MANILA, Philippines – Three government agencies on Friday, August 30, filed the much-awaited money laundering complaint against 24 people, including dismissed Bamban Mayor Alice Guo and Cassandra Ong.
“Alice Guo and her cohorts intended to create layers and layers of corporations to make it appear that they were engaged in profitable and legitimate businesses, but in fact, they are not,” said the 105-page complaint filed before the Department of Justice (DOJ) on Friday.
It was filed through the joint efforts of the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC), Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission (PAOCC), and the National Bureau of Investigation.
While the complaint involves the operation of the raided Philippine Offshore Gaming Operator in Bamban, Tarlac, it included Ong who is an officer of a leasing company tied to another raided POGO in Porac, Pampanga.
The complaint described Ong as “a silent partner in the Bamban Pogo, as she was the one who contributed in the construction of the Baofu compound.”
Baofu is the leasing company incorporated by Guo, which rented its spaces to the Hongsheng/Zun Yuan POGO found to have trafficked and tortured workers.
Ong told a House of Representatives panel that her only link to Guo is through the brother, Wesley Guo, who is her boyfriend. However, Ong was caught with another Guo sibling, Shiela, in Indonesia where Alice and Wesley are believed to have fled as well.
Dennis Cunanan, a former government official who had been convicted for his role in the pork barrel scam, was also included in the complaint. Cunanan appears on some government forms as consultant for both Hongsheng/Zun Yuan in Bamban, and Lucky South 99 in Porac.
Accusation against Guo
The complaint said that the dozen businesses under Guo’s name were meant to conceal the true nature of their businesses and to make it appear that they are engaged in legitimate activities. Guo has been claiming that she was just a businesswoman engaged mostly in piggery and ventured into real estate before she was elected mayor of Bamban in 2022.
Investigators said that Guo never divested from the real estate company Baofu. The complaint said “it is overly impossible for Baofu to afford the construction of the buildings worth hundreds of millions, or even billions, which were purportedly leased to Hong Sheng and Zun Yuan.”
Investigators also said that Hong Sheng could also have not afforded the construction, based on its capitalization records. When Hong Sheng was raided in February 2023, another POGO, Zun Yuan, was incorporated. Authorities treat Hong Sheng and Zun Yuan as one.
“With the huge capitalization of PHP100 million, it is extremely suspicious why Zun Yuan never opened any bank accounts for Zun Yuan,” said the complaint, adding that a background check on the incorporators reveal no financial capacity for such a business venture.
The Senate panel investigating POGOs and Guo earlier presented an incorporator in Bamban who said her name was just used in the documents.
The complaint also said that Guo did not declare 12 vehicles in her Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN).
Guo has repeatedly denied any involvement in Hong Sheng, but the investigators said Guo paid Hong Sheng’s electric bills both with a check and cash until January 2024. Baofu also “stopped using the banking system after its transaction in September 2020 despite its continued operation,” said the complaint.
“The following circumstances that would show the grand conspiracy between and among the incorporators, officers, and other individuals involved in the commission of unlawful activities, such as Qualified Trafficking in Persons, violation of Securities Regulations Code and Swindling or Estafa and in turn, Money Laundering,” said the complaint.
Guo is facing a separate trafficking complaint before the DOJ. – Rappler.com