|
THE involvement of opposition Sen.Panfilo Lacson in the murder of a
prominent public relations practitioner is being revived a good 25
months before the presidential elections in 2010.
It appears that some individuals want to remind
the public of past controversies Lacson, now seen as among the
strong contenders for president,was linked to.
There were a number of such controversies.
However, Lacson’s personal interest in the
abduction and murder of publicist Salvador “Bubby” Dacer had not
been highlighted.
Until this weekend, that is, when an email
message was sent out explaining why it benefited Lacson that Dacer
disappeared.
The opposition senator was previously accused of
ordering an elite police team, which he headed at that time, to kill
Dacer. Lacson has strongly denied this.
Dacer was abducted in broad daylight in a busy
street in Manila in November 2000. His burnt remains and that of his
driver, Emmanuel Corbito, were found days later in Indang, Cavite.
On that day, Dacer was reportedly meeting former
President Fidel Ramos to turn over a document pertaining to the 2000
BW stock manipulation scandal. The BW controversy, the biggest
insider trading case in the Philippines, helped topple
then-President Joseph Estrada a year after the controversy broke
out.
Dacer was supposedly giving Ramos a copy of a
memo from BW Resources Inc. owner Dante Tan transferring 300,000
shares of stocks to Lacson and to three other parties.
An electronic copy of the memo is now being
circulated via e-mail from an account under the name of a lawyer
known to be a close adviser of President Gloria Arroyo.
The document will show a powerful personality
involvement in the (BW) scandal, according to the email sent from
the account of one F. Pancho Villaraza.
Admittedly, anyone could have created that email
account. Villaraza’s office has denied that the email came from
them.
F. Arthur Pancho Villaraza is Arroyo’s
longtime personal legal counsel until a rumored falling out in 2006.
That was the year Avelino Cruz resigned as defense secretary.
Villaraza and Cruz co-founded a law firm that counted Arroyo among
its biggest clients.
If you want to know what that document is and
who this personality is, open the attachment, the e-mail said.
The attachment is an electronic copy of what
appeared to be Tan’s memo dated July 7, 1999 addressed to Raul de
Castro of the brokerage firm at De Castro Securities Corp.
The memo showed Tan’s supposed instructions
for the firm to transfer a total of 1,200,000 (one million two
hundred thousand) shares of BW Resources Corp. from my account to
Lacson and Faustino Salud, Benito Salazar and Teodorico Anriquez and
Buenaventura Peralta.
Until the memo surfaced, taking for granted its
authenticity, Lacson’s involvement in the Dacer murder had been
relegated as a surrogate for Estrada.
People speculated that Estrada gave the original
order to kill Dacer, who he had accused of working with Ramos to
destabilize the government. Estrada has laughed off the charge.
BW whistleblower and former SEC Chairman
Perfecto Yasay, under questioning during Estrada’s impeachment
trial, had alluded to a document that Dacer was supposedly going to
show Ramos.
A former official in the Arroyo government
believes that the memo was floated at this time to discredit Lacson
and derail his candidacy for president or vice president in 2010.
Another possible casualty of the revival of the
Dacer case would be Estrada if it truly is possible to dampen his
popularity among the people who continue to see him as a central
opposition figure.
Estrada, convicted of and pardoned for plunder
last year, has been coy regarding his plans to rejoin Philippine
politics.
The authenticity of the memo needs to be
checked. But even if it is bogus, it is a stark reminder that the
election season is just around the corner.
This is no testimony for Lacson, mind you.
It’s just that too many so-called leads have surfaced not just on
the Dacer case but in many other cases that it’s quite difficult
not to doubt their authenticity.
I really hope, though, that we eventually give
Dacer and his family justice as well as other victims of unsolved
crimes. We have too many of them.
johnnavg@hotmail.com
|
