Chavez hit for filing charges vs Arroyo

Bacolod City — Rep. Ignacio “Iggy” Arroyo Jr. (Neg. Occ., 5th District) on Thursday called the filing of plunder charges against his sister-in-law, former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, plain gimmickry.

“I have said it again and again, the former president or the Arroyos for that matter have nothing to hide,” he said. “Our only request is the next time somebody accuses us of anything the evidence should be presented simultaneously instead of subjecting us to trial by publicity.”

Former Solicitor General Francisco Chavez filed a plunder case against the former president at the Department of Justice on Tuesday for her alleged use of P1.6 billion in fertilizer funds.

He told reporters that he filed the case so Ms Arroyo could account for the fertilizer funds that “were clearly used for her political exercises in 2004.”

Attached to the 31-page complaint were about 200 pages of documents, including the special allotment release order signed by Arroyo that directed then Budget Secretary Emilia Boncodin to release the funds.

Also included in the complaint as evidence were the reports of the Senate committee which investigated the P728-million fertilizer fund scam.

But Rep. Arroyo noted that Chavez admitted in his complaint that the funds were released to specific members of the House of Representatives, provincial governors and municipal mayors.

“So how can the former President be liable for plunder when the recipients were enumerated and not a single centavo passed through her hands?” he said. “Where is the plunder? Among others, a major criterion of plunder is if the funds were diverted to the pockets and personal use of the recipient.”

He said that while Chavez claimed that the money was diverted to the presidential bid of the former chief executive in 2004, the former solicitor general “could not present even a single piece of evidence of how the fertilizer fund was used for the campaign — how or for what was it spent, by whom and where, how and on what campaign needs did the money go to.” /INQUIRER