Cory Aquino visits Lozada
By Juliet Labog-Javellana, Michael Lim Ubac
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:49:00 02/10/2008
MANILA, Philippines -- Former President Corazon Aquino on Saturday afternoon visited Rodolfo Noel “Jun” Lozada Jr., the Senate’s star witness in the NBN-ZTE probe, to give him encouragement and moral support.
“I was humbled that I was visited by a former President. She was just thanking me for what I did,” Lozada said in an interview with the Inquirer and GMA 7.
During the 30-minute visit, Aquino remarked that the unidentified men took him on the exit route reserved for presidents. Lozada said this made him believe that the men who took him could be members of the Presidential Security Group.
Also Saturday, in an unexpected turnaround, Malacañang decided it will not block the appearance in the Senate of all the ranking government officials implicated in the testimony of Lozada, the Senate’s new star witness in its probe into the allegedly irregular National Broadband Network (NBN) project, as well as Lozada’s alleged abduction.
“I suppose that’s the only way we can better address the things he [Lozada] said. They have to be refuted,” said Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita.
This means that the officials concerned will not be invoking Executive Order No. 464, which bars executive branch and military officials from appearing before congressional inquiries without the-approval of President Macapagal-Arroyo
Invoking national security and the public interest, the President issued EO 464 in September 2005, the same day that then Brig. Gen. Francisco Gudani and Col. Alexander Balutan were scheduled to testify at a Senate inquiry into alleged election cheating in Mindanao during the 2004 election. Other executive branch officials have since routinely invoked EO 464 to avoid a congressional appearance.
In a phone interview, Ermita said allowing the members of the Senate and the public to hear the side of Environment Secretary Lito Atienza, Philippine National Police Director General Avelino Razon Jr. and Commission on Higher Education Chair Romulo Neri, among others, would “provide a clearer picture” of the latest development in the NBN-ZTE controversy.
“By listening to them, we will also see the underlying reasons, the motives for all these statements and what’s behind this drama that unfolded before us,” said Ermita.
“Let the truth come out. I’m very sure the truth will come out,” he said.
Ermita himself figured in Lozada’s testimony albeit indirectly. While being held by unidentified men, Lozada said Atienza called him up at one point saying, “Mag-uusap kami ni ES and si ma’am (I’ll be talking with ES and ma’am). Lozada presumed “ES” referred to Executive Secretary Ermita and ma’am was President Arroyo.
Lozada, the former president of the state-owned Philippine Forest Corp., testified at a Senate hearing on Thursday on alleged irregularities in the NBN deal with China’s ZTE Corp. and the alleged involvement in it of the President’s husband, Jose Miguel Arroyo, and former Commission on Elections Chair Benjamin Abalos Sr.
Lozada, who was earlier ordered arrested by the Senate for failing to appear before it, also told of how various administration officials tried to stop him from appearing before the chamber by sending him to Hong Kong and then having him “kidnapped” on his return last Tuesday.
He named Atienza, his immediate superior, and Neri as the officials he dealt with during his ordeal, as well as the escorts with military haircuts who collected him at the airport on his arrival and took him on a scary five-hour ride where he didn’t know where they were going or what they were going to do to him .
Neri, a friend of Lozada’s who took him in as a consultant to review the NBN project when Neri headed the National Economic and Development Authority, has himself invoked EO 464 to sidestep a Senate appearance.
Ermita said that as a Palace official, he could not comment on Lozada’s credibility.
“It’s very hard for me to pass judgment now. I’m in the administration. Whatever I say can easily be discredited also,” he said.
But “we can’t take hook, line and sinker what he said,” Ermita said.
“I don’t know what his real motive is. I think some people whom he has mentioned should be allowed also to say their piece about this affair,” he said.
Ermita said Atienza and Razon were some of the “important people” that may be called by the Senate “to shed light” on the Lozada affair.
“We just have to analyze this very carefully because people always have their own motives in doing what they’re doing, what they’re saying,” he said.
He said Lozada appeared to have repeated and confirmed some of the earlier testimony of Neri and businessman Joey de Venecia.
“Now, there is an intent on the part of some people to ride on his statement seemingly at this moment. We will see how consistent his story is,” he said.
Ermita said the continuing Senate inquiry into the scrapped ZTE broadband deal is aimed at weakening the Arroyo presidency.
“Those who wish to destabilize the government can be seen” in the Senate hearing, said Ermita, referring to critics of the President who trooped to the Senate on Friday to witness the testimony of Lozada.
But Ermita quickly pointed out the “body punching” to weaken the ruling power was not really aimed at ousting Ms Arroyo. It is to weaken her “pulling power” in the 2010 polls.
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