\n

Around 800 BI personnel have been reshuffled in compliance with Duterte\u2019s directive to revamp the bureau.<\/p>\n

Morente said the practice of rotating and changing assignments on a regular and programmed basis is both a method to enable better performance and encourage skill upgrades and a precaution against graft and corruption.<\/p>\n

Besides the shakeup, Duterte said he would ask the Civil Service Commission to give him a list of \u201cfirst-grade\u201d passers who have \u201cgood\u201d scholastic records to replace the erring BI personnel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MANILA\u00a0\u2013 Malaca\u00f1ang on Wednesday said that as soon as there is probable cause, rogue officials and personnel of the Bureau …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":232415,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,95],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-247007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-ph","mauthors-azer-parrocha","mauthors-philippine-news-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=247007"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247007\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":247008,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/247007\/revisions\/247008"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/232415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=247007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=247007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=247007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}