And so it wasn’t the Super Tuesday it was hyped up to be.
Senator Ping Lacson’s so-called “surprise witness” who would, the senator claimed, tell everything he knew about alleged payoffs and kickbacks in the NBN-ZTE deal, on Tuesday told the Senate everything he knew: nothing.
“I’m very surprised that I’m the surprise witness,” businessman Leo San Miguel said during a break in the hearing.
Well, we’re surprised that he’s surprised that he’s the surprise witness, considering that media headlines almost a week before the hearing were building up towards a possible explosion (the absence of which was made even more anticlimactic with the prior minor explosion in the face of the Philippine Daily Inquirer, which pointed to the wrong man.)
Lacson, ever secretive, would not say if he was surprised that we’re surprised that San Miguel was surprised that he was the surprise witness.
Saturday, March 08, 2008 Toledo ‘gave P3.5M for polls’ By JUJEMAY G. AWIT
Sun.Star Staff Reporter
DID Toledo City give away P3.5 million to voters during the 2007 elections in the guise of “clean and green” projects?
Rep. Pablo John Garcia believes so, and has eight checks and two witnesses to support his claim.
Garcia exposed copies of eight checks yesterday, allegedly disbursed by Toledo City, with each check amounting to P439,375.
The checks were all drawn from the Philippine National Bank-Toledo Branch and from the City Treasurer of Toledo-General Fund. They were all signed by City Treasurer Eleuteria Alvez and the mayor’s secretary Avelino Zambo Jr.—aso the mayor’s husband—and dated March 6, 2007, just two months before the May elections.
The similarities ended there. Each check was issued to eight different individuals.
Garcia explained that each individual was related to either a current or former barangay captain in Toledo City. The barangays involved are Pangamihan, Awihaw, Bunga, Upper Sagay, Subayon, Biga, Carmen and Bagakay.
Reached for comment, Toledo City Mayor Arlene Zambo said she would have wanted to keep her silence. But she did explain that the individuals to whom the checks were issued were contractors of Toledo City’s “clean and green” programs.
“They are the implementors of the projects,” explained Zambo. She said that these were all documented in the scope of work of the projects, under the labor contract.
Photocopies
Zambo also hoped that the matter will not reach the court, but if it does, she would rather answer the allegations there.
“But everything is aboveboard,” she continued.
Garcia said he received the photocopies of the checks from a City Hall insider
“This insider said he/she was also disturbed by the manner by which the checks were given out to people who had no business in government,” said the congressman, who promised that the “irregularity” will reach the courts.
Garcia, a lawyer, explained that he is collating affidavits. Aside from his insider, he also has an informant who participated in the clean and green project, he added.
The first-term congressman refused to name his sources.
“My informant said this is just the tip of the iceberg because according to this information, he got checks worth P8 million and was the one who encashed the checks at PNB-Toledo,” said Garcia.
These checks were in addition to the eight checks whose photocopies Garcia released to the media.
P12-P15 million
According to the information given to him, once the checks were cashed, the money was then brought to a house by couriers escorted by Zambo’s men. “They were dummies… gigamit lang ni sila because they are so close to the administration,” he alleged.
The total cash could reach P12-15 million and was used during the 2007 elections to buy votes, Garcia added.
“This was well into the elections campaign for 2007. Large amounts of money were issued to people, not barangays, not local government units, but people in their personal capacity to implement the so-called clean and green programs,” said Garcia.
His informants also said that there was no clean and green program as far as Toledo City was concerned.
Zambo denied this.
The programs include tree-planting in the barangays, cleaning of the public market, and de-clogging of drainage, she added.
“If gusto siya, motabang na lang pud siya sa among (If he wants, he can also help us with this) program,” said Mayor Zambo.
She explained that the funding for the program came from the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) of former congressman Antonio Yapha, who ran for governor last year but lost to Garcia’s sister Gwendolyn.
Documents
Zambo said she has documents to disprove Garcia’s theory of irregularity.
“But I heard that they will be filing a case against us, which I hope wouldn’t happen…I’ll just answer the allegations at the proper time and in the proper forum,” said Zambo.
