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 A HOUSE in a posh subdivision, a
14-room mansion in Surigao City, properties in
Tagaytay, Baguio, and Palawan. What’s wrong with
these?
Most of them were bought by a man with
little known sources of income other than his
salary as a government official.
The official in question is Robert Zabala
Barbers, senator and native of Surigao del Norte
province. Observers and critics, including his
political rivals, ask how one who has been in
government for practically his entire professional
life could have acquired these properties worth
millions of pesos.
The most controversial among the Barbers
properties is his new mansion in Barangay Lipata,
Surigao City. Completed in 1999, it is described
by locals as the "mansion in the sky" because of
its size and location. With a floor area of about
1,000 square meters, the house sits on rolling
land on the slope of a hill. People who have seen
it say it has 14 bedrooms.
When riding a tugboat along Surigao Strait,
quite a distance from the city, one could see the
elevated property. The house is not the only
structure in the Barbers compound. Just below it,
within the fenced property, is the Barbers
family’s private chapel.
"Is there anything wrong if I have houses
built with the help of my family and my children
who are all professionals?" Barbers told Newsbreak
in an interview. He said that he financed the
building of the Lipata house through loans he
obtained locally.
The senator said he bought the land cheap,
at only 30 pesos or 40 pesos per square meter.
"’Yung contractor ko local. May
utang pa nga ako (My contractor is local [from
Surigao]. I still owe him)."
It was Barbers’ father, Felix, a former
judge, who applied for a permit to build the house
in Lipata in 1999. But the senator admitted during
the interview and in press statements that he owns
the house and lot.
Nothing to Hide
The senator stressed that he is hiding
nothing. Everything is declared in his statements
of assets and liabilities (SAL), he said.
The property in Lipata was not specified in
Barbers’ 1999 SAL. That year, however, he reported
an increase of 10 million pesos in the fair market
value of his Surigao properties and changed the
year acquisition from "1989"—the year he
reportedly acquired his first Surigao property—to
"various" years.
Estimates of the combined cost of the
Lipata structures vary widely, from a low of 14
million pesos to a high of 80 million pesos.
According to the application filed by his father,
the house has a floor area of 1,010 square meters
and cost 8,142,847.30 pesos.
An examination of the SAL the senator
submitted to Congress in 1992, the year he won the
first of his two terms as congressman—up to the
latest statements he filed as senator reveals
disparities in income and cost of properties
acquired. From the time he was congressman up to
the present, Barbers accumulated properties with a
total market value of at least 47,300,000 pesos.
This despite the fact that the businesses he owns
declared net losses and that since June 1992, his
basic monthly salary has only been around 40,000
pesos.
In the 1999 SAL, Barbers reported spending
only 1.2 million pesos for new acquisitions
consisting of 200,000 pesos for land, building,
etc. and one million pesos for improvements. In
succeeding years (2000 to 2002), he reported
spending a total of 2.6 million pesos on
improvements on his Surigao properties. This
brings to only 3.8 million pesos the total amount
he reported spending for additional property and
improvements in Surigao since 1999. His
liabilities as of 2002 increased by only 2.63
million pesos from that of 1998.
Critics say Barbers did not have to shell
out a single centavo to have the house built. They
claim that the cost of putting up the structure
was shouldered by the contractors who built it. In
exchange for that, they say, Barbers was to award
government contracts to these
contractors.
Rooted in Politics?
The issues being raised against him are
rooted in politics, the senator told Newsbreak.
"These people have been harping on my house since
1999. Why is it that they have not filed any
complaint?"
He added that his chief accusers are his
political rivals who themselves are facing charges
of corruption, including "overpricing" of
government projects.
Most sources for this article gave
information to Newsbreak on condition of
anonymity. They include some present and former
government officials and employees, political
rivals, business practitioners, and ordinary
residents of Surigao del Norte.
Not everyone who took part in building the
mansion has received his due reward so far, some
of the sources say. They claim that Barbers has
driven a number of local contractors bankrupt. One
was forced to relocate away from Surigao City
because, sources in Surigao say, the senator
demands a steep share (20 to 25 percent) of the
proceeds of the contract even before the budget
for a government project is made available.
Sources say that contractors who want to
stay in business have no choice but to agree to
Barbers’ terms. The sources point out that since
the nickel mining industry went moribund in the
mid-’80s, there have been little other sources of
business in Surigao del Norte apart from
government contracts. And the senator reportedly
makes sure that he has a say in practically all
projects going to the province.
Barbers refused to discuss these "local
issues" in the interview.
