So where did this fabulous but allegedly legal Marcos wealth come from? That’s where the "Imelda vs cronies" series gets really interesting, not to mention entering the realm of fantasy. Part 4 (PDI, 8/12/98) had the astonishing headline: "‘Marcos had gold hoard of 4,000 tons’". According to Imelda, Marcos was the world’s shrewdest gold trader, accumulating his first 1,000 tons whilst a guerilla fighting the Japanese in WWII (the legendary Yamashita Treasure) and amassing 4,000 tons by the 1970s (as against the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ [BSP] mere 650 ton gold reserve). She reckons that he bought gold at $US 17 per ounce and sold it at $US 32. Things really took off in the 1970s, when the price of gold hit nearly $US 800 per ounce
The 500 billion pesos (divide by 20 for $NZ or by 25 for $AUS) is described as a conservative estimate; Marcos lawyers say that it might go as high as a trillion pesos. If such a case or cases actually comes to pass, it will undeniably be the biggest litigation in Philippine history. The P500 billion is in addition to the P22 billion ($US580+million) of Marcos wealth found in Swiss banks. Interesting when you consider that the 1965–84 tax returns for Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos declared a total combined income of P6,756,301.
Imelda’s first target is PLDT, specifically to attempt to block the P30 billion deal passing control of the company to the Suharto–linked First Pacific Co. She contends that a 1967 deal establishes the Marcoses as the real owners of PLDT, not the leading crony family, the Cojuangcos. She is targeting the Philippines’ leading capitalists, such as billionaire Lucio Tan (Fortune Tobacco, Allied Banking, Asia Brewery, and Philippine Airlines. He is also a very close friend and ally of President Estrada). "That Lucio Tan, he’s nothing, just somebody who used to buy used bottles" (ibid). Her logic is impeccable – the Government, via the Presidential Commission for Good Government (PCGG) has tried since the mid 1980s to prove that these companies are Marcos owned and controlled. It has been stymied at every step by failure to prove ownership. So now Imelda openly admits ownership, and wants control back. But unlike the PCGG, she asserts that ownership came from legal, not illegal, Marcos wealth and that her motive for going public is to clear her late husband of the accusation of being a thief. Indeed, Imelda claims that Marcos used his vast fortune to personally finance the development of the Philippines – but presents zero evidence to support this incredible claim.
The Marcos gold deposits alone,
Zobel said, may have reached US$35 billion. Zobel had also mentioned
the US$13.4 billion Irene Marcos Araneta account at the Union Bank of
Switzerland. The gold bars are allegedly kept in various banks in
Portugal, Vatican City, Switzerland, Spain, Germany, Solomon Island,
and the US. Zobel said Marcos obtained the gold bars after the
Liberation (1946) from the Yamashita treasure and from soldiers who
sold their gold bars for only US$20 per bar. Another version was that
of Rogelio Roxas who claimed that Marcos' men seized the real golden
buddha from his house at Aurora Hills in Baguio City on April 5, 1971.
The buddha reportedly costs billions of dollars.
In
February 2001, the Philippine Daily Inquirer disclosed the alleged
attempt of Irene Marcos Araneta to launder billions of dollars in
deposits under the 885931 accounts from Union Bank of Switzerland to
Deutsche Banks in Dusseldorf, Germany. Aside from the Marcos family and
the Philippine government, the 9,539 victims of human rights under the
Marcos regime have interest in the Marcos wealth