De Venecia mulls filing lawsuit for alleged wiretapping
By Erwin Oliva
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 11:45:00 02/21/2008
MANILA, Philippines -- Jose De Venecia III is contemplating filing a lawsuit against former Commission on Elections chairman Benjamin Abalos Sr. for allegedly wiretapping his phone.
De Venecia III has confirmed that the voice on the supposed wiretapped conversation, uploaded to online video sharing service YouTube, was indeed his.
Asked if he knew who was behind the supposed wiretapped conversation now gaining popularity on YouTube, De Venecia III did not mince words.
“Chairman Abalos is the source of this conversation because he told me he wiretapped my phone,” he said in a telephone interview with INQUIRER.net which was hopefully not wiretapped. “I’m still thinking about it. I will file a suit but I don’t know when.”
De Venecia III said he was using a post-paid subscription number from Smart Communications when he called up Lozada.
“I was using my post-paid Smart phone. I didn’t know my post-paid Smart phone was being wiretapped,” he said.
De Venecia III said that the supposed wiretapped conversation happened “days after I came back from Schenzen [China],” and that it happened around December 29 or December 30, 2006.
De Venecia III also confirmed that Lozada was the person in the supposed wiretapped conversation.
“In that conversation, I was teasing him [Lozada] on the fact that he was supposed to be with me there [in Schenzen],” De Venecia III said.
De Venecia III said he was not sure if Lozada has already heard the supposed wiretapped conversation.
“My point here is that this is an example of the wiretapping that Jun said,” De Venecia added, recalling the testimony of Lozada of allegedly being wiretapped by Abalos. “This is an example. If these guys can tamper, wiretap [us], then nothing is democratic in this society [and] for the investors. They can easily listen to your conversation,” he said.
“So our oligarchs can easily corner the market,” De Venecia III added.
Asked if he would have YouTube remove the video from its website, De Venecia III replied that even if he did so, he would not be able to stop the video from spreading.
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