MANILA, Philippines — Despite being cleared by the Ombudsman, Senator Grace Poe believes that Health Secretary Francisco Duque III still has “moral liability” in a health card program launched ahead of the 2004 elections to allegedly boost the campaign of then President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. This, after Malacañang had reportedly expressed doubts that Duque, who served as president and CEO of Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) at the time, had any liability of corruption in the program dubbed as “Plan 5M.”ADVERTISEMENT“Maybe he has no legal liability but he has a moral liability. Duque had supposedly ordered regional vice presidents to distribute a total of five million PhilHealth cards, which corresponded to the 5-million lead votes of then-presidential candidate Fernando Poe Jr. in the pre-election survey. The late Fernando Poe Jr., father of Senator Poe, ran against Arroyo in the 2004 polls. But Duque, during the hearing, denied any “correlation” between the controversial health card program to the 2004 elections.

Source: Philippine Daily Inquirer August 20, 2020 01:31 UTC