MANILA, Philippines – Senator Judges on Tuesday’s Senate Committee on Justice subcommittee hearing on the Guo family’s escape commended the Philippine National Police Intelligence Group for being the first to discover that dismissed Bamban, Tarlac Mayor Alice Guo and her company had already been out of the country.
Bureau of Immigration Commissioner Norman Tansingco said their intelligence that the former mayor had already fled the country came from the PNP IG which they received on August 15, four days prior to Sen. Risa Hontiveros’ manifestation that the controversial former town chief is already gone.
While the BI swallowed a slight reprimand from Hontiveros for acting on the information late, the PNP enjoyed praise for busting out what would be the country’s biggest controversy, thus far.
Committee chair Sen. Coco Pimentel said it is only right to give credit where credit is due.
“The PNP Intelligence Group Foreign Liaison Division received first information that there were name of the subjects booked from Singapore to the Philippines,” said Brig. Gen. Nicolas Salvador, acting Philippine National Police deputy chief for operations,
Salvador said he was informed about the information on August 14, confirmed it with foreign counterparts and turned over the report to the Bureau of Immigration.
“We first worked with our foreign police attache counterparts just simply to verify and validate this. The fact nga po na hindi sila nakasakay, hindi sila sumakay from Singapore to the Philippines but still we were able to monitor them that they went to Indonesia,” he said.
“So that is where the intelligence coordination went through and since the PNP has limited authority when it comes to Immigrations that’s why we passed the information to the Bureau of Immigration your honor,” he said.
Pimentel commended this.
“‘Yan ang magandang example ng paggamit ng intelligence funds,” Pimentel said.
“Meron din tayong positibo [result], kasi against ako sa intelligence funds actually pagdating sa budget season pwede niyo po ipagmayabang sa amin ‘yun when I ask you how the PNP uses its mga P800 million yata intelligence funds yan eh, P900 million so bigyan niyo po kami, ‘yan is one example, one achievement and give us a glimpse of documentation as far as that is concerned,” he said.
Hontiveros also praised the PNP for acting on the information in just one day instead of four days, taking a swipe at the BI.
Sen. Francis Tolentino also commended not only the PNP but also the BI for facilitating the return of Shiela Guo to the country.
