(An Excerpt from MEN & EVENTS By Alito L. Malinao)
Source: http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2007/aug/28/yehey/opinion/20070828opi6.html
Based on an earlier Supreme Court ruling, the Marcos net worth from l965 to February 1986 was estimated to be only P2.3 million. If that is so, how come that he has acquired properties that are worth billions of pesos?
On several occasions, in and outside the courts, former first lady Mrs. Imelda Romualdez Marcos has said that her husband was already a very rich man before he entered politics.
Lore or fact
This brings us back to the fabled Yamashita treasure that was supposed to be the source of Marcos’s immense wealth.
Yamashita’s gold, also referred to as the Yamashita treasure, is the name given to the loot worth tens of billions of dollars stolen in Southeast Asia by Japanese forces during World War II and hidden in caves, tunnels and underground complexes in the Philippines.
The “gold” reportedly included different kinds of valuables looted from banks, depositories, temples, churches, other commercial premises, mosques, museums and private homes. It takes its name from General Tomoyuki Yamashita, who assumed command of Japanese forces in the Philippines in 1944.
According to various accounts, the loot was initially concentrated in Singapore, from where it was later moved to the Philippines. The Japanese hoped to ship the treasure from the Philippines to Japan after the war.
Several historians have made well-documented cases that Yamashita’s gold did exist. Sterling Seagrave & Peggy Seagrave have written two books which deal with Yamashita’s Gold: The Yamato Dynasty: the Secret History of Japan’s Imperial Family (2000) and Gold Warriors: America’s Secret Recovery of Yamashita’s Gold (2003).
Golden Buddha
According to the Seagraves, Marcos recovered US$8 billion from one concealed tunnel known as “Teresa 2” in Rizal province. In 1996, a US Federal Court made a ruling that Marcos had stolen a cache of recovered Japanese loot, from a man named Rogelio Roxas.
According to his family, Roxas found a one-ton solid-gold Buddha and thousands of gold bars in a tunnel near Baguio in 1971. Roxas died prematurely in suspicious circumstances, leading to suggestions that he was murdered.
The US court awarded US$22 billion, against Marcos’s estate, to the heirs of Roxas. This amount was greatly reduced on appeal.
If a US federal court had acknowledged the existence of the fabled Yamashita treasure and that Marcos had acquired a part of it, although under some mysterious circumstances, then the claim that he was indeed not a pauper when he assumed the presidency in l965 gains some credibility.
Perhaps this has now emboldened the Marcos heirs to come out in the open, hoping that finally they can present their evidence in court to prove that their father was wealthy enough to acquire the properties that they are now claiming as theirs.
malinaolito@yahoo.com
Based on an earlier Supreme Court ruling, the Marcos net worth from l965 to February 1986 was estimated to be only P2.3 million. If that is so, how come that he has acquired properties that are worth billions of pesos?
On several occasions, in and outside the courts, former first lady Mrs. Imelda Romualdez Marcos has said that her husband was already a very rich man before he entered politics.
Lore or fact
This brings us back to the fabled Yamashita treasure that was supposed to be the source of Marcos’s immense wealth.
Yamashita’s gold, also referred to as the Yamashita treasure, is the name given to the loot worth tens of billions of dollars stolen in Southeast Asia by Japanese forces during World War II and hidden in caves, tunnels and underground complexes in the Philippines.
The “gold” reportedly included different kinds of valuables looted from banks, depositories, temples, churches, other commercial premises, mosques, museums and private homes. It takes its name from General Tomoyuki Yamashita, who assumed command of Japanese forces in the Philippines in 1944.
According to various accounts, the loot was initially concentrated in Singapore, from where it was later moved to the Philippines. The Japanese hoped to ship the treasure from the Philippines to Japan after the war.
Several historians have made well-documented cases that Yamashita’s gold did exist. Sterling Seagrave & Peggy Seagrave have written two books which deal with Yamashita’s Gold: The Yamato Dynasty: the Secret History of Japan’s Imperial Family (2000) and Gold Warriors: America’s Secret Recovery of Yamashita’s Gold (2003).
Golden Buddha
According to the Seagraves, Marcos recovered US$8 billion from one concealed tunnel known as “Teresa 2” in Rizal province. In 1996, a US Federal Court made a ruling that Marcos had stolen a cache of recovered Japanese loot, from a man named Rogelio Roxas.
According to his family, Roxas found a one-ton solid-gold Buddha and thousands of gold bars in a tunnel near Baguio in 1971. Roxas died prematurely in suspicious circumstances, leading to suggestions that he was murdered.
The US court awarded US$22 billion, against Marcos’s estate, to the heirs of Roxas. This amount was greatly reduced on appeal.
If a US federal court had acknowledged the existence of the fabled Yamashita treasure and that Marcos had acquired a part of it, although under some mysterious circumstances, then the claim that he was indeed not a pauper when he assumed the presidency in l965 gains some credibility.
Perhaps this has now emboldened the Marcos heirs to come out in the open, hoping that finally they can present their evidence in court to prove that their father was wealthy enough to acquire the properties that they are now claiming as theirs.
malinaolito@yahoo.com
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