Garcia countered: “Documents don’t lie. Checks were issued, signed by the treasurer and the husband of the mayor.”
“These people (named in the checks) do not have accountability, because they are just the wife of a former barangay captain (or) leaders of these barangays. They are not accountable officers,” he added.
Garcia said that the City Hall insider, fed up with the “cavalier” manner by which the administration used public funds, photocopied the checks before these were released, reportedly to preserve evidence.
“This person said para sa iyang konsyensya na lang kuno. He or she cannot do anything about it,” Garcia said, explaining that the informant feared the mayor and the other officials who made the order.
After the House of Representatives goes on recess next week, Garcia said he hopes he can finish collating all the evidence and documents needed to file the case. Asked when he might file the case, Garcia said, “Maybe after Holy Week. Let’s give the mayor more time to reflect.”
The Senate has rejected the Puno formula. After saying it had the “soft majority” to accept the compromise solution, the Senate turned around and pushed for a decision in Neri’s Supreme Court petition. Maybe the Palace should have waited for the “soft majority” to harden before praising the proposal as “Solomonic.”
I doubt if it was wise, in the first place. To get the parties to compromise on a constitutional question would be like saying the Constitution is subject to compromise. The problem with Solomonic decisions is that it invariably involves the threat to rend a baby apart. The baby being, in this case, the Constitution.
Besides, I think the Neri petition presents the perfect opportunity to resolve this recurring issue between the Senate and the Palace.
More particularly, a lot of legislators are interested in a definitive ruling on the power of the Senate (and, for that matter, the House) to order the arrest of a person who disobeys a Senate subpoena. I personally don’t think it has that power, given the clear language of the Constitution that no warrant of arrest may issue except upon probable cause “to be determined personally by a judge after examination under oath or affirmation of the complainant and his witnesses.”
It would seem, under the Constitution that, in order for the Senate to enforce a subpoena, the Senate should apply for a warrant of arrest before the regular courts. That’s the way they do it in the United States, whose constitutional tradition we follow. I hope this question is finally settled.
I always thought rightists wrote better than leftists, but I didn’t expect leftists to be writing against themselves. Badly.
The leftist icon Alejandro Lichauco — whom we read in college because it was either him or Adrian Cristobal — thinks the Left was bought off by the Makati Business Club during Friday’s so-called interfaith rally. Muzzled so that they couldn’t even shout their almost instinctive slogan, “Down with US-(your current President here) Imperialism”.
The Left? Bought off? Well, if Lichauco says so, who are we — who are neither Left nor Right (who are neither here nor there, our opponents are wont to say) — to question him?
So here it is.
* * *
Bad for resign movement and leftists
By Alejandro Lichauco
ANALYSIS
03/03/2008
The Makati Business Club (MBC) claim that it financed the rally is bad for the resign movement — and the “Left”
The worst thing that can happen to the ongoing resign movement is for it to be seen as a creation of special interest groups, particularly those with a large foreign component.
Such a perception will undermine the credibility and independence of a perceived citizens movement out to force the resignation of the nation’s head of state — in this case GMA — on the ground of her corrupt business relations with the agency of a foreign government.
But that’s exactly what happened to the resign movement which staged a protest rally in Makati last Friday. The MBC claimed, through its executive director Albert Lim, that it financed the rally. According to the PDI, Lim acknowledged that the MBC “committed to shoulder between a third and a fifth of the expenses in organizing the rally. The Makati executive director was further quoted to have made the boast that “there will be more (rallies) until she (GMA) steps down.”
The MBC executive then proceeded to name prominent personalities identified with the leadership of the organization he represented as among those who joined the crowd in the rally.
Nothing wrong, of course, in the MBC and its leadership joining in the rally. That’s their right and privilege. But it is something else to claim, as the MBC executive director did, that the MBC itself was among the financiers of the rally and a major financier at that. The bad taste it leaves in the mouth is the impression that the resign movement is the creation of the MBC whose membership is known to include US-based multinational companies who presumably don’t like the idea of the Philippine government having any deals with China. Such must be presumed because it is public knowledge that the US and China are now locked in an economic war the world over, and among the most critical venues of that war is, of course, the Philippines.
