MANILA, Philippines?An arrest warrant for perjury is expected to be issued at any time for the man who blew the whistle on the purported bribery and overpricing in the aborted $329-million National Broadband Network (NBN) deal between the Philippine government and China?s ZTE Corp.
The Manila Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 11 issued a resolution dated March 19 upholding the perjury charge filed against Rodolfo ?Jun? Lozada Jr. by former Malacańang official Michael Defensor.
Defensor held various high posts in President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo?s Cabinet before he made an unsuccessful run for the Senate in 2007.
Sr. Mary John Mananzan, co-chair of the Association of Major Religious Superiors in the Philippines (AMRSP) which had been providing sanctuary to Lozada and his family at La Salle Green Hills since February 2008, said the man would not resist arrest.
She said Lozada would do nothing to avoid jail in order to send the message that he was protesting the ?sham? judicial system.
?He won?t resist arrest, he won?t even post bail,? Mananzan said when reached on the phone.
Lozada said he was abducted by state forces at the airport on his return to the country in February 2008. He had earlier left for Hong Kong to avoid testifying before the Senate inquiry into the alleged kickbacks and overpricing surrounding the NBN-ZTE contract.
Defensor filed the perjury charge in July 2008, accusing Lozada of issuing ?contradictory? statements to the Senate and the Court of Appeals about Defensor?s alleged instruction to him to lie and say he had not been kidnapped and that he did know anything about the NBN-ZTE deal.
?No inconsistency?
In his complaint for perjury, Defensor said Lozada had given conflicting versions of their conversation:
?Mr. Lozada?s testimony before the Senate significantly deviated from what he gave before the Court of Appeals. In the Senate, he stated that I asked him to deny that he was kidnapped; in the [appellate court] however, he said I asked him to deny any knowledge about the NBN-ZTE deal.
?The statement of Mr. Lozada before the Senate and the appellate court are clearly contradictory and cannot be reconciled. After validating the completeness of my story before the Senate, Mr. Lozada cannot thereafter change its tenor in the court hearing without being held liable for perjury.?
But on Nov. 14, 2008, Judge Jorge Emmanuel Lorredo of the Manila Metropolitan Trial Court (MTC) Branch 26 found no inconsistency on Lozada?s part and dismissed Defensor?s complaint.
In his ruling, Lorredo said: ?In the second and third statements [at the Court of Appeals], Lozada was given the impression that if he does not stop, there will be a demolition job against him.
?The Court notes that even in [his Senate testimony], Mike Defensor also said ?Tapusin na natin ?to.? To the Court, that shows the intention of Mike Defensor to put an end to all these things about the ZTE deal ...?
Reversal
Manila RTC Branch 11 Presiding Judge Cicero Jurado Jr. reversed Lorredo?s decision on March 19, upon Defensor?s appeal through his counsel, the Fortun Narvasa law firm.
Jurado said the MTC went ?a notch above? the requirement for determining probable cause and seemed to have already rendered a verdict without conducting a trial when it concluded that an element of the offense was absent.
He said the question at hand was whether there was evidence showing that a crime had more likely been committed and the accused should be placed under custody.
Lozada was served a copy of the Manila RTC resolution at La Salle Green Hills on April 14, according to Mananzan. With a report from Erika Sauler
