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By Jomar Canlas, Reporter
What Romulo Neri refused to tell the Senate
about his conversation with President Gloria Arroyo about the
national broadband deal, he may be compelled to reveal to the
Supreme Court in an executive session.
Last year, Neri testified before a Senate
blue-ribbon committee hearing that he was offered a P200-million
bribe by then Chairman Benjamin Abalos Sr. of the Commission on
Elections. Neri was then director general of the National Economic
and Development Authority (NEDA), which reviewed the now scrapped
$330-million broadband deal that was allegedly being brokered by
Abalos. He denied bribing Neri and brokering the deal.
Neri told the Senate that he reported the bribe
offer to Mrs. Arroyo, but refused to give details, saying
conversations with the President are covered by executive privilege.
The Senators do not agree, and the decision whether Neri can talk or
not is now for the Supreme Court to decide.
But some justices said they feel that they can
only decide on what is covered by executive privilege after they
hear the whole story from Neri. The public will not be privy to the
disclosure, as the justices want him to talk in an executive
session.
Last week, Chief Justice Reynato Puno said the
Supreme Court wanted to “determine which [part] of his [Neri’s]
conversation with the President is covered by executive
privilege.”
The justices will force Neri to disclose
everything to them, a source at the High Court told The Manila
Times.
“If Neri cannot speak before the Senate, he
should speak before the justices and an executive session could be
an option,” the source said.
That is “the only way” to determine which
portion of Neri’s conversation with President Arroyo is covered by
the constitutional provision on executive privilege.
“The problem with Neri confessing to the
justices the contents of the conversation is the leakage,” the
source added.
The Times has learned that the justices got into
a heated discussion during the February 12 en banc session because
of news leaks about the “Hello, Garci” decision. In that case,
the High Court ruled against government, saying it cannot exercise
prior restraint against media establishments that wish to air the
recordings that are allegedly wiretapped conversations between
President Arroyo and a former elections commissioner during the 2004
polls.
A Supreme Court justice was reportedly irritated
about how former Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban was able to get
advance information from the High Court about that case, given that
he is retired from the bench.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear oral
arguments about Neri’s case on Tuesday.
“Greedy gang” to testify
At the Senate, three of the four members of the
so-called “greedy gang” that allegedly worked out a $41-million
advance payment from China’s ZTE Corp. for a broadband network
project will be subpoenaed, Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano said Sunday
during an interview on the radio network dzBB.
Cayetano, chairman of the Senate blue-ribbon
committee, said the three are Leo San Miguel, Quirino de la Torre
and Ruben Reyes, whom the new ZTE witness Dante Madriaga had linked
to the scandal. The fourth alleged member, Abalos, will be merely
invited, since he has been willing to attend the Senate hearings.
In his Senate testimony, Madriaga, an engineer,
said he was a former consultant of ZTE Corp. and that the “greedy
gang” worked out a $41-million advance payment in three
installments.
The Senate, however, has yet to resume its joint
panel hearings on the broadband deal, saying that decision will be
made after a meeting Monday with the three chairmen of the
committees handling the broadband probe and Senate President Manuel
Villar Jr.
Cayetano added that they will wait for the
outcome of oral arguments in the Supreme Court on Tuesday involving
the petition of Neri questioning the arrest order issued by the
Senate to compel him to testify about his conversation with
President Arroyo about the broadband deal.
He said Executive Order 464 and executive
privilege are the best defense mechanisms of the government
officials to snub congressional hearings.
Views from the Palace
Neri’s refusal to talk has sparked calls for
his resignation, along with those for President Arroyo to step down.
Critics have mobilized antigovernment protests, the latest was being
the interfaith protest in Makati on Friday. More are being planned.
(See related story page A2.)
But Press Secretary Ignacio Bunye said the
search for truth can never be based on opinion innuendo or on
hearsay.
In his newspaper column, Bunye cited the widely
disparate crowd estimates as illustrative of “what is fact and
what is opinion.” The police estimated the number of attendees at
the Makati protest to be 15,000 maximum, while the protest
organizers said more than 75,000 were there.
Bunye said, “The more we rely on opinion and,
worse, on innuendo and hearsay, the farther we will be away from the
truth.”
The “disparity stems from the fact that both
are opinions,” he said, adding that “neither side attempted to
establish the actual area occupied by the crowd, and multiply the
area by crowd density.”
For his part, Deputy Press Secretary Anthony
Golez said Malacańang is unfazed by the President’s falling
trusts rating, pulled down by a series of scandals. A recent survey
said three out of four people in Metro Manila do not trust President
Arroyo.
“At hindsight that survey talks about the
popularity of the President,” Golez said. “But we know for a
fact that the President has already made some unpopular decisions
but with a net beneficial effect that will improve the lives of the
poor Filipinos.”
He said the President remains in high spirits
especially when she saw that the implementation of major projects,
particularly the pro-poor programs, were not affected by the
political noise.
“What we need now is to focus on areas hit by
disasters especially in Bicol,” Golez added. “The people there
need help.”
Church also to blame
The church is also to blame for the alleged
culture of corruption in the country’s social and political
ladder, according to Boac Bishop Reynaldo Evangelista.
In a way, the church may have fallen short of
its task to inculcate Christian values, like honesty, on the
faithful, which, in effect, contributed to the prevalence of graft
and corruption, he said.
“We have long been Christians, but it seems
too hard for almost all of us to put flesh into the term
‘honesty,’” Evangelista said in an interview on the
church-run Radyo Veritas over the weekend.
Similar observations were also raised by Bishops
Honesto Ongtioco of Cubao and Buenaventura Famadico of Gumaca,
Quezon. They said corruption exists “from top to bottom” of the
social and political ladder.
The existence and prevalence of the said social
and political ill, they explained, is the essence of the latest
pastoral statement of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the
Philippines (CBCP) so that appropriate actions are instituted and
enhance the formation of social conscience on every Filipino.
Famadico, a member of the CBCP’s permanent
council representing southeastern Luzon, said corruption has
encompassed everyone from the President down to the barangay or
village level.
“There are vivid examples of government
officials who resort to graft and corrupt practices, say, the tong
collections levied on citizens who violate simple traffic rules and
regulations,” Famadico said. Tong is a Filipino term for a bribe.
Ongtioco, for his part, said everyone should be
aware that graft and corrupt practices affect everybody.
“It’s time for self-examination, self
assessment, and find out how we live as children of God,” he said.
For his part, Tagbilaran Bishop Leonardo Medroso
said government should work for a stable society and look after the
common good of people.
-- With Sammy Martin, Angelo S. Samonte and William B. Depasupil
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