MANILA, Philippines?Releasing a second ?psychiatric report? in as many weeks, the camp of Nacionalista Party standard-bearer Manuel Villar Tuesday claimed that Liberal Party presidential candidate Benigno Aquino III was diagnosed as suffering from depression and melancholia when he was a college student.

A Villar campaign volunteer claimed that a psychiatric evaluation taken 30 years ago, when Aquino was 19 years old, recommended that the latter take antidepressant pills and undergo regular psychotherapy sessions.

Guido Delgado, former National Power Corp. president, presented the results of the alleged evaluation at a press conference in Quezon City Tuesday morning.

Delgado said he made the report public although he had not verified it. The report, he claimed, was brought by a messenger to Villar?s volunteer office in Mandaluyong City.

Like the priest cited in the first report leaked by the Villar camp, another priest who allegedly signed the second report and Ateneo de Manila University declared the report bogus.

Asked about the new report from the Villar camp, Aquino said: ?Our enemies are becoming desperate.?

Ninoy in prison

Based on the report, Aquino voluntarily sought the psychiatric test, while his father and namesake, the late Sen. Benigno ?Ninoy? Aquino Jr., was in prison and he was studying economics at Ateneo in 1979.

?The patient is a 19-year-old male who claims he is suffering from episodes of depression and melancholia, each episode being 2-3 weeks in duration. His attacks always occur after his visit to his father who is now incarcerated in a military camp for political crimes,? the beginning of the report said.

The four-page psychiatric evaluation supposedly signed by Jesuit priest Jaime Bulatao, a psychology professor at Ateneo, said Aquino had symptoms of depression and melancholia.

?The patient has complained of hostility, anger and being openly punitive. He also complains of fatigue, coated tongue, disturbed and unrefreshing sleep and poor appetite,? it said.

Treatment

Bulatao allegedly ?recommended treatment of regular psychotherapy and pharmacological treatment with aminobenzol (tofranil) 75 mg three times a day.?

The report distributed by Delgado to reporters did not contain a letterhead, but it had a date, 8/9/79, beside Bulatao?s alleged signature.

Bulatao said he neither conducted a psychiatric assessment nor signed a report on Aquino.

?It has come to my attention that an unverified ?psychiatric evaluation? allegedly signed by me in 1979 about the mental condition of Sen. Benigno C. Aquino III is currently circulating in the news. I categorically deny having written and signed that report,? said Bulatao in a statement.

The release of the report just 13 days before the elections was the second time the Ateneo Department of Psychology was linked to a purported mental evaluation of Aquino, who attended Ateneo from grade school through college.

Earlier this month, a document that circulated online claimed that Aquino suffered from clinical depression in 1996. The report, which carried the letterhead of Ateneo?s Department of Psychology, was signed by Fr. Carmelo Caluag.

ABS-CBN ran a report on the first document from the Villar camp on April 8.

Caluag denied making any such evaluation. The priest, a former principal of the Ateneo High School and vice president for University Development and Alumni Relations, was never connected with the psychology department.

Malicious falsification

In a separate statement sent at 6 p.m. Tuesday, the school?s Department of Psychology called the report a ?fabricated document.?

It called the report released by Delgado a ?malicious falsification? and denounced the use of its name in ?black propaganda.?

?We strongly condemn these repeated attempts to use the Ateneo Psychology Department for black propaganda,? read the statement.

Without naming names, the department said such ?malicious falsifications? must stop.

?When the first fabrication did not work because of the mistake of choosing a signatory (Fr. Caluag) who has never been affiliated with our Psychology Department, the same scheme was thought of, this time using our most esteemed Fr. Jaime C. Bulatao, SJ,? it said.

?We hope that this is the last time that the name of the Ateneo Psychology Department will be dragged into the malicious misinformation campaign about the alleged mental condition of Senator Benigno C. Aquino III,? it added.

Brown bag

Delgado said the report was brought by an unidentified messenger to Villar?s volunteer office at Starmall in Mandaluyong. (The mall is owned by Villar.)

?It was in a brown bag when it was given to me by a volunteer in the office,? he said.

Delgado said he released the report because of his concern that people might think that the document, should it turn out to be a fake, came from the Villar camp.

He asked media to check the veracity of the report. ?It?s not for me to verify it. I did not also believe the report and you (reporters) should verify it yourself,? Delgado said when asked if he believed the report.

Asked if releasing the report to the media could boomerang on Villar, Delgado said: ?My concern about the document goes beyond just the candidacy of Manny Villar. I?m a private citizen. I love my country very much.?

Another smear campaign

In Maasin City, Aquino said the new report released by the Villar camp was another smear campaign against him.

Aquino said Ateneo had already denied that it made the psychiatric evaluation when he was still college student.

?The (school) authority said that there never was (a psychiatric report). Why are they insisting that there was one? The institution has a reputation. They have to protect it,? he said.

Aquino added that there might come a time when this kind of smear campaign should be investigated.

He arrived at the Maasin port at around 2 p.m. where a huge crowd waited for him and other LP candidates. He and his running mate, Manuel Roxas II, were mobbed when they arrived.

Former Gov. Rosete Lerias lambasted the Maasin City government for not giving the LP a permit to use the city gymnasium.

In Tacloban City, Aquino later said: ?Is this the work of educated persons? An educated person would not do this to his fellow man. But then again thank you because it just shows how far the difference is between me and my adversaries.? With a report from Philip Tubeza