Property Acquisitions
Before he ran for Congress, Surigao City
residents say, Barbers did not have a house of his
own in Surigao. According to some locals, the
address he listed on his certificate of candidacy
was the old house in the Zabala compound along
Borromeo and Narcisa streets, Surigao City, where
most members of his mother’s family, the Zabalas,
also lived.
The clan led modest lives, residents say.
The senator’s parents are respected members of the
community. Felix Barbers, his father, was
municipal judge of Surigao City and later became
an executive judge in the city of Manila. His
mother, Regina Zabala Barbers, was division
superintendent of schools for Surigao del Norte.
Both are now retired.
Not a native of Surigao province -- he
hails from Ilocos Norte—the senior Barbers had no
other visible sources of income. The Zabalas, on
the other hand, operated a small cockpit in the
city and one of the four small stevedoring
services in the port of Surigao.
Robert Zabala Barbers served as a police
officer from 1965 to 1991, when he quit the police
force to run for Congress. Any SAL he may have
filed during those years are no longer available,
according to officials of the National Police
Commission (Napolcom) and the Civil Service
Commission (CSC).
The SAL he submitted to the House of
Representatives in 1992, however, showed that in
1982, while he was Police Officer II earning about
5,000 pesos a month, he was able to buy a house
and lot for 6.5 million pesos at 9532 Taguig St.,
Makati, Metro Manila.
The same document showed that in 1989,
while serving in Manila as chief of intelligence
of the Western Police District (WPD), he purchased
a piece of land for P500,000 in Surigao City and
spent two million pesos for the construction of a
building on it.
The Surigao City assessor’s office has no
records of any property belonging to Barbers. What
it does have are records of a Four Aces Sports
Complex Building listed as property of the Four
Aces Sports Complex Inc.; a cockpit listed under
the names of "Robert Z," Emilia Zabala, Adriano
Zabala Jr., and Felix Barbers; and a rest house.
Adriano and Emilia are siblings of Barbers’
mother, Regina. The three structures—worth a total
of 2.96 million pesos as of 1995 according to
records at the assessor’s office—are situated near
a church in Barangay Rizal, Surigao
city.
In 1999, records at the Surigao assessor’s
office indicate that the value of the cockpit in
Barangay Rizal, now called New Zabala, increased
in year 2002 to P2.6 million because of
improvements. The cockpit, according to sources at
the assessor’s office who have seen the facility,
is now air-conditioned. A basketball court was
also built within the compound.
Some residents say the structures were
actually built after Barbers became congressman.
Barbers used the rest house as his local residence
and district office. After the Lipata mansion was
built, the rest house became the district office
of the senator’s son, Robert Ace Barbers.
Up to 2002, tax declarations on the land
where the three structures are located remained
under the name of the original owner, Pedro Sitoy.
But Barbers admitted to Newsbreak that the
buildings and the land on which they sit are his.
Barbers joined the Ramos Cabinet in 1996 as
secretary of the Department of the Interior and
Local Government (DILG). In the last SAL he
submitted to the House of Representatives in 1996
before assuming the DILG post, Barbers declared
the purchase of a P9.5 million property in
Bel-Air, an upper-crust subdivision in Makati City
in 1994, two years after he got elected as
congressman. The Bel-Air property replaced the
Taguig St. property in the 1996 SAL. Barbers said
he sold his original Makati property to buy the
house and lot in Bel-Air. The Bel-Air property,
however, was not declared in his 1994 and 1995
SALs.
In a letter, the Malacañang records
division informed Newsbreak that it had no copy of
SALs that Barbers filed as a Cabinet member from
1996 to 1997.
Documents from the assessor’s office of
Surigao City and the register of deeds of Surigao
del Norte indicate that in 1997, he bought
adjacent parcels of land in Lipata, Surigao City.
This was not indicated in the first SAL he
submitted to the Senate in 1998.
The 1998 SAL shows that Barbers spent on
the following:
* A 1.75-million-peso house and lot in
Tagaytay (declared later in his 1999 SAL to have a
fair market value of 4.5 million
pesos).
* Two-million-peso "lot and improvements"
in Baguio City (declared in his 1999 SAL to have a
fair market value of P3 million).
* A
150,000-peso lot in Palawan (declared in 1999 to
have a fair market value of P300,000).
This was the same year Barbers reported
spending 9.76 million pesos for his senatorial
campaign, 750,000 pesos of which was paid "out of
personal funds."
