Philippines - The Richest Country In The World?!

We can call it vindication. The Yamashita treasure turned out to be true and former President Ferdinand Marcos seemed to have cornered one of the biggest portions of the "loot". Nobody really knows the exact amount but judging from the unbelievable figures bandied about (hundreds of billion dollars per Treasury certificate, for instance and a plane which crashed in Mindanao was full of them), Marcos' share must have worth trillions of dollars many times over. Several books which came out recently revealed his deposits were farmed out in hundreds of banks around the world. If nearly a trillion dollars (allegedly now worth $10 trillion in today's gold price) were found in Brussels which is not exactly a major financial center, how much more in the gigantic havens of Switzerland, London, etc.?.

This video is consistent with the Western script to mock Imelda to paint incredulity (part of the ill-gotten wealth drama to bolster what appears now as People Power fiction), but now that claimants were winning their share from the Marcos "loot" in the courts (like Rogelio Roxas of the Golden Buddha fame who was awarded billions by a US court, confirming the existence of the Marcos Gold), Imelda is finally vindicated & having the last laugh.

What makes one giddy is that 1/3 is still waiting to be mined in the Philippines.

So, what was the PCGG's hunt for "ill-gotten" wealth all about then? After 30 years, it allegedly recovered half a billion dollars. Recovery or confiscation?

Even now, the Philippines only has a $200 billion GDP, too peanuts for somebody who allegedly already had trillions in the 1950's (that amount was only his initial share from the immediate post-war $50 trillion-worth of Yamashita digging which included the so-called Vatican Gold brought for safekeeping into the Philippines by Fr. Antonio Diaz during WWII, it doesn't include the proceeds from the digging of the rest of the Yamashita loot when he was already President of the Philippines). With 950,000 metric tons of Vatican Gold (trusts from aristrocratic European families) missing, most allegedly found their way into the Philippines to escape the war. Alas, WWII courtesy of Japan caught up with them. With the European gold and the Asian gold allegedly amounting to 250,000 metric tons (this should be very conservative considering the Philippines presently has the biggest unmined gold reserve, and the rest of Southeast Asia is as blessed with natural resources) buried in the Philippines by the retreating Japanese, the lucky ones got really lucky. A young lawyer named Ferdinand Marcos, contracted by Fr. Diaz to administer the loot, got really lucky, more so when he became President of the Republic itself. The vultures immediately closed in. 132,000 metric tons of Philippine gold were deposited in Fort Knox & 63,000 metric tons were extorted by American globalists so he won't be dislodged during the Edsa People Power "revolution" (READ here and the letter itself here). When the World Trade Center towers were bombed, some of the alleged Marcos gold were at the basement. Conservatively, there are 200,000 metric tons of Philippine gold in the US alone.

To think, you read in Western economic publications there are only 171,000 tons of gold in the world. It's obvious the world gold cartel doesn't want the world to know the abundance of gold to control the value of their reserve currency. It is believed 2/3 of the world's gold are Philippine gold, making some of the more giddy ones claim the Philippines is actually the richest in the world (I think they have a point).

Especially now when the survival of the dollar fiat economy is tottering at the edge of the cliff and it's almost a certainty that a new reserve currency backed up with gold will be established. The Philippine gold extorted during EDSA 1 allegedly backed up the CIA's Black Eagle Fund which was used to bankrupt the Soviet Union in Project Hammer. The Philippine gold will surely play the major part in the new post-dollar world and Philippine leadership should be astute enough to position the country's interests in the new scheme of things.

So back to PCGG. Where is the ill-gotten wealth then? Recovery? From my corner, it appears more as confiscation. Shouldn't those who served in the PCGG be subject for investigation now?

Another bad taste in the mouth: what was all those hoopla about the People Power revolution for then? ...

Tagle wants the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to explain what happened to the 132,000 metric tons of gold deposited in New York. A metric ton of gold is worth around $10 million, according to Tagle. ''Tayo ang pinakamayaman na bansa sa buong mundo. Tapos nagpapalimos tayo (WE ARE THE RICHEST COUNTRY, WHY ARE WE BEGGING?'' Tagle said. He said the country's wealth was ''confirmed by World Metal Preciux which is owned by Swiss banks and which controls the world's gold supply.'' The resigned Catholic priest said the World Bank was making the Philippines bow to its demands even as it was lending part of the Marcos gold to the country.

Have You Heard Of Vatican Gold? (While reading this, please note it was 1999. Today is 2013 & the price of gold is nearly $2,000 per ounce)


The Inquirer (October 29, 1999)

DAVAO CITY--A former Catholic priest here claims to have evidence that the alleged Marcos gold horde is composed of World War II ''Yamashita gold and Vatican gold.''

Ex-priest Marcelino Tagle of Bataan, a former director of Caritas Manila and one of the nation's ''Ten Outstanding Young Men'' in 1967, said in a recent interview that the nation ''should benefit'' from the Marcos gold, which he estimated at ''10 trillion dollars.''

Ten trillion dollars is 10 times more than the gross national product of China in 1998; around 127 times more than the GNP of the Philippines last year; and almost 10 times the combined worth of the world's 200 richest known billionaires in 1999. ''I am ready to substantiate and defend my claims for the benefit of the Filipino people,'' Tagle said when told that his claims were preposterous.

