Benny Antiporda, former National Irrigation Administration acting chief has gone on a leave of absence from the National Press Club (NPC) after being implicated in the drug trade by a former Bureau of Customs intelligence officer who testified before a four-committee House hearing in Pampanga on Friday.
The NPC added that its board of directors accepted Antiporda’s offer to take a leave as NPC vice president “as he prepares to address, point by point, the allegations made against him.”
The NPC further said that Davao City businessman Michael Yang, a former adviser to then President Rodrigo Duterte and who was implicated anew in the illegal drug trade, is not a member of the organization, reports said.
NPC president Leonel Abasola, quoted by reports, said: “Mr. Yang is not, and was never, a member of the National Press Club nor affiliated in any way with the organization.”
During the hearing, Guban said Yang and Antiporda, as well as Davao City 1st District Rep. Paolo Duterte and lawyer Manases “Mans” Carpio had been mentioned by a man who threatened him while the Senate was holding hearings in 2018 into P6 billion in shabu hidden in magnetic lifters that authorities intercepted that year.
Rep. Duterte, Antiporda, as well as Presidential Task Force on Media Security head Paul Gutierrez — a former press club officer and the man whom Guban said threatened him — have denied Guban’s allegations.
Earlier, former Customs intelligence officer Jimmy Guban accused former National Press Club president and current Presidential Task Force on Media Security executive director Paul Gutierrez, as well as then-Department of Environment and Natural Resources Undersecretary Benny Antiporda of involvement in a botched drug-smuggling attempt.
Guban made this revelation through an affidavit and testimony during a House of Representatives probe where he also tagged Vice President Sara Duterte’s husband Manases Carpio, her brother Davao City 1st District Rep. Paolo Duterte, and former presidential economic adviser Michael Yang in the smuggling of P11 billion worth of shabu hidden in magnetic lifters discovered at the Manila International Container Port (MICP) in 2018.
Guban said Gutierrez, accompanied by a Senate committee staff member, visited him and warned him against mentioning the names of Pulong Duterte, Carpio and Yang in his testimony.
“Do not mention the names of Pulong, Michael Yang, at Mans. We know where your family lives and we know that you have a son in Makati,” Gutierrez allegedly told Guban in Filipino.
In another instance, Guban recounted a phone call from Bureau of Customs official Lourdes Mangaoang, who inquired about the Vecaba Trading shipment.
According to Guban, Mangaoang said in Filipino, “What can we do about that shipment — that belongs to our buddy Benny Antiporda.”
The shipment from Vecaba Trading was eventually intercepted, and the two magnetic lifters containing shabu were discovered.
Antiporda said in a statement that Guban’s allegations are “lies of great magnitude as magnified by the fact that it lacks any evidentiary support but his self-serving allegations.”
“For one, I do not know him as he himself admitted that he does not know me. For another, while I know Michael Yang, Mans Carpio and Polong by their names, I do not personally know any of them, have not met them, much less talked to any of them personally or electronically on any occasion,” he added.
“I would like to emphasize that I totally abhor corruption and it is common knowledge, and it is with more reason that I absolutely against illegal drugs,” Antiporda further wrote.
For his part, Gutierrez called Guban an “inveterate liar.”
“At the Quadcomm hearing of Congress early today (Friday), my name was repeatedly mentioned by Mr. Jimmy Guban, the former customs intelligence officer who has been convicted for a drug trafficking incident in 2018,” Gutierrez said in a statement.
“I don’t’ personally know nor have I ever met—even up to now—any of the Dutertes, Atty. Mans Carpio or Michael Yang; I also never had any personal or professional dealings with Mr. Guban while I was covering the customs beat, although the things I’ve been hearing about him at the waterfront are all unsavory,” the PTFoMS chief added.
“At the time that he said that I confronted him at the detention center of the Senate, I (was) not an assistant of Mr. Benny Antiporda but a reporter and columnist for my newspaper, People’s Tonight covering the customs and Senate beat… As a lowly reporter, I am not in any position to make any threats to him, and according to him, in front of a Senate Blue Ribbon Committee staff,” said Gutierrez.
Meanwhile, the quad committee ordered that invitations be sent to all individuals mentioned by Guban in his affidavit and testimony.
