‘Para magkaalaman na!’ Teodoro dares critics to prove Maltese passport claims

Department of National Defense (DND) Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. challenged the complainants who accused him of holding a Maltese passport to prove their allegations, saying he had long addressed the issue before they filed a case against him. Teodoro brushed off the issue and said he would let the legal process run its course. “If a case has been filed, then we will see how it turns out. It is a case, so we will see,” the defense chief said on the sidelines of the Philippine Air Force’s 79th founding anniversary at Villamor Air Base in Pasay City on Wednesday, July 1. The complaint filed last month stemmed from allegations that Teodoro possessed a Maltese passport issued in 2016 and may have misrepresented his citizenship status. The petitioners, led by lawyer Russel Miraflor, asked prosecutors to investigate the matter. “I clarified that a long time ago. They do not want to believe it, so let them prove it. They are the ones who filed the case. They should prove it,” Teodoro said when asked about his reaction to the complaint. The DND earlier came to Teodoro’s defense and dismissed the complaint as “baseless.” DND Assistant Secretary Erik Dy, chief of the Legal and Legislative Affairs Service of the defense department, said the allegations were unverified and unsupported by evidence. He argued that the complainants were trying to shift the burden of proof to the government instead of substantiating their own claims. “The complaint filed against the Secretary of National Defense appears to be built on unverified allegations, and attempts to shift the burden of proof to the State by requesting the Office of the Pasay City Prosecutor and other government agencies to establish the very facts the complainants themselves failed to prove,” Dy had said. Teodoro has consistently maintained that he had already renounced any foreign citizenship, saying he had repeatedly clarified the matter before the latest complaint was filed. He said he acquired Maltese citizenship in 2016 while he was a private citizen and formally renounced it in 2021, with the renunciation taking effect in March 2022 before he ran in the 2022 elections. He also said he disclosed the Maltese passport to the Bureau of Immigration, the Commission on Elections, and later to the Commission on Appointments before his confirmation as defense secretary in 2023. China’s sanctions Meanwhile, Teodoro shrugged off anew China’s sanctions against him, saying the Filipino people would judge the truth of his statements on Beijing’s actions in the West Philippine Sea (WPS). “As far as I am concerned, it is the people who will judge. I have not said anything that is untrue. Everything I have said is true. It is not my problem if nobody believes (China). That is (China’s) problem,” he said. China announced on June 11 its sanctions on Teodoro, including barring him, his spouse, and child from entering mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau. It also banned Chinese individuals and organizations from conducting transactions or cooperation with them. Beijing said the sanctions were in response to Teodoro’s “irresponsible remarks” that allegedly harmed China’s interests. However, Teodoro stood by his position and said the dispute is not with the Chinese people, but with their government. “I think they (Chinese government) should look in the mirror. Our enemy here is not the Chinese people. It is the Communist Party of China and their government that is grabbing territory and twisting the story,” he said. He added that Beijing was trying to create distractions instead of addressing the issues raised against it. “They cannot deal with the issue, so they resort to making noise. That is why I called it ‘alburoto.’ That is as far as it goes because when what we are saying is correct, and it is accepted by the whole world, it becomes difficult for them to refute it,” Teodoro said. Teodoro has been one of the administration’s most outspoken officials on the WPS dispute. He has repeatedly criticized China’s “illegal, coercive, aggressive, and deceptive” actions or ICAD in Philippine waters. He has also maintained that the Philippines’ position is anchored on international law, including the 2016 arbitral award that invalidated China’s sweeping claims in the South China Sea.