Businesses
Aside from real properties, sources told
Newsbreak that the senator owns two pump boats
named Parak I and Parak II and a
number of luxury cars.
From 1992 to 1993, Barbers listed in his
SAL a few businesses, mainly the consultancy firms
Sherlock Security and Promotions Inc., both of
which he supposedly acquired in 1988.
In 1994 and 1995, he omitted the two and
declared one firm, Earth Security and Protective
Services Inc., under "business interests and
financial connections." It is his son, Robert
Dean, and not the senator, who is listed as one of
the major stockholders of Earth Security, which,
according to documents from the Securities and
Exchange Commission (SEC), was incorporated in
September 1993. The 32-year-old Robert Dean
graduated from Miriam College in summer of that
same year.
Sources working at the Security Agencies
and Guards Supervision Division (SAGSD), the
agency under the Philippine National Police that
supervises security agencies, told Newsbreak that
Earth Security had a valid license up to March
2003. Listed as licensee in the SAGSD records is
Annabelle Cendaña, one of the stockholders.
The senator, SEC records show, was an
incorporator of the Four Aces Sports Complex Inc.
(established in 1995) and Surigao Sports Inc.
(established 1999). But he only declared Four
Aces. During his stint in the House of
Representatives, Four Aces appeared in the last
SAL he filed, in 1996. The spaces under "business
interests and financial connections" were left
blank in subsequent SALs Barbers filed as senator
(1998 to 2002). Surigao Sports Inc. operates the
cockpit now known as New Zabala.
Some residents of Surigao del Norte say the
senator has two other companies, although not
listed under his name: Bilang-bilang Arrastre
Services Inc. and Glad Security and Protective
Agency.
Barbers admitted to Newsbreak that he owns
Bilang-bilang, which was incorporated on June 2,
1992, a month after he won his first term as
congressman. The arrastre firm was never listed in
yearly SALs he filed with the House of
Representatives and the Senate. Listed as company
incorporators and stockholders are his sons Robert
Ace Barbers and Robert Dean Barbers. Ace also
failed to report the company in his yearly SALs.
Bilang-bilang bagged the exclusive contract
to provide stevedoring services in the port of
Surigao in January 1993, months after Barbers won
his first congressional term.
Losing Money
Glad Security, which according to SEC
records was only incorporated on Feb.19, 2002, has
been bagging a number of security service
contracts in Surigao del Norte, Surigao City
residents say. Among its current clients, sources
say, are the Pacific Cement Corp. (Pacemco), the
Philippine Nickel Corp., and a number of local
banks and business establishments.
Pacemco used to be serviced by the security
agency of Cruz Yuipco Jr., the former vice
governor of Surigao del Norte.
SAGSD officials confirmed that quite a
number of Glad security guards are deployed in the
Surigao provinces. The word Glad, according to the
sources, stands for the names of the senators’
children: Grace, Lyndon, Ace and Dean.
To be fair, none of the Barbers family
members is listed as stockholders of Glad
Security. Glad agents, however, have been seen
standing guard at the senator’s Bel-Air residence
and the rest house in barangay Rizal, Surigao
City. One of the agency’s stockholders, Ponciano
Pontiveros, contributed 30,000 pesos to Ace’s
congressional campaign in 1998, according to the
statement of campaign contributions and expenses
he submitted to the Commission on Elections in
1998.
Barbers’ critics and even some of his
allies say that these businesses could not have
earned enough to finance the senator’s recent
acquisitions.
One Barbers ally, Surigao City Mayor
Ponciano Cassura, said the arrastre service does
not earn much because the port of Surigao is just
a small port. Neither does the cockpit, other
residents say. "Malakas din kasi silang
[referring to Barbers and his relatives]
magsugal. Minsan natatalo (They
[referring to Barbers and his relatives] also bet
heavily on cockfights. Sometimes they lose)," a
source not involved in local politics told
Newsbreak. Both Four Aces and Surigao Sports never
filed financial statements before the SEC.
The sports complex Four Aces, according to
locals, has not been doing well. It used to have a
bowling alley and a restaurant. Nowadays, the
family merely rents it out as a venue for special
occasions.
In its financial statement submitted to the
SEC Dec. 31, 1997, Bilang-bilang reported a net
loss of P1.3 million that year. That was the last
financial statement the company filed.
Earth Security reported a net loss of P1.5
million in year 2001 and a net loss P1.837 million
in its latest financial statement (dated December
2002).
It looks like the senator has a lot of
explaining to do.
—With research assistance from Maricar
Veluz, Monica Krishnan, and Francis Capistrano.
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