Sandiganbayan asked to include Mercado as witness vs Elenita Binay in graft case

State lawyers have asked the Sandiganbayan to include former Makati Vice Mayor Ernesto Mercado as a witness against Vice President Jejomar Binay’s wife, Dr. Elenita, over the alleged overprice of Makati city hall furnishings when she was mayor in 1999.

This after the defense blocked Mercado’s testimony when he was supposed to take the witness stand last Thursday because he was not included in the pre-trial order of witnesses for the graft trial.

In their motion filed before the antigraft court’s Fifth Division, the prosecutors said they failed to include Mercado in the original list of witnesses finalized on Sept. 2013 because he only surfaced as privy to the corruption allegations against Binay’s family in the middle of 2014.

Mercado was vice mayor of Makati when Binay was mayor.

“Witness is a known ally of the Binays having been the vice mayor during the times when the husband of the accused was mayor for several terms… It was only in the middle of 2014 that Vice Mayor Mercado came out in the open and made revelations against the Binays and declarations against his own interest. Prior to this, nobody could be certain that Vice Mayor Mercado has pertinent information which he could willingly and truthfully disclose,” the prosecutors’ motion said.

“To state the obvious, the prosecution could not have known that Vice Mayor Mercado was a viable witness at the time pre-trial was being conducted,” it added.

Mercado was set to testify about the original audit report he supposedly furnished to Audit Commissioner Heidi Mendoza last Aug. 2014. Mendoza was then having trouble testifying in the trial proper against Dr. Binay because she could not present to court the original copy of the audit report which found anomalies in Dr. Binay’s furnishings deal.

When Mendoza then presented the original copy of the audit report and said it was handed to her by Mercado, the court said Mercado should be the one testifying about the authenticity of the original audit report.

“The exchanges (in the transcript of stenographic notes) unmistakably point to the fact that Mr. Mercado is a vital witness and establishes sufficient and just cause for the prosecution to present Mr. Mercado as witness. He will identify this report and give competent and relevant testimony if allowed to testify,” the prosecutors said.

The prosecutors then challenged the defense to instead grill Mercado during the cross-examination, instead of “resorting to legal technicalities to suppress his testimony.”

The graft case stemmed from the alleged P21.536-million overprice of the P72-million contract for panel fabric partitions and connector brackets for the Makati city hall when Dr. Binay was mayor.

Dr. Binay allegedly bypassed bidding procedures to favor bidder Office Sales International, to the disadvantage of the government.

The case is the result of audit findings led by Commission on Audit commissioner Mendoza who said the bidding for the contract was rigged.

Mercado is the main witness against Vice President Binay, his son Makati mayor Junjun, their alleged dummies, and other Makati officials in a Senate investigation over the purported overprice or kickbacks of various Makati projects when the vice president was mayor.

The court set the next hearing on June 18.