NEWS

Banker testifies on money trail of Jose Velarde Account

A BANK officer testified Monday how 189.7 million pesos in alleged commissions to jailed ex-president Joseph Estrada was moved from the private accounts of businessman Jaime Dichaves to the "Jose Velarde" account allegedly owned by Estrada. Full Inquirer text here. The commission was for the sale of a publicly listed gaming corporation that was purchased from its owners with the use of pensions funds from the Philippine Social Security System (SSS). The trouble with Estrada was he lacked proper legal advice on how to make those transfers clean --unlike former Pres. Marcos who employed brilliant lawyers in hiding kickbacks that 16 years after he was ousted from power and still not a single penny of the loot has been recovered by the government. So, I don't know if I am mad at Estrada for being so corrupt or for being sloppy at being corrupt or for both. In any case, he really is stupid.