2 Legacy execs offer to help probe vs Delos Angeles

MANILA, Philippines - Two Legacy Group officials on Wednesday asked the Department of Justice (DOJ) to consider them as possible state witnesses against company owner Celso delos Angeles Jr., who they accused of siphoning the company’s funds to his personal accounts. In their separate but almost identical counter-affidavits, Legacy president and chief operating officer Carolina Hinola and chief finance officer Namnama Pasetes also asked the DOJ to dismiss the syndicated estafa complaints filed against them. “I am willing to cooperate with all government agencies in their investigation of the Legacy group of companies and answer questions relating to the operations and transactions of said companies that I may have knowledge of," the two officials said. They further said that they are willing to provide government investigators with documents that they may have in their possession to assist them in their respective investigations. Both Hinola and Pasetes earlier this month testified before the Senate Committee on Trade and Commerce about the alleged wrongdoings of Delos Angeles in connection with the collapsed firm’s funds. The two told the Senate panel that millions of pesos in Legacy funds had been deposited in Delos Angeles' personal banks accounts. They said some of the money were used to bankroll his political campaign as mayor of Sto. Domingo town in Albay in 2007. “The business of the Legacy group collapsed and this can be attributed not only to the depressed business environment worldwide but due to the mismanagement of the Legacy group by Mr. delos Angeles and the massive siphoning of company funds by Delos Angeles to his personal accounts," the two said in their separate affidavits. But Delos Angeles, in his defense to the similar complaint filed against him, said Hinola and Pasetes should also be held liable since they were the ones who managed the financial and executive affair of the firms under the Legacy Group. “Between the two of them, Hinola and Pasetes could direct the day-to-day operations of all the Legacy companies. Ms. Hinola was my ‘right hand person’ and the chief enforcer of the plans and programs. Ms. Pasetes handled the central treasury operations of the Group. In that capacity, Ms. Pasetes controlled all the funds of the Legacy companies," he said. Delos Angeles also denied the charges against him and several other officers of Legacy Group. He said the Legacy Group and the firms under it are “legitimate entities and their officers never operated in complicity to defraud their investors." “They cannot be held liable for syndicated estafa.," Delos Angeles said of Legacy’s accused officers. - GMANews.TV