Drilon: Senate not in crisis, just watch us as we go to work

Senate President Franklin Drilon. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines—“It’s not in crisis. We continue to work. We’ll continue to work,” said Senate President Franklin Drilon, pointing to the fact that senators continued to hold hearings and attend sessions.

“Just watch us as we go to work,” he added.

The Senate President challenged the DOJ to file charges against senators involved in the scam. He said the Senate would survive the scandal and would be “strengthened” by it.

Some senators on Wednesday bristled at the mention of whistle-blower Benhur Luy’s files detailing their transactions with Janet Lim-Napoles, challenging the Department of Justice to file charges against them.

Riled by the publication of the files, Majority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano and Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago pressed the blue ribbon committee to resume its inquiry into the scam so they could confront Napoles and Luy.

“Preposterous,” Drilon said, laughing off the claim he got a P5-million allocation as chair of the Commission on Appointments in 2005.

“There is no PDAF (Priority Development Assistance Fund) in the Commission of Appointments if that was the purpose of the allocation,” he told reporters. He said he was a member of the opposition in 2005.

Drilon added there was no check, voucher or Saro (special allotment release order) “that has gone to me.”

The Inquirer on Tuesday ran a story about Luy’s digital files detailing Napoles’ transactions with 15 incumbent and 10 former senators from 2002 to 2012, during which Napoles channeled pork barrel allocations to ghost projects.

“It’s absolutely false. I never had any cash advance from Ms. Napoles,” Cayetano said. “If someone got it, I don’t know him or her. The only VLL I know is a staff from Vista Land. I don’t know anyone with those initials. I didn’t get commissions.”

Luy’s records showed Cayetano allocated P3 million of his PDAF for a communication supply when he was a Taguig-Pateros lawmaker in 2003.

These records showed a cash advance of P639,625 was received by “VLL,”  but that P500,000 was returned by Cayetano to JLN, Napoles company.

“For the record, I denounce as false, the allegations against me drawn from the Luy list.  All the documents are fake.  I have no clue about the alleged details, which are all falsified or fictitious,” Santiago said in a statement.

She claimed that the Napoles group “merely forged certain public documents and used certain names like mine to pad their in-house records.”

Sen. Aquilino Pimentel III said a purported October 2012 letter to the Department of Agriculture requesting P10-million allocation for Surigao del Sur from his office was “forged.”

“You become part of their list because they forged the letter in your name. That’s the kind of list we’re spending time on. We should spend time on the evidence,” he rued in an interview with reporters.

“And then the DOJ and the Ombudsman should start filing the cases so we don’t become too dependent on these lists,” he added.

Sen. Joseph Victor Ejercito said he could not recall allocating P5 million for the Department of Interior and Local Government. If at all, he allotted much of his pork barrel for scholarships.

“I would not risk destroying my name for P5 million,” he told reporters.  “I challenge anybody who could prove that I have transactions with Napoles, I will give him or her P5 million.”

Sen. Cynthia Villar belied claims she received a P500,000 kickback. She said that the Department of Transportation and Communications directly dealt with her constituents, and gave away computers to them.

“We don’t know how much they bought it, how many they bought. It was typical for the DOTC to give away computers,” she said. If at all, this is part of black propaganda against perceived political enemies in 2016.

“I’m so confused by all the lists. I have never met Janet Napoles. We’ve never been together. I have never spoken to her. I have no dealings with her. I have not been to a party with her; there’s no picture with her,” said Sen. Ferndinand Marcos Jr.