Rodrigo Duterte and Michael Yang were closely intertwined when the latter brought in investors from China. For being so obliging to Duterte, Yang was rewarded with an official position in government – presidential economic adviser even if he was clearly an alien from the Peoples’ Republic of China.
Yang’s appointment was in fact covered by two presidential contracts signed by Duterte’s executive secretary Salvador Medialdea and by his then deputy Menardo Guevarra. In both contracts, Yang signed as Yang Hong Ming.
Duterte first lied that he had appointed Yang. But Yang told the truth – his calling cards had the presidential seal and “office of the presidential economic adviser” was emblazoned on his Manila office. It even had its own website: www.opea.com.ph (since taken down). (N.B. under Republic Act 9184, the hiring of foreign consultants requires public bidding. Duterte did not follow the law in appointing Yang.)
One of the businessmen that Yang had brought over to the Philippines was his own brother, Hong Jiang Yang. He was assigned to Cagayan de Oro where he attended to his brother’s DCLA store, the main counterpart of which was established in Davao city.
In the affidavit that former Davao Death Squad assassin Arturo Lascañas submitted to the International Criminal Court, he mentions the Yang brother in passing: “Michael Yang has a brother in Cagayan de Oro City who managed their branch of DCLA store there.”
Lascañas, however, had much more to say about Michael Yang than the brother. Among several were:
“The late Mayor Aldong Parojinog of Ozamiz City was DCLA’s Michael Yang’s friend and protector of their business operations in the Northern Mindanao area.” (page 179)
“I say and declare honestly and truthfully that the person of Mayor Rodrigo Roa Duterte and his son Paolo Polong Duterte are directly involved in the illegal drug trade in Davao City. Mayor RRD in partnership with Michael Yang and Sammy Uy, and Polong Duterte in partnership with Charlie Tan. Mayor RRD also had police enablers in the illegal drug trade.” (page 183)
In my interview with Lascañas on November 17, 2023, he revealed however that Yang’s DCLA was just a front. The real business was drugs, he said. Yang was close to the Dutertes, Lascañas would relate. He said Yang would do target shooting practice in Laud Quarry, the dreaded killing field in Davao city of the DDS, in the company of Sara Duterte. No media reporter has ever asked her yet of her target shooting practice hobby.
I had asked Lascañas why the Parojinogs of Ozamiz City were executed in a police operation when Duterte was already president. Was there a drug relationship between Duterte and Parojinog? This was his reply: “Parojinog knows so much of the drug trade of Duterte, especially the brother of Michael Yang in Cagayan de Oro city.” His implication was Northern Mindanao was the share of the Yang brother in the shabu trade and so much Duterte connection was at stake.
What else was the Yang brother doing in Cagayan de Oro? He lived in a high-end gated village where a resident intimated that the brother Yang operated a POGO that was specialized as a scam call center. The operation was inside a residential house formerly owned by a couple who were both medical doctors and who had sold that house to move to another village in the city.
One day, a fire had erupted inside the POGO house. Village residents were shocked that a swarm of people came out of the house. “It was a residential house but you’d be amazed how it contained so many people.” Residents also noticed that vans would regularly unload young Filipino workers to that house.
And then the operations stopped when the Yang brother moved to another gated village in uptown Cagayan de Oro, in the mixed-use Pueblo de Oro township. So far, the Presidential Anti Organized Crime Commission has not raided yet any of the POGOs in Mindanao. A Davao city friend said there are many there.
But it appears now, from the current senate hearings of Sen. Risa Hontiveros on the alleged POGO crimes and Guo Hua Ping, that Michael Yang’s brother, identified as Hong Jiang Yang, has navigated himself around the other POGOs in the country, such as the one in Bamban, Tarlac.
It was the brother Yang’s money that was used to fund the raided Bamban POGO, Hontiveros revealed. Not only that, the Yang network was extensive. Hongjiang Yang was incorporator of the Full Win Group of Companies where one incorporator was Gerald Cruz of Pharmally Biological. Cruz was also incorporator of one Brickhartz POGO whose corporate papers were also found in Bamban.
The ties to criminally associated personalities are amazing. “One big happy Pharmally,” Hontiveros quipped.
There is no more doubt about it – POGOs have existed since the Duterte era because they are the perfect front for crimes. Duterte tolerated it out of his friendship with Michael Yang, reasoning that Mainland China money had benefitted the Philippines.
Now that the great news of banning all POGOs is out, the hard act must follow — arrest all those found to be responsible for their operations, and then deport them.
The Duterte pivot to Red China is over.
