Filipina Soul

Joseph Estrada, who was convicted of plunder last year, will be able to keep most of his personal wealth. An anti-graft court said that it will not seize the personal assets of the former president, even to cover the rest of the money that he still owes the government.

“The court order said the sheriff cannot proceed against the personal property of the former president which cannot be directly linked to his ill-gotten wealth,” court spokesman Renato Bocar told AFP.

“There is no more need to go after the property of president Estrada,” he said.

Here’s a rundown of the math involved:

* 700 million pesos: money that Estrada owes the Philippine government; it was illegally obtained from tax kickbacks and bribes from gambling lords.

* 215 million pesos already seized from a bank account under Estrada’s private foundation.

* 485 million pesos that still has to given back by Estrada.

* Over one billion pesos in shares and pledges: amount of money in an investment management account under a name believed to be an Estrada alias (which he has denied).

If the anti-graft court can prove that the alias is indeed a cover for Estrada, then, from the standpoint of the plunder case, there is really no need to look into the rest of his wealth. In the end, it all boils down to how well Estrada has covered the tracks to his ill-gotten wealth.

via AFP

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