Friday, June 15, 2007 Roperos: Imelda and Danding By Godofredo M. Roperos Politics Also
TWO interesting matters came out in a national daily yesterday, things that brought back memories of certain events.
The first was an article given a banner headline in a national daily although the full report was on page 4. It was about former first lady Imelda Marcos’ acquittal by a Quezon City court of a tax evasion case filed by the Bureau of Internal Revenue some 16 years ago. Imelda reportedly cried as she listened to the 16-page decision being read.
Coincidentally, the Regional Trial Court judge was Rosa Samson-Tatad. To young people who were small kids under the regime of Ferdinand Marcos, the family name Tatad may no longer be familiar. But when martial law was imposed, the name owned the voice on radio and the face on television that announced the imposition.
Although Francisco “Kit” Tatad is no longer in public office, having chosen not to run for reelection as senator, it was still an interesting coincidence that the judge who acquitted Imelda is married to a Tatad. But that is immaterial to the case the court has just resolved after 16 years.
Imelda, known the world over as the woman with a collection of thousands of pairs of shoes, was not a tax evader after all. But I understand that the case was only one of many that Marcos is facing.
The second interesting matter was the story that Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco has finally paid the first installment on his reported almost P5-billion debt to the government. He paid P1.4 billion as initial payment. The money came from the sale of part of his San Miguel Corp. stocks that amounted to P4.786 billion purchased by the SMC Retirement Plan.
Cojuangco was one of those who were behind the coconut levy, a tax imposed on the country’s coconut product. The amount collected was placed in the hands of a group of Marcos cronies and were invested in the development of copra oil processing plants in various parts of the country.
The multi-billion fund became the seed investment capital of the Marcos cronies.
The coconut levy became a big issue in the final years of the Marcos regime.
Indeed, up to this day, the government has not yet decided what to do with the coconut levy fund that amounts to billions of pesos legally owned by the country’s copra producers.
What the government is going to do with the fund is being awaited with deep interest by millions of potential beneficiaries.
