VILLAR, LACSON, STILL WANT TO CONTINUE NBN INVESTIGATION
MANILA, MAY 1, 2008 (STAR) By Aurea Calica - Senate President Manuel Villar Jr. and other senators want the investigation into the national broadband network (NBN) deal to continue even as the Senate Blue Ribbon committee prepares an interim report on the issue.Villar said he would accept a “partial” report to become basis for necessary legislation to prevent overpricing and other irregularities such as bribery in approving government projects but would not allow any move to close the probe at this time.
“I think it will also be better if we wait for the Supreme Court (to decide on the case of Commission on Higher Education Romulo Neri),” Villar said. The SC had upheld Neri’s invocation of executive privilege in refusing to answer certain questions regarding the NBN deal, particularly on the role of President Arroyo in having the project approved despite reports of overpricing. The Senate filed a motion for reconsideration on the matter.
Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano, chairman of the Blue Ribbon committee, drew flak from Sen. Panfilo Lacson for announcing that he would already come out with an interim report and re-open the hearings only if new witnesses come out.
Lacson said there must be an effort to look for witnesses to testify and not wait for them to voluntarily surface.
He also said it would be better to wait for the SC ruling even as Neri could not be expected to disclose his conversations with Mrs. Arroyo on the NBN. “What if Neri is compelled (by the SC to speak up?)” Lacson asked.
Senate witness Rodolfo Noel Lozada Jr. said the President forced Neri to approve the project despite the reported anomalies involved.
The President’s husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo was also said to be involved in the project approval.
Sen. Manuel Roxas II, chairman of the Senate committee on trade and commerce, said it was okay to come up with an interim report on the NBN issue but it should be far from being considered closed.
Roxas said the SC had not even acted yet on their petition to force the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) to submit to the Senate the various documents on the NBN project.
Like Cayetano, Roxas said there might be no direct testimony that would link Mrs. Arroyo to the scandal but there were other evidence that would do so.
“There are clearly other circumstances and other events that would lead one to believe that Malacañang, the executive, the President, clearly influenced or clearly had some say as to the direction of the transaction as well as the approval of the transaction. That is the reason why the NEDA documents are important,” Roxas said.
He said the NEDA documents would show that Mrs. Arroyo suddenly changed her policies on the NBN project.
Sen. Rodolfo Biazon, chairman of the Senate defense committee, said an interim report would be okay since the hearings could again be conducted if there would be new witnesses or vital information that would surface.
Cayetano, Roxas and Biazon lead the investigation into the NBN scandal.
Barking up the wrong tree
Sen. Loren Legarda expressed hopes there would be strong recommendations for prosecution of those responsible for the graft and corrupt practices.
Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago said the hearings should indeed be closed already since there should be a time period for all investigations.
But Roxas said it was obvious that the executive department exerted all efforts to stop witnesses from going to the Senate investigations and testifying on the matter.
Lacson said other witnesses had been invited and some were just around and not abroad as they claimed. Lacson said the lawyer of businessman Ruben Reyes, one of those who allegedly brokered the deal along with former Commission on Elections chairman Benjamin Abalos, promised to present his client in the next Senate investigation.
He said Cayetano should not give the wrong impression that Senate subpoenas were not important and could be disregarded after a long period of time since the Senate would also be exhausted in waiting for the summoned witnesses to appear.
But Cayetano said Lacson was “barking up at the wrong tree” and must be forgiven for not being able to hear everything that he stated.
“Let me just clarify that there is no direct testimony leading to the President but there is evidence. I am just saying it is better if there is a witness who will say it directly, the involvement of the President, if there is any. We’re waiting for that witness but we can’t wait forever. But I never said that there’s no evidence leading to that because there is,” Cayetano said.
“There are two kinds of evidence, one is you have to make a conclusion out of all the evidence and the other is direct,” Cayetano added.
‘Bring it on’
But administration congressmen urged the senators to make public their final report not on a piecemeal basis.
Reps. Matias Defensor of Quezon City and Monico Puentevella of Bacolod warned against releasing the Senate Blue Ribbon committee report by installment, even if this will benefit senators running for president in 2010.
“My advice to the Senate is bring it on! But please in one report, one time, so you will not be suspected of unnecessarily stretching the schedule of release to fit your campaign timetable,” said Defensor, chairman of the House committee on justice.
“At the end of the day, the report will be adjudged not by its spin but by its substance, and it will be fatally flawed if it links the President to the contract she herself aborted, because months of inquisition yielded no evidence which showed she acted illegally.”
Puentevella, another senior administration congressman, said he doesn’t see any logic in making public the committee report in chop-chop fashion.
“What’s the agenda? Propaganda,” he said.
Malacañang, meanwhile, said that the end of the Senate’s investigation would put to rest all questions about the culpability of President Arroyo in the alleged anomalies in the deal.
Deputy presidential spokesperson Lorelei Fajardo, in a text message, said the preliminary report of the Blue Ribbon came as no surprise to Malacañang.
Fajardo reiterated that all of the testimonies presented during the hearings were unsubstantiated since they were all based on hearsay. – With Delon Porcalla, Marvin Sy, Paolo Romero, Christina Paguinto
Reported by: Sol Jose Vanzi
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