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Monday, March 10, 2003
Kintanar: Damned if you do, damned if you don’t
By June Kintanar
The case of Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes regarding the military offensive he reportedly ordered in Buliok complex in Pikit, North Cotabato is a case of damned if you do, damned if you don’t. It is obvious Reyes would still have been lambasted had he opted not to do anything after the MILF manifestly flared up against our soldiers.
Being a former general, Reyes could not have thought otherwise. Besides, the area is practically a war zone and any contradictory action Reyes would do could have caused him similar criticism.
This is the problem with critics, particularly all-knowing politicians. They encroach even in areas where they know nothing. Grandstanding is how some people call it.
These critics, among them a senator and a congressman, now demand the ouster of the beleaquered defense secretary. As expected, however, Presidential Spokesman Ignacio Bunye had kinder and more sober words regarding the issue. He said the demand for Reyes’ ouster is uncalled for. To which, I add, it’s also malicious and ridiculous. For why should one be punished for doing his job?
* * *
As the name implies an anti-money laundering law is a piece of legislation intended to prevent the entry into our commercial banking system of dirty money, like money from crimes and other illegal sources. To see its implementation through, there’s a group called FATF or the Financial Action Task Force composed of 31 member-countries whose main task is to see to it that each and every nation has that kind of law.
Much earlier the Philippines, through Congress, passed the anti-money laundering law, posthaste. However, true to form, our legislators were extra cautious in passing the law, afraid that some of its provisions — specially on the threshold or minimum amount of new or initial deposits which would warrant a freeze by the bank without court order — might boomerang to the legislators, some of whom are known to be big depositors. Our senators and congressmen tried to peg the amount at P4 million.
FATF, showing that it was not born yesterday, found the amount too big for comfort. The group was afraid that an initial deposit from dubious sources of, say, P1 or any amount less that P4 million would escape bank scrutiny. It refused to accept the pegged amount.
And so the proposed law came hurtling back to the Philippine Congress with a stiff warning from FATF to lower the amount or else the country’s international transactions, like dollar remittances from overseas Filipino workers abroad, will suffer strict sanctions.
It’s better now that Congress finally yielded to the pressure. Now, the minimum amount has been reduced to P500,000 for the bank to effect the freeze. Any amount bigger than that would certainly give the depositor, unless he is reputed to be making big deposits from the start, some real problems.
An anti-money laundering law is deemed by experts to be a desirable law. In areas like the Philippines where lots of money from crimes, like kidnapping for ransom and drug trafficking, exist, this law is indeed imperative.
(March 10, 2003 issue)
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