Binay confident AMLC won’t find dubious transactions in bank accounts

Vice President Jejomar Binay is confident the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) will find no “red flags” or suspicious transactions involving his bank accounts that were ordered frozen by the Court of Appeals (CA).

“They won’t find any (irregularities) there (in my bank accounts). That is saddening. They even included the accounts of many of my friends, even those of their children and parents. That’s too much already,” Binay said in an interview in Cebu on Saturday.

Binay maintained that he does not own 242 bank accounts, as reported by AMLC, and that only five accounts included in the freeze order were under his name.

He also claimed that the funds in his bank accounts were hard-earned money.

“The frozen accounts under my name, I’m telling you, to God and people, that money is clean. These were my earnings. I was a practicing lawyer. My wife is a practicing doctor. I was also a teacher,” he said.

The Vice President also hit what he said was the “unfair” treatment of the AMLC and pointed out that it was being used to oppress members of the opposition.

“Why is the Anti-Money Laundering Council not looking into the bank accounts of Liberal Party leaders despite them being linked to anomalies?” he asked.

Binay said he expects the smear attacks against him will continue even after the presidential elections next year.

“That (attacks against me) won’t stop because these people really hate me. Of course after the elections, and they lose, they would get even more angry at me,” he said.

Immune from suit

Meanwhile, veteran election lawyer Romulo Macalintal said yesterday that just like the President, as Vice President, Binay is also immune from suits.

Citing Supreme Court ( SC) rulings, Macalintal rebutted the similar legal opinions of Senate President Franklin Drilon and Justice Secretary Leila de Lima that while Binay may be an impeachable official, he is not immune from suits.

“If the President is immune from suit, then all constitutional officials, like the Vice President, Supreme Court justices, memin bers of constitutional commissions, and the Ombudsman, who could only be removed by impeachment, are likewise immune from suit,” Macalintal said in a statement.

He stressed that there is no provision the Constitution or any law, which provides that only the President or any of the impeachable officials are immune from suit.

“As a matter of fact the executive immunity provided for under the 1973 Constitution was repealed or removed under the 1987 Constitution,” he said.

Macalintal explained that immunity is actually a mere “tradition” that applies only to actual cases filed in courts against these officials.

He said the President and all other constitutional officials could be investigated by the ombudsman since it only either recommends or not the filing of a criminal case against a public official before the Sandiganbayan.

“Once the case is filed with the court, that is where the privilege of immunity could be invoked since the official faces the danger of being removed from office by a judicial action and not by impeachment,” he added. –