Presidential legal counsel Atty. Salvador Panelo has issued a piece of ‘friendly’ advice to ABS-CBN about President Duterte‘s latest remarks.
During his program Counterpoint on Tuesday, February 9, Panelo made unsolicited advice to the Kapamilya network executives to pay the necessary taxes they need to settle if they wanted to go back on air soon.
Panelo said ABS-CBN has the means to pay their tax dues as known to be the biggest media company in the country.
“Kung ako naman kayo, ito naman ay payong kaibigan. Marami tayong kaibigan diyan. Tingnan ninyo mabuti. If you really see na mayroon naman kayong naiwasan na mga buwis na dapat ninyong mabayaran, eh after all, kayo naman po nagkamal na kayo ng marami ng profits, ilang taon na ‘yan kaya nga kayo lumaki nang lumaki. Ibig sabihin mayroon kayong pambayad, bayaran na lang ninyo,” said Panelo.
“Kaya pag-aralan ninyong maagi. Magbayad na lang kayo ng buwis. Ano ba naman ‘yun. Pera lang ‘yun. Kikitain ninyo rin ‘yun.”
Duterte, in his latest tirade against the Lopezes, warned that he won’t allow the Network to operate again even if Congress grants them with a fresh 25-year broadcast franchise.
Duterte insisted that the Network must pay first their tax dues, which in truth, BIR already cleared the media company.
During the ABS-CBN franchise last year, BIR said the Network has no tax deficiencies with the agency as it regularly paid their taxes.
“ABS-CBN Corporation ay (is) regularly paying taxes for the past years. Na-check naman po na ‘yung dapat nilang i-withhold at na-remit naman nila sa gobyerno (The amount that it needed to withhold had been checked and it was remitted to the government),” BIR Asst Commisioner Manuel Mapoy said.
Concerning the DBP loan (which has been abused by DDS fake news spreaders), DBP executives themselves attested that the Lopez group has no more liability to the bank.
In the widely-circulated news about loan condonation, DBP stated the Lopez loans were not condoned or written off rather were sold to the Lehman Brothers under the SPV law.
“These NPLs and NPAs were dealt with in the regular course of business and disposed of by DBP pursuant to Republic Act No. 9182, entitled The Special Purpose Vehicles Act of 2002, as amended by RA No. 9343 and other applicable laws, which authorized financial institutions, like DBP to transfer NPLs and NPAs to SPVs (special purpose vehicles) created under the Act,” DBP President Herbosa said.
“It was audited by the Commission on Audit and in the annual audit report, there was no finding of irregularity,” pointed by DBP Senior Vice President Soraya Adiong.
