Members of National Bureau of Investigation-Anti Fraud Division arrested Ma. Victoria ‘Marivic’ Lopez, head of the Metrobanks’ Corporate Service Management for alleged qualified theft, falsification and violation of the General Banking Law on a entrapment operation during press briefing in NBI office, Manila. INQUIRER PHOTO / RICHARD A. REYES
The massive internal fraud uncovered at Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co.—valued by the bank at P900 million, but pegged by two sources at P2.5 billion—may have been going on for at least five years before it was discovered.
A full-blown probe is now being conducted by Metrobank and the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) to determine whether the suspect was acting alone in executing the scam or was in league with other parties in the bank or even outside.
According to two sources who spoke to the Inquirer, the manipulation of loan releases into accounts of fictitious borrowers was also likely made easier by the “relatively high stature of the suspected rogue banker in the country’s second-biggest financial institution.”
“Everyone knew that Mavic was an important person in the bank,” said a source who has dealt with the suspect, Maria Victoria Lopez, 54, a corporate services assistant vice president of Metrobank. “She had a fancy car, she had a bodyguard and she knew the [bank’s] owners.”
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The second source said that due to her status within Metrobank’s Makati City head office, she could order the execution of transactions even without the benefit of complete documentation.
“People trusted her, or were afraid of saying ‘no’ to her when she gave an order,” the banker said.
