HOUSE Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez has admitted asking the Bureau of Customs to promote employee Sandy Sacluti.
A letter showed Alvarez asked Customs Commissioner Nicanor Faeldon to consider the promotion of Sacluti from acting customs operations officer 5 to customs operations 5.
But Alvarez denied he lobbied for Sacluti’s promotion, saying such endorsement was just part of his many routine recommendations.
He dismissed the allegations of Faeldon’s chief of staff, Mandy Anderson, that he gave her a tall order to “bring hell to me and the commissioner.”
Meanwhile, Ilocos Norte Rep. Rodolfo Fariñas said Anderson leaked “imbecile” post to divert the attention of the public from smuggling issues of the entry of P6.4 billion worth shabu without BoC knowing it.
In a statement on Saturday, Fariñas said the apology of Anderson to Congress during an inquiry last week did not mean she was already off the hook, saying she still had to apologize to Alvarez for calling him “imbecile” in her Facebook account.
“During the hearing, [Anderson] in gleeful mood claimed her post was private and although she apologized to me and the other members of the House, she did not apologize to the Speaker,” he said.
“Who could have leaked her private post if not she herself and her cohorts in order to divert the public from the House investigation of the successful smuggling of more than P5 billion pesos worth of shabu through the [Bureau of Customs] Express Lane?”
The lawmaker from Ilocos Norte noted how Anderson still managed to grant an interview on “mainstream broadcast media” to divulge her supposed “tiff” with Alvarez.
Fariñas during a joint inquiry over the shabu recovered in warehouses in Valenzuela City last May scolded Anderson for her scathing post against Alvarez.
Anderson earlier alleged that Alvarez, through an assistant, threatened her when she refused to promote an “unqualified” employee of the BoC.
Alvarez, however, denied pushing for the promotion of Acting Customs Operations Officer V Sandy Sacluti.