Observers have pointedly observed that the factor which appears to be the main trigger of and motive force behind the rally is the controversial ZTE contract and that it was no less than the US ambassador herself who pried open that particular can of worms. The protest rally singled out the host of alleged untruths about the ZTE transaction when in point of fact a great many other untruths about this government — and certainly more serious untruths that the untruth surrounding ZTE — had become issues long before the China deal came along.
In brief, so the impression now goes, Friday’s rally was, in fact, inspired and brought to being by a business group identified with US multinationals and staged in protest against a transaction with China over the US government had previously made known its objection.
That impression might easily be unfair to the protesters — which included the radical Left and elements of the clergy — but one must be forgiven for thinking, in light of MBC’s claim, that the rally was a brainchild of the US government acting through the MBC. And that the funds which came from the MBC might well have come from the US Embassy itself.
This unflattering impression was definitely made even more unflattering for the Left which played a prominent part in the rally. The cry of US imperialism has always been a defining signature of the Left but this time around, as the MBC executive director himself so proudly noted, there wasn’t any such a cry.
In the proud and satisfied words of the MBC executive director, “There is no” — (repeat, no) — shouting slogans against imperialism.”
If Bayan and/or Bayan Muna weren’t in the rally, there wouldn’t have been any significance to the MBC observation. The fact, is, however, that the Bayan/Bayan Muna were there and so one must ask what happened to their defining slogan. Was the Left paid off — to ask the question bluntly — to keep quiet about their favorite villain? The Left bought off — by the MBC — and, by implication, the US Embassy?
That said, we shouldn’t wonder why the military didn’t break away from GMA as everyone had expected. For with the rally seen as a creation of the MBC — and therefore of American business, too, why should the AFP support the marchers’ demand for GMA’s resignation? After all, the AFP doesn’t owe any loyalty to the MBC. And between the MBC — and the foreign elements in it — on one hand and the Commander-in-Chief, on the other hand, no matter how corrupt, there isn’t any question where the AFP’s loyalty lies or should lie.
So, you want to know why the AFP didn’t switch sides as was expected? Answer is: The MBC, of course. Besides, the MBC was among those that mounted Edsa II and gave the nation the illegitimate president that GMA is. And now it wants to mount the Vice President because GMA struck a deal with China.
The message of this piece? The Resign Movement should now repudiate the MBC as it has repudiated GMA. And cry out against US imperialism as well as China’s expansionism. Which the Left will never do.
Oh, great. I wonder if I can ask the new Speaker to “mull” over this idea a while longer. Already, questions on the wisdom of the proposal to cover sessions at the House of Representatives on live TV are cropping up:
1. If TV adds 10 pounds to one’s appearance, will it make the “pork barrel” seem fatter than it really is?
2. Judging from ANC’s extensive coverage of the Senate, won’t this make congressmen all want to run for President?
3. Should the House adjust to the medium, or should TV adjust to the House? I mean, will our debates now look like the debates of those hapless college students on ANC, trying to get 100 words per minute in order to beat the clock?
4. Will this really discourage congressmen from being late or absent, or won’t this instead discourage the public from watching TV? (Come to think of it, that might not be a bad idea)
5. Excuse for absentee congressmen: “I was watching it on TV the whole time.”
The person whose father named an “angel sent from heaven”, and whom the media quickly painted in celestial light after his theatrical performance in the Senate, seems to have been caught, in what he himself has called a “wiretapped” conversation, sounding impatient about getting his lands on some “lobby money” for the NBN-ZTE deal.
Choice cuts:
1. “That’s what I’m trying to get… Just to get Jun secured.”
2. “All I’m saying is I want to be identified, Amsterdam Holdings, as THE operator responsible for this national broadband network. Alright? And besides that, to have the logistics to be able to make that happen.”
