“There are at least four actors plus one juridical entity (in the local version of the money laundering case). I doubt if a mere branch manager can pull this off or set this up. The branch manager has a day job that should keep her busy enough,” said Pimentel in a forum with Capampangans in Media, Inc. (CAMI) here.
Pimental said “I need more hearings, perhaps three to pinpoint mastermind or for me to identify at least a set from where mastermind can be picked.”
This, even as he lamented the lack of full cooperation from the Rizal Commercial and Banking Corp. (RCBC) where the $81 million landed after it was remitted there through Philrem Service Corp. (Philrem). RCBC had served as the conduit for the passage of the money stolen from the Bangladesh Central Bank’s account.
“The impact is on the reputation of our banks in the country,” he said, noting that both RCBC and Philrem had been already implicated in money laundering in alleged anomalies linked to Vice Pres. Jejomar Binay.
He was referring to a report of the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) showing that in 2014, a law firm owned by Binay used Philrem to send P100 million to a Citibank account in Hong Kong.
The AMLC report also showed that Binay’s supposed dummy, Gerry Limlingan, had transactions with RCBC amounting to P3.1 billion, or around $68.1 million.
Pimentel said that the case has only beefed up the commitment of presidential candidate Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, who is the official candidate of his PDP-Laban party, to repeal the Bank Secrecy Law or at least significantly trim down its provisions to prevent it from being cited in money laundering cases.
He also dared RCBC officials to come out with more affidavits of its personnel who could shed light on the hacked Bangladeshi fund case, as he noted the remark of the RCBC-Jupiter branch manager Maia Santos Dequito that only one bank personnel had issued an affidavit on the case.
“I expect more affidavits during our hearing on March 29,” Pimentel said.
