(Eagle News) A graft case and other criminal charges were filed against former President Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III and former Finance Secretary Cesar Purisima before the Office of the Ombudsman on Wednesday (September 14) .
The charges were filed due to failure to collect P100 billion in taxes from Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. (PSPC) from 2004 to 2009.
Aquino and Purisima were charged with violation of Section 3(e) and 4 of Republic Act 3019 or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act, Section 10 of RA 9851 in relation to Executive Order No. 226 or the Institutionalization of the Doctrine of Command Responsibility in all government offices, and Sections 3601 and 3604 of the Tariff and Customs Code, which refers to smuggling.
Aside from the two, PSPC Chairman and President Edgar Chua, Vice President for Communications Robert Kanapi, Country Tax Manager Nigel Avila and other John Does were also charged.
The complainants, former Bureau of Customs (BOC) Commissioner Napoleon Morales, former BOC district collector Juan Tan, and Headlines News Today publisher Lourdes Aclan, accused Aquino and Purisima of snubbing PSPC’s supposed failure to pay the right taxes for their gasoline shipments which were wrongfully declared as non-taxable products.
The complainants also said that Aquino, Purisima and the other accused “were silenced into submission” by PSPC.
“Since 2011, the former President and DOF Secretary did nothing but allowed PSPC to continuously use the P7.348 billion and P1.99 billion government revenue for its own use and benefits, thereby giving it unwarranted benefits, and causing undue grave injury to the government,” they stressed.
This is the fifth case filed against Aquino since he stepped down from his office. He is facing a complaint over the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) and three others related to the Mamasapano encounter.