Blue Ribbon Committee Chair Teofisto Guingona III shows the two affidavits of alleged pork barrel mastermind Janet Napole containing the list of politician involved on the pork barrel scam during a press conference at the Senate in Pasay City. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — Agriculture Secretary Proceso J. Alcala said on Monday that Janet Lim Napoles’ two affidavits on the pork barrel scam showed an obvious attempt “to divert the issues against those who have plundered the national coffers by discrediting people who have been pushing for genuine reforms in the bureaucracy.”
Alcala said in a press briefing that one affidavit did not even give a hint of his involvement in the scam while another implied that he was the signing authority for scam-related projects.
The agriculture chief reiterated that he never had any dealings with Napoles, neither in the past as a lawmaker representing the second district of Quezon nor in his current post as head of the Department of Agriculture.
“(Such accusations are) malicious and has no basis in fact,” Alcala said. “(The affidavits) are not to be taken hook, line and sinker. It’s unfair to the farmers and fishers and to those who are merely being picked on.”
Further, he said that based on the second affidavit, the alleged DA transactions did not even occur during his term as agriculture secretary as these happened from 2004 and 2005.
“There are transactions that were not provided with dates, but the lawmakers named are no longer in Congress when I joined the DA,” Alcala said.
The accusations have also been “unfair to the farmers and the fisherfolk as this issue threatens to take away DA’s focus on its programs and services, and negate the gains the agriculture sector achieved since the start of the Aquino administration,” he said.
Alcala said that in the past three years, rice farmers have been able to provide 96 percent of domestic demand. Rice self-sufficiency was pegged at 82 percent in 2010.
He said that the improved harvest as well as the National Food Authority’s intensified local palay procurement and operational reforms, the government was able to reduce the country’s rice import bill by an average of P54 billion a year.
In 2010, the NFA spent P176.8 billion on rice imports. This went down to P155 billion by the end of 2013, Alcala said.
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