SC ruling elates lawyers of whistle-blowers
Lawyer Levito Baligod, principal counsel of the whistle-blowers. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines—The lawyers of the whistle-blowers are holding their breath.
The decision of the Supreme Court declaring the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) unconstitutional is the best proof that the nation’s political system has the ability to correct itself—no need for impeachment, coup d’etat or revolution, they said.
“It is a great victory, if strictly implemented,” said Stephen Cascollan, one of the lawyers of 11 former employees of Janet Lim-Napoles, the alleged mastermind of a P10-billion pork barrel scam that they had exposed.
“We have impeached a President and a Supreme Court chief and yet corruption remained, we had a coup d’etat and insurgency but nothing has changed. But with patriotic citizens, journalists and government people doing their jobs, we can reform society,” said Levito Baligod, the principal counsel of the whistle-blowers.
He added that in the beginning they were only seeking justice for Benhur Luy, a Napoles aide she had allegedly held captive for three months for threatening to reveal her activities.
“But now we realized that the coming out of the whistle-blowers as witnesses of the plunder of state funds by some legislators, government officials and private individuals became the trigger for reforms,” Baligod said.
“This is just beginning. We have the power, we have found our voice, and we can’t just now go back to being uninvolved,” Peachy Rallonza-Bretaña, organizer of the One Million People March in August, posted on Facebook.
President Aquino, who is in Tacloban City on a visit to areas destroyed by Supertyphoon “Yolanda,” had no immediate comment.
“Let’s wait for some kind of explanation of that decision,” the President was quoted by his spokesman, Ricky Carandang, as saying.
Lobby money up for grabs
Former Sen. Panfilo Lacson, who called for the abolition of the congressional pork barrel system as early as 2003, can’t wait to see what effect the court ruling will have on the country’s elections.
“I’m as anxious as you and other Filipinos are,” he said. “I’m just worried that the same self-aggrandizing legislators might turn to lobby money and other illegal means to save for their reelection.”
Lacson said he’s praying that members of Congress will now “focus more on exercising their oversight function especially on how the executive allocates the funds in implementing the hard and soft projects identified in the appropriations law that have passed their scrutiny.”
Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago said she was vindicated by the Supreme Court ruling.
In a statement, Santiago said then Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile distributed in late 2012 some P2 million in Christmas bonuses to all senators, except certain colleagues including herself, Senators Antonio Trillanes IV, Alan Peter Cayetano and Pia Cayetano.—With reports from Norman Bordadora, Leila B. Salaverria, Gil C. Cabacungan and Jerome Aning
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