Vitangcol says he’s broke, asks for public defender

OVERLOADED FOR A DECADE Built to move 320,000 passengers daily, the MRT started exceeding its capacity in 2004, five years after its launch, according to former general manager Al Vitangcol (inset).

In a move that raised not a few eyebrows, former Metro Rail Transit (MRT) general manager Al Vitangcol III has asked the Sandiganbayan to have the Public Attorney’s Office (PAO) defend him temporarily in the graft cases he is facing over a $1.5-million maintenance contract awarded to a company owned by his wife’s uncle.

Under the law, PAO lawyers may represent only indigent litigants who cannot afford the services of private lawyers.

Vitangcol, himself a lawyer, and five others have been indicted in three separate cases for violation of Republic Act No. 3019, the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act.

“[I]t would take time for the accused to generate and accumulate the funds necessary to pay for his counsel de parte (of his own choice),” Vitangcol said in a three-page motion he filed on Wednesday.

In seeking its permission, he told the antigraft court’s Third Division that the cases brought against him by the Ombudsman had affected his profession as a lawyer.

He said he had approached “prominent law firms” which asked him for P1 million in legal fees.

“The institution of this instant case, together with the seemingly calculated and biased press releases of the Office of the Ombudsman, had effectively ruined the reputation and integrity of the herein accused,” Vitangcol’s motion read.

“Thus, he was not able to get new clients in the exercise of his profession and that greatly diminished his earning capacity,” it added.

According to Vitangcol, the travel ban against him issued by the court likewise prevented him from pursuing “business opportunities he was recently working on.”
Emotional attachment
In a previous interview, Vitangcol said he had opted not to represent himself because “there will be an emotional attachment to the case when a lawyer defends himself.”

The ex-MRT official showed up in court for his arraignment on Jan. 21 without a lawyer. He tried but failed to convince the court to defer his arraignment as he did not have a lawyer.

Vitangcol—who resigned as MRT general manager in May 2014 after being accused of demanding $30 million from a Czech company for a P3.7-billion contract to supply MRT coaches—also assailed the media for giving too much attention to his case.

“Who am I? I’m just an ordinary individual. So why is the media giving me this attention?” he asked reporters after his arraignment.

Aside from Vitangcol, also standing trial for graft are private respondents Marlo de la Cruz, Manolo Maralit, Wilson de Vera, Federico Remo and Arturo Soriano, an uncle of Vitangcol’s wife.

The five were incorporators of Philippine Trams Rail Management and Service Corp. which won a contract to service MRT trains without a public building, and despite Soriano being a member of its board and being related to Vitangcol.