PNP ‘White House’ media tour unlikely due to security issues

Bea Cupin

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PNP ‘White House’ media tour unlikely due to security issues
While the PNP chief is 'transparent,' the PNP also has to consider the security of PNP chief Alan Purisima and all other PNP chiefs after him, says its spokesman
MANILA, Philippines – While Philippine National Police chief Director General Alan Purisima agreed to open his personal residence in Nueva Ecija to media scrutiny, security concerns may compel him not to extend the same courtesy in the case of his other controversial home, his official residence in Campe Crame.

PNP spokesman Senior Superintendent Wilben Mayor made the statement on Tuesday, October 7, a day after journalists visited Purisima’s home in San Leonardo, Nueva Ecija, amid allegations that the property was undervalued in his latest Statement of Liabilities, Assets and Net Worth (SALN).

Will the equally controversial “White House,” the official home of the PNP chief, be opened to the media as well?

Mayor told Rappler in a phone interview on Tuesday, October 7, that “security issues” have to be considered in any request to allow reporters into the PNP chief’s official residence.

“It will not only jeopardize [the security] of the current PNP chief but also PNP chiefs of the future,” explained Mayor.

He said opening Purisima’s Nueva Ecija home was a security risk in itself.

“It’s farfetched for now because it’s not the personal property of [Purisima],” said Mayor, who added that he has yet to discuss the possibility with the PNP chief.

He said, however, that Purisima is “transparent,” which was why he opened his Nueva Ecija property to the media.

The Nueva Ecija home is the centerpiece of a series of exposes on Purisima’s alleged weath, and the basis of plunder raps against him.

The PNP chief insisted the house was “not a mansion nor a villa” as previous reports insisted, but an ordinary, 204-square-meter house. The 4.7 hectare San Leonardo property has a declared fair market value of P3.75 million.

The “White House” is also mentioned in the same complaint, but for indirect bribery. The PNP chief said in a Senate hearing that his “friends” had donated the new house, worth around P12 million, to the PNP.

“The White House issue has been discussed already. Donors have been given, everything has been given,” Mayor said. 

Aside from the two houses, Purisima is also under fire for an alleged shady deal in the PNP’s Firearms and Explosives Office, and for reportedly accepting huge discounts for vehicles and borrowing a bulletproof SUV from his friends.

Purisima has at least 3 plunder cases against him before the Ombudsman.

Despite wave after wave of controversy, President Benigno Aquino III has remained as the staunchest defender of the embattled PNP chief. 

The two have known each other since 1987, when Purisima was part of the Presidential Security Group (PSG) under the administration of the late Corazon Aquino, the incumbent president’s mother. – Rappler.com

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Bea Cupin

Bea is a senior multimedia reporter who covers national politics. She's been a journalist since 2011 and has written about Congress, the national police, and the Liberal Party for Rappler.