(From left) Senate Minority Leader Juan Ponce Enrile, Sen. Jinggoy Estrada and Sen. Ramon Revilla Jr. INQUIRER FILE PHOTOS
MANILA, Philippines— The Office of the Ombudsman announced on Thursday it has begun a preliminary investigation of Janet Lim-Napoles, Senators Juan Ponce Enrile, Jinggoy Estrada and Ramon Revilla Jr. in connection with an alleged P10-billion racket to divert assistance intended for impoverished farmers to ghost projects and kickbacks.
A press statement said the four, along with other respondents named in a letter complaint of the National Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Justice on Sept. 16, were directed to file “counter affidavits and other controverting evidence” within 10 days from receipt of separate orders to them dated Nov. 19.
An Ombudsman panel, after evaluating the case, found “enough basis to proceed with the preliminary investigation,” said the statement issued following a Philippine Daily Inquirer report on Thursday, that a memorandum prepared by Assistant Ombudsman Joselito P. Fangon had tagged Enrile as the mastermind of the scam—not Napoles as alleged by her former employees.
“There exists sufficient evidence to warrant the filing of criminal and administrative charges against all individuals involved in the release, utilization and disbursement” of the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF), said the memo submitted by Fangon to Ombudsman Conchita Carpio Morales.
In an interview after she attended the budget hearing in the Senate on Thursday, Morales was asked if she had received an eight-page memo from her investigators on which the Inquirer based its story. “I’m surprised about that eight-page memo… I don’t recall an eight-page memo. But the memo I received is more than 200 pages.”
The eight pages referred to in the Inquirer report comprised the copies of introductory and dispositive portions in the 246-page Fangon memorandum. The copies of these eight pages were made available to the Inquirer.
On Page 242 of the memo, it said: “Clearly, no matter how layered the scheme may have been perpetrated or unrelated the players may appear, all facts point to Senator Enrile as the unseen hand directing the compass and the tempo of the whole orchestra.”
Estrada said he thought the Office of the Ombudsman was moving “rather hastily” in its investigation.
“I remember Ombudsman Morales say when the NBI-DOJ filed the case on Sept. 16 that it will take a year or so. But they did it in just two months,” Estrada told reporters.
Justice Secretary Leila de Lima downplayed findings by the Ombudsman’s investigative panel purportedly showing that Enrile was the mastermind of the alleged scam.
De Lima said she did not see any conflict between the Fangon memo and the NBI-DOJ letter complaint.
“Any perceived conflict is more apparent than real, hence, immaterial,” De Lima said in text messages to reporters. “As far as the NBI is concerned, all those charged are conspirators. Each participated in a grand conspiracy to steal public funds, in varying roles and degrees of culpability. The act of one is the act of all.”
De Lima was asked about the proposal of Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago for Napoles to become a state witness in light of the report by the Ombudsman’s investigators implicating Enrile as the “unseen hand” behind the alleged diversion of PDAF allocations.
The justice secretary replied that the government would consider Napoles as a state witness but only after her admission of her part in the conspiracy.
“She has not done so. We all saw her stance during the Senate blue ribbon committee hearing,” said De Lima, referring to the Nov. 7 event, where the detained businesswoman repeatedly invoked her right against self-incrimination.
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