The Napolist of the Self-Perpetuating Elite

Facing plunder charges for stealing at least P10 billion ($240 million) from the taxpayers, alleged Pork Barrel Queen Janet Napoles finally released what has been called the “Napoles List” (“Napolist”) of senators who conspired with her to hand over their pork barrel allocations to her dummy non-profit corporations in exchange for fat kickbacks she either personally handed over to the senators or had delivered to their “aides”.
 In her May 12 affidavit released to the press, Napoles described her transactions with 20 former and current senators. Most notable was her detailing of the 9 transactions involving Sen. Juan Ponce-Enrile’s pork barrel fund totaling P345 million. She said Enrile’s personal share was 45% while the rest of the funds were distributed to various government agency officials who approved and facilitated the fund transfers of pork.
 Napoles also detailed 7 transactions involving Sen. Jinggoy Estrada’s pork barrel allocation of P306.35 million. Instead of the standard 45% kickback, Napoles said that Jinggoy demanded and received 55%. Unlike Enrile where the money was handed over to aide Ging Reyes, Napoles said that with Jinggoy, she mostly personally handed over the cash to him.
 Napoles also provided details of the 5 transactions involving Sen. Bong Revilla’s pork barrel allocation of P275 million. Unlike Enrile (45%), Jinggoy (55%), Revilla received only 40% including 8 million pesos which Napoles personally handed over to Sen. Revilla at his home in 114 Sarangani St., Ayala Alabang Village, Muntinlupa in January 2009.
 Through aide Jennifer Corpus, Sen. Vicente Sotto III received a Special Allotment Release Order (SARO) worth P200 million for the Department of Agrarian Reform with a “rebate” of P100 million. Napoles then detailed 7 additional amounts totaling P225 million in pork barrel funds with 40% going to Sotto and 10% going to his aide Jennifer Corpus. Corpus also asked Napoles for a Hyundai Starex car for Sotto’s wife, former actress Helen Gamboa.
 A total of 20 former and current senators received pork barrel allocations through the dummy non-profit corporations that Napoles had set up to bilk the government of funds that would otherwise be used for infrastructure improvement or to pay for needed government services.
 Aside from the senators listed above, the hall of shame list includes: Sen. Gringo Honasan, Sen. Loren Legarda, former Sen. Loi Ejercito, former Sen. Rodolfo Biazon, former Sen. Tessie Aquino-Oreta, Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos, Jr., former Sen. Manny Villar, Sen. Chiz Escudero, Sen. Cynthia Villar, Sen. Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel, Jr., former Sen. Aquilino “Nene” Pimentel Sr., Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano, Sen. Lito Lapid and former Sen. Robert Jaworski.
 There is nothing in the Napoles disclosures that Filipinos did not suspect before. But there it is in sworn affidavits. The involved senators could do nothing more than produce feeble excuses that their aides received the money, not them.
 Sen. Bong Revilla first charged that the Napoles List was nothing but political vendetta by the Aquino government against the opposition. When the Church officials told Revilla to come up with a better excuse, Revilla claimed that his signatures were forged. When evidence was produced that he vouched for the allocations, he kept silent.
 But Bong’s wife, Rep. Lani Mercado-Revilla, blurted out to the press in exasperation: “Basta ‘wag lang manghihingi sa amin ang mga tao!” (“People shouldn’t expect to receive money from us”). She apparently believes that the pork barrel funds they received were meant for their personal use and not for the people. It was reported that their son, Leonard Bryan Revilla, is a business partner with James Christopher Napoles, son of Janet Lim Napoles.
 When asked by the press, what should go to the people for whom the pork barrel funds were supposedly earmarked for, Rep. Lani Mercado-Revilla’s responded: “E ano’ng ibibigay namin? Hindi naman puwede yung pinaghihirapan namin dahil sa personal naman namin ‘yun, sa mga anak, sa mga pang-araw-araw na paggastos namin,” (What should we give them? It can’t be from what we worked hard for, that’s personal, that’s for our children, for our day to day expenses.”)
 When the late Sen. Ninoy Aquino was starting out in politics in the early 1960s, he expressed this observation about the Philippines, as true then as it is now:
  “Here is a land in which a few are spectacularly rich while the masses remain abjectly poor. . . . Here is a land consecrated to democracy but run by an entrenched plutocracy. Here, too, are a people whose ambitions run high, but whose fulfillment is low and mainly restricted to the self-perpetuating elite.”
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