Senate ‘internal purging’ proposed
Senate blue ribbon committee chair Teofisto Guingona III: Internal purging. INQUIRER FILE PHOTOS
MANILA, Philippines—In an unannounced press conference, Sen. Teofisto Guingona III on Tuesday presented the draft report of the Senate blue ribbon committee’s investigation of the pork barrel scam.
Curiously, the blue ribbon committee chair announced his committee’s findings an hour before the Ombudsman presented its own on the same scam.
The draft report, still unsigned, recommended an “internal purging” after it found sufficient evidence to file plunder and other charges against Senators Juan Ponce Enrile, Jinggoy Estrada and Ramon Revilla Jr., in connection with the alleged P10-billion pork barrel fund scam.
It also recommended the filing of similar charges against Janet Lim-Napoles, the alleged mastermind of the racket involving the purported diversion of congressional allocations from the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) to ghost projects and kickbacks.
Guingona proposed that the Senate committee on ethics and privileges be convened to investigate the three senators and conduct a hearing “to discipline its members.”
“Lest we forget, while Janet Lim-Napoles has become the proverbial ‘poster child’ of corruption, the entire (PDAF) scam would not have been consummated without the participation of a few from our august institution,” it said.
“While the committee is aware that only a handful of senators were involved, it cannot be denied that this has greatly damaged the reputation of the Senate as an institution. To restore the integrity of the Senate and the trust and confidence of the public, an institutional purging is needed once and for all.”
Though the heavens fall
Guingona presented his report in a news conference shortly before the Office of the Ombudsman announced that it found probable cause to file plunder and other charges against the three senators and scores of alleged conspirators in the Sandiganbayan.
“Fiat justitia ruat caelum. Let justice be done though the heavens fall,” the report said.
After reading the report in a news conference, Guingona instructed the Senate secretary general to take it to the committee members, including Estrada and Enrile, for their signatures. He didn’t entertain questions from reporters.
“I would love to answer questions but in due deference to my colleagues, who I want them to read the report first and then a chance to sign it, I’m deferring answering questions,” Guingona said. “The report speaks for itself.”
The report also referred the case of the lawyers implicated—Enrile, his chief of staff Jessica “Gigi” Reyes and Revilla’s chief of staff Richard Cambe—to the Integrated Bar of the Philippines and the Supreme Court “for disbarment or disciplinary proceedings.”
“In order to preserve its reputation and integrity, the legal profession must be free from those who use their knowledge and skills to perform or facilitate criminal activity,” it said.
The report indicated that the committee found merit in the evidence presented for the filing of plunder, direct bribery, frauds against the public treasury and similar offenses, graft and violation of the code of conduct and ethical standards for public officials and employees against Napoles, Enrile and his chief of staff Reyes, Revilla and his chief of staff Cambe and Estrada and his staff Pauline Labayen.
Guingona said the committee also found merit in charging former line agency heads Alan Javellana of the National Agribusiness Corp. and Antonio Ortiz of the Technology Resource Center (TRC).
9 hearings
The panel conducted nine hearings, starting with the testimony of Commission on Audit Chair Grace Pulido-Tan and ending with Dennis Cunanan, a former deputy chief and later head of TRC.
Other witnesses included former Napoles employees-turned-whistle-blowers Benhur Luy, Merlina Suñas, Marina Sula, line agency heads such as Javellana, and Napoles herself.
Enrile, Revilla and Estrada have denied any wrongdoing and inhibited themselves from the Senate hearings.
“We found out that there was a plan to steal public funds… and to implement the plan, they came up with a conspiracy. And for a long period of time, they abused the public funds,” Guingona said in his news conference.
Guingona said the committee established that Napoles’ scam started with her creation of dubious nongovernment organizations (NGOs), followed by negotiations between her group and lawmakers on multimillion-peso kickbacks, then the funneling of the PDAF allocations to fake NGOs through the line agencies and lastly, the splitting of the loot.
Sophistication in stealing
“In the splitting of the loot, there’s a standardization. You can see that there is a level of sophistication in the plan, in the conspiracy,” Guingona said.
He said that under the scam, 50 percent of the pork barrel allocation went to the lawmaker, 5 percent to the chief of staff or representative, 10 percent to the conspirators in the implementing agencies and 35 percent to Napoles.
“And the most glaring and lamentable part is the zero percent [that] goes to the beneficiaries,” he said.
Guingona said the committee was recommending further investigation in the case of the House members implicated in the scam since none of them was summoned to the Senate inquiry due to parliamentary inquiry.
Whistle-blowers’ credibility lauded
The draft report lauded the credibility of Benhur Luy and the other whistle-blowers, mostly former employees of Napoles.
“This report relies heavily on the testimonies of the whistle-blowers and with good reason,” it said.
“Juxtaposition between the bare wholesale denials of Janet Lim-Napoles, and the positive, categorical and specific assertions of the whistle-blowers, who testified with confidence, is revealing. It is the best evidence in determining who is telling the truth,” it added.
Tuason testimony critical
The report said the committee also could not downplay the testimony of respondent Ruby Tuason, who has asked that she be made a state witness.
Tuason, in her testimony, said she delivered kickbacks from Napoles to Estrada and Reyes.
“Ms. Tuason’s voluntary surrender and admission of guilt constitutes critical information that identifies two legislators as recipients of kickbacks sourced from simulated government projects,” the draft read.
“Being an admission against interest, her statements deserve serious consideration by the court. She would not have implicated herself in these crimes if these were not true,” it added.
The report also cited the testimony of TRC Director General Dennis Cunanan, also a respondent in the case. He has also asked to turn state witness.
“Cunanan’s testimony supports the case theory that there was direction by lawmakers involved in the stealing of public funds and that TRC was used only as a conduit for the whole operation,” the draft read.
“Cunanan’s testimony is largely supported by the testimonies of the whistle-blowers, except as to whether or not he received kickbacks from the transactions,” it added.
The draft indicated that the committee was leaving to the Department of Justice and the Ombudsman “to decide upon Mr. Cunanan’s fitness to be granted immunity from prosecution.”
Policy guidelines for NGOs
The report also recommended policy measures on the conduct of NGOs.
These include the “real-time” audit of NGOs that receive government funds, the blacklisting of NGOs that commit wrongdoing, the enhancement of regulatory functions of the Securities and Exchange Commission over nonstock and nonprofit organizations, the improvement of the regulatory functions of the Cooperative Development Authority over cooperatives, and the computerization of a centralized database on NGOs of relevant government agencies.
It also suggested that the Commission on Audit prohibit NGOs, which have been in operation for less than three years, from receiving government funds and requiring NGOs to prove their capacities to undertake government-funded projects.
“Approximately, 80 percent of the PDAF has been lost probably to corruption. If this manner of utilization of PDAF is descriptive of how other government funds are disbursed, then corruption is an endemic cancer insidiously spreading and leading our very government to ruin,” the draft report said.
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