Bond probe manipulated, civil society group says

PRESIDENT Benigno Aquino III’s House allies on Sunday were accused of manipulating a probe of the P10-billion Poverty Eradication and Alleviation Certificates or Peace Bonds that taxpayers must begin paying for on Oct. 16 this year, and at a total cost of P35 billion.

The Freedom from Debt Coalition said the bonds smacked of “irregularity” and only allowed the civil society group Code-NGO to earn P1.4 billion in endowment funds.

Code-NGO used to be led by Social Welfare Secretary Corazon Soliman, who turned against the Arroyo administration but is now close to President Aquino.

Soliman has said she was no longer with the Code-NGO when the project was conceptualized and awarded, since she had already been appointed by then President Gloria Arroyo to head the Social Welfare Department.

Freedom from Debt Coalition president Ricardo Reyes on Sunday demanded that a panel report being circulated for signing be withdrawn and the hearings extended to allow an audit of how the funds were spent to ease poverty.

Reyes said early this week his group had been informed that the House committee on good government and public accountability, led by Iloilo City Rep. Jerry Trenas, a member of the President’s Liberal Party, was about to submit the report on its inquiry into the Peace Bonds.

“A copy of this report now being circulated among committee members for signing shows that the House committee will come out with two findings—that the issuance of the Peace Bonds was regular and conformed to prescribed procedures, and that the Philippine government obtained a fair and reasonable value from the proceeds of the sale of the bonds,” Reyes said.

The House committee report on the Peace bonds was expected to be released any day next week, days before the Oct. 16, 2011 maturity date of the bonds, Reyes said. –Christine F. Herrera, Manila Standard Today