Incumbent and former lawmakers agree that disgraced ex-mayor Alice Guo has no shortage of funds to use for bribing her way to freedom.
On Wednesday, former senator Panfilo Lacson disclosed that when scrutiny of her identity and dealings was intensifying, Guo sought intermediaries to relay to authorities her offer of up to P1 billion in exchange for making her legal problems in the Philippines disappear.
Lacson said that Guo, also known as Guo Hua Ping, sought the assistance of a Chinese-Filipino businessman friend to reach out to persons within President Marcos’ inner circle regarding her bribe offer.
The former senator noted that his Chinoy friend claimed to have contacts in the halls of power.
“Alice Guo approached him/her… this was before she fled but when things were already getting tough and she was already laying low… she [Guo] offered P1 billion if she can be introduced to the contacts. I’m not saying that I believe my friend hook line and sinker…,” Lacson narrated.
However, Lacson quickly pointed out that his Chinoy friend, who he refused to name, never relayed the bribe offer to his supposed contacts in the incumbent administration.
He also urged the intelligence community to look deeper into Guo’s background, including the network of people she is associated with, as they may pose a serious national security threat.
Lacson, himself a former Philippine National Police chief, said had she not been exposed by the Senate and the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission, Guo could have won a seat in an even higher office.
This would have given a potential foreign spy access to classified information made available to lawmakers and other elected officials, he added.
Earlier, Senator Risa Hontiveros said her office received information that Guo paid a P200 million bribe to unnamed officials in exchange for allowing her to slip out of the country.
Testifying before the Senate’s Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality panel, Guo’s purported sister Shiela admitted that they received plenty of help in carrying out their ultimately futile escape.