The former priest said he once served as an adviser of the late President Ferdinand Marcos and administrator for the estate of another man whom he claimed was the source of the Marcos gold.

But because Marcos was allegedly able to gain control of the gold certificates and cover the paper trail, according to Tagle, ''it is almost impossible to recover them without piecing the various pieces like a mosaic.'' Tagle said the gold certificates and bullion were deposited in at least 15 countries.

How the Vatican and Yamashita treasure reached the Philippines is a story that, he claims, involves two of the century's most influential personalities--Adolf Hitler and Gen. Douglas MacArthur.

Royal gold

Tagle said the Vatican gold included ''gold bars captured by Hitler (which belonged) to the royalties of Europe of which the Vatican was the trustee.'' It also included ''royal gold'' which the British reportedly shipped to Singapore for safekeeping in the event that Hitler would conquer all of Europe. Tagle said the Vatican entrusted the treasure to a certain Fr. Jose Antonio Diaz, who assumed several names when he moved to the Philippines.

One of his aliases, according to Tagle, was ''Col. Severino Sto. Romana.'' Tagle said Sto. Romana hired the young Marcos as his lawyer and trustee. He said the Sto. Romana gold was ''actually more than the Marcos gold, about $50 trillion, but this treasure is tied up with the Marcos gold.'' Tagle, co-administrator of the Sto. Romana estates, said the Yamashita treasure was recovered through the help of MacArthur and Yamashita's wife.

But an estimated 400,000 metric tons from both the Marcos and Sto. Romana gold, he said, ''are still in the country, hidden in caves.''


For lack of documents

The heirs of Sto. Romana were unable to recover the assets ''for lack of original documents and (because of the) nature of the accounts (which required) full cooperation of nominees and trustees constituted by the late President Marcos.''

Appearing before the Senate blue ribbon committee on Oct. 14, 1997, Tagle said Marcos, as lawyer and chief trustee of Sto. Romana, ''succeeded in isolating the nominees or trustees of the gold certificates from the physical assets--so much so that it is almost impossible to recover them without piecing the various pieces like a mosaic.'' Tagle said the ''Marcos gold'' was ''not stolen from the Philippine government.'' Instead, said the former priest, Marcos abused his authority by using the Central Bank to transact the gold.

Tagle, who is presently in Davao City as consultant of gold prospectors, said he was ready to substantiate his claims. He allegedly went into exile in the United States in September 1969 because the Marcoses were displeased about his leading a protest against graft and corruption in the Bureau of Customs.
He resigned from the priesthood and married. He is now chair and chief executive officer of International Consultex Inc., a New York-based mining, consultancy and engineering firm.
A lot of money The Senate is conducting public hearings on the Marcos wealth, revolving around a $13.4-billion Swiss bank account once allegedly kept by Irene Marcos Araneta.

Former Solicitor General Francisco Chavez is presenting the evidence. ''Chavez knows what he is talking about,'' said Tagle, adding that the Marcos wealth was so huge that even Marcos' widow Imelda did not know its exact worth. If Tagle's $10-trillion estimate of the Marcos wealth were true, the Marcoses would be around 111 times richer than ''the richest man in the world,'' Microsoft chief Bill Gates.
Forbes Magazine in June estimated Gates' fortune at $90 billion. Ten trillion dollars is also 56 times more than the combined net worth of the top 50 billionaires in Asia, and almost 1,111 times the combined net worth of four Filipino billionaires who made it to the 1999 list. The Marcos family was not on that list. The amount is also equivalent to almost half of the combined GNP of the world's top 10 economies in 1998.

It would take approximately 4500 people--counting uninterrupted at a rate of one dollar per second--70 years to count $10 trillion. Seven-point solution Tagle said among the first things government should do to recover the wealth is to abolish the Presidential Commission on Good Government which has spent ''millions of dollars'' but has ''failed to produce the desirable results in bringing back the gold assets for the benefit of the Filipino people.''

Tagle proposed a ''seven-point solution'' to the problem of recovering the Marcos wealth: Create a Global Trust Fund to ''secure, recover and distribute the assets of Marcos in an out-of-court settlement.'' Have ''banking groups lend money to the Trust using the gold certificates and physical assets deposited in the lending banks, for a period of 15-20 years.'' The proceeds should be used to ''pay the Philippine debt'' and to fund ''education, social services, medical needs, and generate jobs by building new plants, roads, transport facilities, communication, irrigation, energy development, etc.''

Probate courts ''should assist in determining the rightful heirs and beneficiaries (of the wealth) and effect compromise agreements with primary and secondary beneficiaries.'' Government and all beneficiaries should ''agree on their respective'' shares. ''Adequate compensation should be given to human rights victims.'' ''Put a major portion of the funds into the development of Mindanao and other depressed areas of the Philippines by creating new centers of industrial development and free trading zones.'' ''Establish an Asia-Pacific gold trading house in Subic backed up by a gold refinery, jointly operated by the Central Bank and private gold hallmark companies.'' ''Call a general and sectoral conference on the Marcos gold. World banking officials and lawyers involved in recovering the wealth must be invited.''