Philippines Supreme Court upholds forfeiture of Marcos jewels

The Philippine Supreme Court has upheld a 2014 lower court order to the family of late dictator Ferdinand Marcos to forfeit jewelry, describing the family’s petition to win back the gems as “utterly baseless.”
The Supreme Court found “no reversible error” in an anti-graft court’s ruling to forfeit the sets of jewels seized from the Marcoses, known as the “Malacanang collections,” when they fled into exile in 1986.
Marcos was elected in 1965 and toppled by a popular uprising in 1986.
His family, which is active in politics and remains highly influential, had failed to demonstrate the jewelry collection was lawfully acquired, the court said in a 21-page ruling.
Marcos would have earned about $304,000 during his entire 21-year tenure as president, and thus would not have had the means to acquire the jewels, the court found, according to its decision, made last month but published on Monday.
The auction house Christie’s valued the collection at $153,000 in 1991.
Two other sets of gems — the Hawaii collection and Roumeliotes collection — were also seized in 1986.
The three collections are valued at an estimated $21 million.
A government agency created to recover the Marcos’ ill-gotten wealth has estimated the former dictator, his family and cronies amassed about $10 billion. About half has been recovered.

Source: Arab News