THE Philippine government will continue exhausting efforts in retrieving the public funds allegedly stolen by pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles and in going after her co-conspirators, Presidential Chief Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo said Friday, August 3.
"While Mrs. Napoles is currently detained behind bars, the Philippine government will not stop until the last centavo is returned and all conspiring government officials and involved persons are incarcerated," Panelo said in a statement issued Friday night.
Napoles and five of her family members have been indicted in the United States (US) for allegedly laundering around $20 million in Philippine public funds obtained through the controversial multibillion-peso Priority Development Assistance Fund (Pdaf).
Napoles; her children Jo Christine, James Christopher, and Jeane Catherine; her brother Reynaldo and his wife Ana Marie have been indicted by a federal grand jury for supposed conspiracy to commit money laundering, domestic money laundering, and international money laundering.
Napoles is currently detained at the Camp Bagong Diwa detention center in Taguig City, facing charges before the Sandiganbayan office for five counts of plunder, graft, and other cases, in connection with the controversial of P10-billion Pdaf scam.
The Philippine government is now preparing to extradite Napoles family to the US to face trial for funneling $20 million from the Philippines.
On July 31, the US Department of Justice said Napoles family, along with 20 lawmakers and other government officials, had "converted to their own benefit millions of dollars" in the now outlawed Pdaf and transmitted approximately $20 million from that scheme into the US "to purchase assets, including real property and luxury vehicles."
Panelo said the current administration would closely coordinate with the US with regard to Napoles's case, in a bid to fulfill President Rodrigo Duterte's unwavering commitment to eradiacate corruption in the country.
"The Philippine Government, through the Department of Justice, will not wander from this case and shall closely coordinate with US authorities in their efforts to bring justice to our country and its citizens, including the possibility of extraditing Mrs. Napoles and her co-defendants to face indictment therein," Panelo said.
"The indictment of alleged pork barrel mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles in the United States for various crimes, including, among others, the serious offense of international money laundering, is a welcome development in the Philippine government's efforts to recover the ill-gotten wealth she and her co-defendants supposedly have acquired."
Napoles was placed under the government's partial witness protection program in February during the stint of former Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II, in an attempt to convince the former to "tell all" about the mulitibillion-peso fund diversion scheme.
On May 25, incumbent Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra terminated Napoles's provisional admission into the government's witness protection program since "as there has been no further claim of threats to her personal security."
Panelo said ending Napoles's partial witness protection proves the Duterte government's efforts to put an end to "wide-scale" corruption.
"Such an undertaking only proves the strong efforts of the Philippine government to go back to the drawing board in cleansing this wide-scale corruption and, at the same time, have the said ill-gotten wealth returned to our National Treasury," he said. (SunStar Philippines)