THE Palace on Monday branded as black propaganda photos posted on social media of Davao City Vice Mayor Paolo Duterte with Cebu-based businessman Kenneth Dong, linking them to the P6.4- billion shipment of shabu that had slipped through Customs in May.
“What’s important [is] documentary evidence, not hearsay,” said Presidential Spokesman Ernesto Abella. “Otherwise, all these things are just speculation, propaganda that can be used and misused.”
Abella said that those claiming the younger Duterte was linked to smuggling must make their claims in court.
He added that photos should be “vetted for accuracy.”
“What does the picture prove? [It’s] different when it’s in the court,” he said.
In a congressional hearing, Dong was accused by Bureau of Customs broker Mark Taguba of being the middleman of Richard Tan or Richard Chen, owner of Hongfei Logistics, the company which transported the shabu shipment to a Valenzuela City warehouse.
On Friday, President Rodrigo Duterte vowed to resign if critics of his son could produce an affidavit linking him to the P6.4-billion shabu mess.
“If my son was really into it… all you have to do is produce the paper,” Duterte said in a speech at the centennial celebration of the Southern Philippines Medical Center at SM Lanang, Davao City.
“Just give me an affidavit and I will step down as the President of this republic. And that is my commitment to you now. That is my word,” he added.
A lawmaker on Monday called on Customs Commissioner Nicanor Faeldon to resign for allowing the shabu shipment to slip past Customs examiners.
Parañaque City Rep. Gus Tambunting said the continuing congressional probes into the failure of the bureau to spot and stop P6 billion worth of shabu revealed mismanagement, if not outright corruption at the Bureau of Customs.
Tambunting also criticized the decision of Faeldon to hire 28 athletes as “technical assistants.”
“We are doubly concerned at the discovery that public funds were used to hire the services of these active and retired professional athletes under the guise of technical assistants and intelligence operatives, especially in the light of what appears now as a major failure of intelligence on the part of the Bureau of Customs,” he said.
“Instead of hiring qualified and properly trained intelligence operatives, the BoC leadership, particularly Commissioner Faeldon consciously chose to engage the services of professional athletes with zero training or experience in field intelligence operations, or even in Customs administration. The failure of the Bureau to catch such a huge shipment of illegal cargo after adopting this policy is no accident. This is a direct result of an ill-advised, if not illegal policy,” he said.
“Commissioner Faeldon must face the music. His actions clearly violated his sacred duty to the Filipino people. We also believe that these actions constitute clear violations of our anti-graft laws. He should resign,” Tambunting said.
Earlier, the House committees on dangerous drugs and ways and means chided Faeldon for mishandling a raid to retrieve the shabu shipment, saying their failure to call the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency could make the seized drugs inadmissible as evidence in court.