Dismissed Mayor Alice Guo —Inquirer/Marianne Bermudez
MANILA, Philippines — “Curiouser and curiouser!”
The famous line from “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” seems a fitting description of the case of another Alice, the dismissed mayor of Bamban, Tarlac, who has reportedly left the country as she faces multiple investigations.
While the government believes that Alice Guo has already escaped to Malaysia, a notary public maintains that she is still very much around.
On Monday, Sen. Risa Hontiveros disclosed that Guo had already fled on July 18, showing an image of a document with Guo’s passport and supposed entry log at the Kuala Lumpur airport.
READ: Alice Guo out of PH, fled to Malaysia last month – Hontiveros
Citing “very reliable sources,” the Bureau of Immigration (BI) later that night also said Guo may have left the Philippines illegally without passing through the required immigration checks.
Corroborating the BI’s information, and quoting its “foreign counterparts’ immigration records,” Winston Casio, spokesperson for the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission, said Guo arrived in Kuala Lumpur from Denpasar, Indonesia, on July 18.
Seen ‘through window’
But now comes a lawyer who has supposedly notarized the counteraffidavit of Guo, saying he personally saw the ousted mayor “through the window” of her vehicle on the night of Aug. 14.
Elmer Galicia appeared on Tuesday at the Department of Justice (DOJ), which is conducting an investigation into the qualified human trafficking complaint filed against Guo and several others.
Galicia was accompanied by Bulacan Provincial Prosecutor Sonny Ocampo and Caloocan City Prosecutor Darwin Cañete, who are part of the panel looking into Guo’s links to a raided Philippine offshore gaming operator (Pogo) in Bamban.
Speaking to reporters after a meeting with the National Bureau of Investigation, Ocampo said Galicia volunteered to report his last sighting of Guo.
As quoted by Ocampo, Galicia said that around 7 p.m. on Aug. 14, he arrived at his office in Barangay Tungkong Mangga in San Jose Del Monte, Bulacan, and saw a Toyota Land Cruiser waiting outside—with Guo in it.
Out of respect
Asked if Galicia boarded the vehicle to notarize Guo’s document, Ocampo said: “He did not say, but he said he saw her through the window.”
Galicia declined to talk to reporters at the DOJ but in an interview on dzRH early Tuesday, he detailed the supposed encounter.
He said Guo had companions but that they all stayed in the vehicle throughout the process and just rolled the window down to communicate with him.
Galicia, who had served as a city legal officer in San Jose Del Monte, explained that he did not compel Guo to step out of the vehicle out of respect for her position.
‘Alice na lang po’
When he addressed Guo as “mayor,” she supposedly responded: “Alice na lang po. Pasensya na po kayo, attorney, at wala na po akong malapitan, wala na pong gustong tumulong sakin. (Just call me Alice. Please bear with me, attorney, but I have no one else to turn to. No one wants to help me anymore.)”
Galicia said he agreed to render his services out of compassion.
“I have a soft spot for that. I feel this person needs help, so why should I deny it? It’s my duty as a lawyer to represent (her),” he said in the radio interview.
He said Guo presented her driver’s license as proof of identity.
Cañete said Galicia committed to file an affidavit on the Aug. 14 encounter.
In and out?
Reacting to Galicia’s claim, Hontiveros, one of the lawmakers who had investigated Guo and questioned her identity, asked: “Does it mean that the dismissed mayor was just coming in and out of the country?’’
“Because if Guo was just coming in and out of the country, thumbing her nose at the Senate’s warrant of arrest, the more the law enforcement authorities need to explain these circumstances.”
“Why was she able to come in and out of our borders without (being served) the standing warrant? And if that lawyer was lying, he is also accountable. So we will get to the bottom of this,” Hontiveros said.
“If they insist that Guo is still here, they have much to prove and they have much information to discredit coming from very credible sources who also have an interest in this case,” she said.
House Assistant Majority Leader and Zambales Rep. Jefferson Khonghun said Guo’s lawyers, including the notary public who had attested to her sworn statement in the DOJ, should be held accountable if found to be covering her tracks. —with reports from Tina G. Santos and Jeannette I. Andrade