By Clarist Zablan
(September 10, 2021) – President Rodrigo Duterte had a meeting with a suspected illegal drug personality when executives of a Taiwan-based pharmaceutical company called on the leader at his office in Davao City in 2017, a minority senator said on Friday.
Allan Lim, a suspected illegal drug personality, was present during Duterte’s meeting with top executives of Pharmally Pharmaceutical International, Risa Hontiveros said at a Senate Blue Ribbon committee public hearing. Lim was seen in the video shown by Senator Richard Gordon.
Hontiveros said a former police officer, Eduardo Acierto, had information that Lim and former presidential economic advisor Michael Yang had been involved in the illegal drug trade. Acierto went into hiding after he claimed the president had ordered to kill him.
“We need to verify the identity of this person. Kung totoo man na siya ito, nakakabahala na ganyan ang mga taong nakapaligid sa Pangulo,” Hontiveros said in the hearing.
The firebrand leader won in the 2016 elections on the platform of fighting crime and illegal drugs. His centerpiece program, war on drugs, has killed more than 6,000 people since he assumed the presidency.
The senator said it is ironic that a president who vowed to eradicate the drug problem is seen meeting with a suspected illegal drug personality.
She said she had sources who also alleged that Lim was married to Rose Nono Lin, the incorporator of sister company Pharmally Biological.
Hontiveros suggested inviting Lin to the Senate hearing, saying that she could easily be reached as she is active in social media and has plans to run for congress in the District 5 of Quezon City.
“Susi si Rose Nono Lim para maliwanagan ang kumite sa kaduda-dudang mga koneksyon na ito. Pwedeng-pwede siya maimbita sa hearing kasi hindi siya mahirap hanapin,” she added.
Lin was also the incorporator of Full Win or Fu De Sheng Group in the Philippines, which is chaired by Yang, the senator said. The chairman of the group in Xiamen, China, Zheng Bingqiang, is also a fugitive in Taiwan over manipulating Pharmally stocks.
The Senate has zeroed in on Pharmally after it was found to have won P8.6 billion contracts from the budget department to procure medical supplies despite being incorporated for only less than a year with a paid-up capital of P625,000.
The company’s chairman Huang Wen Lai and his father Huang Tzu Yen had also been issued arrest warrants for multiple financial crimes in Taiwan.
“It seems these people run in the same circles. Dapat masagot nila ang ugnayan nilang lahat, at kung bakit mukhang ang lakas nila sa Pangulo, Hontiveros said. “Naniniwala akong hindi habambuhay matatago ang anumang alingasaw at baho.”
The elder Huang was also flagged for links to Yang. However, Yang recently denied that he was involved in Pharmally’s operations, explaining that one of the company’s officials, Lincoln Ong, merely approached him to help him find suppliers.
(MM)
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