Palace leaves decision on calls for Enrile house arrest to Sandigan

MANILA, Philippines— Amid calls for the government to place detained senator Juan Ponce Enrile under house arrest, Malacañang said the Sandiganbayan will have to decide on the issue.

“It would be eventually the court that would decide should the side of Senator Enrile move to have him placed under house arrest,” deputy presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte said in an interview on state-run dzRB radio.

On Thursday, Enrile was rushed to the Makati Medical Center due to pneumonia.

The 91-year old senator has been suffering from fever since then and even coughing blood, which prompted physicians at the Philippine National Police General Hospital to move him urgently to the private hospital.

Lawmakers belonging to the minority bloc at the House of Representatives will ask their colleagues to support a call to the Sandiganbayan to place Enrile under house arrest on humanitarian grounds.

At the senate, opposition senators Vicente Sotto III and Joseph Victor Ejercito have also pressed for Enrile’s house arrest.

Enrile has been under hospital arrest since July 2014 in a private room at PNP hospital in Camp Crame, Quezon City while facing plunder and graft charges in connection with the P10-billion pork barrel scam.

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