By Moira Encina
Eagle News Service
The Volunteers Against Crime and Corruption and the Vanguard of the Philippine Constitution Inc. filed on Monday a criminal complaint against former President Benigno Aquino III and several others over the Dengvaxia mess.
Apart from Aquino, facing the complaint for technical malversation, criminal negligence, violation of the Revised Penal Code and other violations were former Budget Secretary Florencio Abad; former Health Secretary Janette Garin; Health Undersecretaries Carol Tanio, Gerardo Bayudo, Lilibeth David and Mario Villaverde; Health Assistant Secretaries Lyndon Lee Suy and Nestor Santigao; Department of Health Financial Management Service director Laureano Cruz; DOH director Joyce Ducusin; DOH director Mar Wynn Bello; DOH director Leonila Gorgolon, DOH director Rio Magpantay; DOH director Ariel Valencia; Director Julius Lecciones and retired DOH undersecretary Nemesio Gako.
Resigned DOH undersecretaries Vicente Belizario Jr., Kenneth Hartigan-Go, resigned head executive assistant to Garin Yolanda Oliveros, and directors and officers or employees of Zuellig and Sanofi Pasteur were also included in the complaint filed before the Department of Justice.
According to the VACC and VPCI, all the respondents played “actions and key roles” in the Dengvaxia mess which “caused undue injury to any private property, including the government.”
For instance, they said based on hearings conducted by the Senate and the House of Representatives, Aquino “met with Sanofi officials abroad and juggled funds and authorized the releases of a total of 3.550 billion pesos for the procurement of the Dengvaxia vaccine in connection with the implementation of the Dengue Immunization Program of the DOH first launched on April 4, 2016 or within the 45-day election ban.”
Abad, for his part, “caused the issuance of the allotment order for 3.550 billion pesos for the procurement of the Dengvaxia vaccine,” while Garin was the Secretary of Health during which the Dengue Immunization Program of the DOH was implemented on a” mass scale,” they said.
“The Philippine Children’s Medical Center, the procuring entity, was under her supervision and control,” they added.
The complainants said Suy was “an active member of the executive committee” of Garin, while Lecciones “received P3 billion from DOH to procure and administer Dengvaxia vaccines” even if they said the PCMC has “no expertise and experience in managing and implementing sub-national mass vaccinations.”
Zuellig, they said, supplied the Dengvaxia vaccine to the DOH, and Sanofi Pasteur is the “manufacturer of the Dengvaxia vaccine.”
“Its representatives in the Philippines played an active part in the anti-dengue Dengvaxia mess,” they said.
Over 800,000 children were administered the controversial vaccine under the national immunization program that began during the Aquino administration.
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