MANILA – A mid-level official at the Philippine Bureau of Customs has been named in a criminal complaint for allegedly amassing unexplained wealth worth the equivalent of $1 million while receiving a monthly salary of only more than $500.
Named in the charge sheet filed before the office of the Ombudsman was Rudy Amistad who has been working at the Bureau of Customs for the past 40 years.
The complaint was filed by investigators of the Revenue Integrity Protection Service (Rips), a special unit established to investigate the lifestyles of officials and employees of the Bureau of Customs and the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR).which are under the control and supervision of the Department of Finance.
The customs bureau and the BIR have been widely perceived to be among the most corrupt and graft-ridden government agencies, along with the Department of Public Works and Highways and Department of National Defense.
In the complaint, Rips investigators said they found Amistad and his family, including his wife and five childtren, to be allegedly living way beyond their means by acquiring assets and properties on a maximum monthly salary of more than $500.
Investigators disclosed they decided to look into Amistad’s assets after discovering that he has not been filing his statement of assets, liabilities and networth (Saln) in 35 of the 40 years that he has been working at the customs bureau.
All civil servants, from the president of the Philippines down to the lowly janitor in a government agency, are required by law to submit their Saln every year mainly to determine whether they have amassed unexplained wealth while in office.
What they discovered in the case of Amistad was that he allegedly enriched himself while in office to the tune of about $1 million.
These include, they said, eight buildings, two parcels of agricultural land, six residential units as well as 14 motor vehicles, including six motorcycles, several sport utility vehicles and a BMW, some of which were in the name of his wife and five children.
But more than that, investigators alleged that Amistad is known among cockfighting aficionados as an operator and owner of a cockpit known as Mactan Tourist Sports Complex and Amusement Incorporated based in Cebu province in the Visayas.
The complaint said that Amistad “usually bets in hundreds of thousands and even millions of pesos (the Philippine currency) during the midnight derbies.” Derbies refer to cockfights in which selected known and big-name aficionados are invited to participate in usually high-stakes betting.
Based on their computations, investigators pointed out that the assets acquired by Amistad were disproportionate to his salary and other lawful income, which they did not clarify.
If found guilty, investigators asked the Ombudsman to dismiss Amistad from the service and file a petition for the forfeiture of his alleged unexplained wealth in favor of the government.
This is in addition to the maximum penalty of imprisonment of up to five years and a fine of about $10,000, according to investigators.
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