MANILA, Philippines -- A screaming mob of students showered Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada Jr. with confetti at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines (PUP). Elsewhere in Manila, his wife Violeta sobbed before judges, telling them of death threats to her family and pleading for court protection.

The Senate star witness touched off riotous scenes at the PUP in Sta. Mesa, Manila, Thursday as dozens of students forced open the campus’ main gate to allow others who had been denied entry to get in, even as school guards fought to keep the steel gate shut because of a purported bomb threat.

The bomb threat turned out to be a dud.

Security officer Jay Telan said the guards closed the gate at 10 a.m. -- the time Lozada had been expected to arrive -- as part of “standard operating procedure” because classes had already been suspended as a result of the threat.

Several hundred students, many of them members of militant youth groups, were already on the campus by that time but scores of others, as well as faculty members, had been locked out.

Push-’n-pull motion

The closure of the gate angered the students, triggering the commotion.

The badly outnumbered guards, about five in all, were no match for the state scholars, who succeeded in prying the gate open.

The supposed bomb threat was received by the security office shortly before 10 a.m., causing the cancellation of classes.

A student, Jessie Cruz, was seriously injured in the commotion after a steel hook pierced his right foot.

Since testifying at the Senate on the $329-million broadband project, Lozada has been touring schools to tell students of the alleged corruption in the deal with China’s ZTE Corp., in which President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and her husband, First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo, had been implicated. Malacañang and ZTE have denied the allegations.

Shower of confetti

“The administration is desperate. They don’t want to let us in and listen to Lozada!” Rene Boy Abiva shouted in Filipino, holding up his business administration ID.

“If there was a bomb why did they close the gate? Do they want us to die here?” said Henry Enaje, a former PUP student regent and secretary general of the National Union of Students of the Philippines. “Lozada is on his way but now they’re suddenly floating that there’s a bomb here. We’re condemning this,” Enaje said.

A Manila police bomb squad arrived ahead of Lozada at 11:10 a.m. and a lone male student darted in front to stop it. The police vehicle roared through, forcing the youth to fall back.

Yellow confetti rained from the main building as Lozada arrived, closely guarded by the Senate sergeant at arms as both the media and the students mobbed him.

“I thank you all for staying despite the bomb threat,” Lozada said in Filipino as the students and some faculty members, altogether numbering about 2,000, cheered.

‘Yes, yes’

Then, speaking again in Filipino, he tossed out questions:

“Do you believe there was overprice in the ZTE deal? Do you believe there was a large overprice? Do you believe that FG and GMA (Ms Arroyo) were involved?”

To each question, the students shouted “Yes.”

Lozada said: “What are we going to do?”

A handful shouted back: “Sobra na, tama na, patalsikin si Gloria! (“It’s too much, we’ve had enough, throw out Gloria).”

Lozada told the students that if they were to take to the streets, it should not be due to anger, which would dissipate in time.

“If it is love of your fellowmen that will move you to act, you will not stop,” he said.

A different story

Before leaving, Lozada told reporters he had received death threats but he had stopped becoming afraid.

“Paninira lang yan (It’s a hatchet job),” he said when asked about unconfirmed reports that he had another wife and had four kids with her, living in Las Piñas.

Dr. Juan Birion, PUP vice president for student services, denied the school was suppressing the students’ rights.

Sobbing wife

“The administration will not curtail the freedom of the students. We closed the gate because we wanted to make sure Mr. Lozada will be safe,” he said.

It was a different story for Violeta Lozada at the Court of Appeals Thursday.

Breaking down, Lozada’s wife told the court that their family life had been disrupted by death threats since her husband’s exposé.

“At present, with all the threats he has been getting, I still fear for his life and our lives. We’re still not free to go out as we wish. We’re not living a normal life,” Violeta testified, breaking into sobs.

She covered her face with her hands but her flushed cheeks were visible. Her microphone was turned on and her sobbing echoed through the courtroom.

A nun handed her a bottle of mineral water and Violeta clung tightly to her in an embrace as she continued crying.

The court’s special 17th division suspended the session to allow Violeta to regain her composure.

The court was hearing the petition for a writ of amparo filed by Lozada’s brother, Arturo, seeking the court’s protection for Lozada.

Airport incident

Violeta narrated to the court how her husband texted her shortly after he arrived from Hong Kong last Feb. 5 and was taken by unidentified men at the airport, how she sought Church help to rescue him.

Assistant Solicitor General Amparo Tang told reporters the fact that Lozada was able to send text messages showed he was not under any restraints.

A lawyer of Lozada’s, Neri Colmenares, argued in court that Ms Arroyo should not be dropped from the list of respondents in the amparo petition.

Colmenares said that even if the President was immune from civil, criminal and administrative suits, the writ of amparo case did not fall under those categories.

Tang said the recent Supreme Court decision expressly stated that the President could not be sued.