THE Court of Appeals has extended by another six months a freeze order over the assets of former Trade minister Roberto Ongpin and several current and former board members of the state-owned

Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP), in connection with the P660 million behest loans granted by the bank in 2009.

In a four-page resolution obtained by The Manila Times, the appellate court’s fifth division extended until June 26, 2013 the freeze order it earlier issued over the bank accounts of Ongpin and other former DBP officials led by former president Reynaldo David, former chairman of the DBP board Patricia Sto. Tomas and senior executive vice president and chief operating officer Edgardo Garcia.

Also covered by the freeze order are the bank accounts of Josephine Manalo, Ma. Lourdes Torres, Miguel Luis Romero, Benedicto Ernesto Bitonio Jr., Franklin Velarde and Armando Samia.

The freeze order covers 114 bank accounts and other related web accounts, including bank deposits in the Bank of Philippine Islands, Standard Chartered Bank, Philippine National Bank and DBP.

The six-month freeze extension was sought by the Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) to keep the bank accounts from being dissipated. The order was written by Associate Justice Leoncia Real-Dimagiba, with Justices Rosmari Carandang and Ricardo Rosario, concurring.

The appeals court also directed the Office of the Solicitor General, lawyer for the council, to reply within 10 days to the plea of Ongpin, et al for the lifting of the order.

Ongpin and the other respondents are required to file their reply within five days from receipt of the comments of the Solicitor General office.

It will be recalled that on August 5, 2012, the Development Bank filed criminal and administrative cases before the Office of the Ombudsman against its past board led by Ongpin and several others, in connection with the alleged P660 million behest loans that the bank had granted to an Ongpin company, Delta Ventures Resources Inc. (DVRI), to finance his acquisition of Philex Mining shares.

Meanwhile, Ongpin himself lodged graft charges before the Ombudsman against Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Deputy Gov. Nestor Espenilla Jr. and AMLC Executive Director Vicente Aquino.

Ongpin filed the complaint against Aquino for violating the Anti-Graft Law because of his alleged gross inexcusable negligence based on the records on the DBP-Philex case, which caused the issuance of the freeze order over their assets.

In addition, Ongpin also charged Aquino with perjury for swearing under oath that the Development Bank’s loans to Ongpin violated banking laws, rules and regulations.

However, Espenilla himself stated under oath in a Senate hearing, that the central bank, the regulator of banks, considered DBP’s sale of its 50-million Philex shares to a company owned and controlled by Ongpin as a “prudent” and “positive” transaction that resulted in trading gains for the bank.

In a related development, Ongpin and 14 other former DBP officials asked the Sandiganbayan third division to look first if there is probable cause in their graft charge before issuing warrants.

In separate motions, Ongpin and Sto. Tomas said that there is no probable cause in the two loans that the state bank extended to Ongpin. They reiterated that the loan applications were bereft of irregularities because the Ongpin-owned DVRI was in good standing to acquire the loans.

They said that the Ombudsman erred when it alleged that DVRI was under-capitalized because the corporation has assets worth P330 million. They argued that the loan was collateralized since a P303-million value of Philweb Corp. shares, which DVRI owned was used as “collateral security” for the P150-million loan.

They also noted the admission by DBP chairman Jose Nuñez Jr., the complainant to the case, that the P660-million loan was fully paid in December 2009, “which negates any undue injury to the government arising from the loans.”

“The loan, which was admittedly fully paid ahead of schedule and with interest, was anything but behest,” Ongpin said.

With a report from John Constantine G. Cordon