PDI Get Real 12.06.08 The Que stories: who's listening?

Get RealThe Que stories: who’s listening?
By Solita Collas-MonsodPhilippine Daily InquirerFirst Posted 01:48:00 12/06/2008
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Elpidio Que. The name may not be a household word, as is Joc-joc (Bolante) or (Rodolfo) Lozada. But if he perseveres in what he is doing, and his stories prove to be correct, it surely will be. Who is Elpidio Que? Well, for one, he is one of the few individuals who have publicly taken on the multibillionaire Lucio Tan. And for another, like Lozada and Joc-joc, he should know where the bodies are; and like Lozada, but unlike Joc-joc, he has been spilling the beans. In other words, Que is a whistleblower.

Unfortunately, while Lozada’s stories have been eaten up by the public, and resulted in the resignation of a high government official and the cancellation of a multibillion-peso, corruption-tainted project, the Que stories have not been picked up. One can only speculate that perhaps, with regard to the Lozada stories, both the political opposition and the media picked them up. No such luck yet for Que.

But Que deserves as much attention, if not from the public, at least from government, particularly the Department of Finance and the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), which have been pursuing tax evasion cases against Tan for about 20 years, and so far have failed miserably at it. Whether government has sufficient evidence or not is a matter of perspective: Per Liway Chato, former BIR head, the government had “truckloads” of evidence, and as per the investigative report of Raul Locsin’s Business Day newspaper (now BusinessWorld), it was an open and shut case. But per Chato’s successor, Beethoven Rualo, and his administrative superior, Finance Secretary Edgardo Espiritu (during the Joseph Estrada administration), there was insufficient evidence.

What Que adds to the equation is that he claims to have a smoking gun, so to speak. His bio-data says that he was with Tan’s Asia Brewery Inc. for eight years as sales manager, at various times, for North Metro Manila, Southern Tagalog and Bicol, and North Region and Central Region. And he has not hesitated to share this experience in writing—as when he protested Tan’s being made an adopted son of Ilocos Sur province (where Que is from), and more recently, when he testified during a session of the city council of the Ilocos Sur capital Vigan, which invited him to elaborate on such experiences.

You would think that the government, at all levels, would be all ears—the BIR, for example, and its Large Taxpayers Unit; the Department of Justice; the Department of Finance; the City of Vigan, etc., etc. The letters that that they received detailing the operations of the “dummy” companies of Tan were signed by Que. And there is no question that the letters were received because Que sent them by registered mail, and he has the registered mail numbers. In fact, I devoted two columns last July, yes, five months ago, on Que’s allegations.

But so far, nothing. On the national level, no announcements about an investigation by the BIR, or by the Department of Finance; and, according to Que, no reply acknowledging receipt of his letters. On the local level, the provincial board of Ilocos Sur has not replied to Que’s letter of protest (sent over six months ago). The Vigan City council , as adverted to above, did ask Que to attend their “Question Hour” four months ago (August), and Que not only testified, but followed it up two months later, and even sent them a letter recapping what he said. But that’s it.

Excuse me. Not quite it. Que claims that a closed-door meeting was held last Oct. 21 between Vigan City Mayor Eva Singson Molina and Vice Mayor Franz Ranches on one side, and one Alvin Go (allegedly a lawyer for Tan’s Fortune Tobacco Corp. and Allied Banking Corp.) and one Angelo Ang (general manager of Tan’s Northern Tobacco Redrying Co. Inc.) on the other. What they discussed is anybody’s guess because, according to Que, the city council was not briefed on the minutes.

I am also in receipt of a copy of a letter on a City of Vigan letterhead, signed by one Milagros Contreras as city treasurer, informing a company (supposedly one of Tan’s) that its books were to be examined. It was undated but was allegedly delivered to the company in the second week of October.

But Que says that he will not be deterred in his campaign. (I have yet to meet him, although we have talked on the phone.) And he continues to send me papers.

The Philippines has the dubious distinction of having one of the lowest tax effort ratios in the region, if not the world. Que, a former Tan executive, is willing to testify in court on what he says he knows of the alleged tax evasion practices of the Tan group of companies and its dummies. Que says that another former associate, one Romeo Tan, is also willing to tell his story—Romeo Tan being an incorporator of one of eight companies in the original government case against Lucio Tan.

That case, which the government lost, involved P26 billion in unpaid taxes (including penalties and interest). Former secretary of finance Lito Camacho and former undersecretary of finance Nene Guevara have given estimates of what the government loses in taxes from Tan—something like P20 billion a year. Que says that last year, Philip Morris (a Fortune Tobacco competitor), which is supposed to have about 25 percent of the market, reported sales revenue of P30.3 billion, while Fortune Tobacco, with about 70 percent of the market, reported sales revenue of P30 billion for the same period.

Que’s witness presents a golden opportunity for the government. Missing it, would raise many questions about the government’s campaign against tax evasion.

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This shows that all the Filipino politicians and government officials, from Malacanang and down, are all in the service of the Yellow Economic Lucifer Lucio Tan!