3. “I’m assuming that in China, . . . if we are really identified, Amsterdam, then I’m sure these two guys will race to whoever . . . is the appointing body of people. . . and try to get the advantage, right?
4. “I hate to ask you this, but when are we going to get some gas to do this thing?”
5. “That’s why I’m getting kinda impatient with this amount because even though I AM WHO I AM AND WE’RE PREFERRED. . . what if somebody gets to Jun [Lozada]. . . and Jun will find a way to tell Romy, ‘Romy [Neri], much as THIS IS FOR JOEY’S DAD, technologically, [the other side is superior]. . .’”
Listening to the audio, one’s mind is brought back to the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee hearing, to a voice that sounded just like the one on this. Well, almost: minus the righteous indignation, minus the choir of angels.
So it wasn’t exactly the united front it was made out to be, or the kind of unity its organizers had hoped for.
A day after the so-called interfaith rally in Makati Friday, confusion, regret, recriminations, remorse, sanctimony and self-righteousness drowned out any clear articulation of what it had achieved. It seems that those who went there to pray suspected that politicians were there to prey. Politicians, for their part, must have resented the presumptuous suggestion that their acknowledged expertise at bringing down a government wasn’t needed this time.
And those who were there for their first march for some lofty cause must have wondered what a convicted plunderer was doing at a rally against corruption.
“[Caloocan Bishop Deogracias Iniguez] admitted that there was a slight confusion because he and the other participants had the impression that the gathering was purely for prayers.
“He said they were informed of the end of the prayer gathering and the start of political speeches shortly before 7 p.m.
“He said they thought it was time to leave the stage when political personalities, including former President Joseph Estrada, began delivering speeches.
“It’s okay, maybe they wanted to maximize the presence of the crowd and thought that this would be an added treat to the crowd, but some groups might not have liked it (politicians delivering speeches),” Iniguez said. - Philippine Star, 2 March 2008
“On the day of the rally, Ernesto Macedo who, by the standard of his youthful days, couldn’t have been more different from the youth gathered in Makati . . . thundered against the Catholic Education Association of the Philippines, the La Salle students, Youth Act Now and sympathetic groups that resisted the trapo efforts to grab the limelight.
“Who are these people, he crowed, when we, the traditional politicians can muster 20,000 at a drop of the hat? And he even dared the critics of his kind of politics to do their own thing.” - Inquirer editorial, 2 March 2008.
This has been on youtube for a long time now, but somehow, this hasn’t merited as much coverage as media is giving Jun Lozada’s unsubstantiated allegations against the government. Perhaps in the rush to elevate Lozada to sainthood.
Do you hear Joey de Venecia (who has admitted that the voices are theirs; and who, by accusing Abalos of “wiretapping” seems to admit that the conversation took place) and Jun Lozada, talking about where to skim some commissions off the ZTE deal?
“We need to get something from this,” Joey de Venecia’s voice is saying. “Oo, from both sides, putang ina,” Jun Lozada agrees. And they simultaneously burst into a giggling fit, like little boys dividing a stolen loot of candies.
Since we can’t hope for balanced coverage these days, my only hope that this tiny episode merit at least a footnote when Jun Lozada makes it to The Lives of Saints.
Which is not to say I’ve not been a congressman while Congress was not in session. Here, in the Philippines, a congressman is expected to take on the schizophrenic roles of legislator and (I guess) local executive, who should be not only filing bills on behalf of his constituents, but actually paying their bills of an entirely different kind.
I mean, at least in Congress, a bill goes through three readings. Outside of it, a congressman is expected to approve, say, a hospital bill, without first reading it.
But who’s complaining? When we claim to speak for a constituency, we try to take care of its needs. I’d rather be saddled with all these requests than claim to speak for a constituency for which I haven’t done anything. I am a member of Congress, after all. Not the Black and White Movement.
Does that make me a traditional politician? If the opposite of traditional is Leah Navarro or Enteng Romano — who claim to speak for people whose calloused hands they haven’t touched — then I certainly hope so. To them I say — moderate your creed. . . with a little action.
