Related killings?

Police are now investigating government’s theory that the murder of Assistant Solicitor General Nestor Ballacillo and his son Benedict had something to do with the Piatco controversy.

Just last Dec. 6, shortly after father and son left their home in Barangay San Antonio, Paranaque City, a man armed with a Cal. 45 pistol allegedly approached the victims, shot the elder Ballacillo at the back of his head point blank then fired at the young boy. The triggerman took Ballacilo’s cellular phone, the brief case and their wallets then walked away casually.

Police investigators believe the gunman was not alone but in fact accompanied by several lookouts strategically positioned in the vicinity. Killing of the younger Ballacillo, police theorize, was not in the plan.

The killing was initially treated like an ordinary crime by the papers but gained prominence after Solicitor General Eduardo Nachura announced that Malacanang had ordered the release of P1 million as reward money for the capture of the perpetrators. The Southern Police District Office under newly installed director Chief Supt. Roberto Rosales has also earmarked P200,000 reward for the information that would lead to the identification and arrest of the perpetrators.

Nachura told the press that the murder of Judge Ballacillo, the most senior in the roll of OSG lawyers, could have something to do with the expropriation case on the Ninoy Aquino International Airport Terminal 3 (NAIA-3) which he was litigating before the Pasay City Regional Trial Court.

It will be recalled that former Solicitor General Alfredo Benipayo filed the expropriation case to determine the just compensation due the Philippine International Air Transport Corp. (Piatco) which built the NAIA-3 after the concession agreement awarded by the government to the consortium led by Paircargo and owned by the Chengs was nullified by the Supreme Court. The court then presided by Judge Henry Gingoyon ordered the government to pay Piatco P3 billion representing 10 percent of the compensation the consortium was asking as a pre-condition to the government takeover of the terminal.

Shortly after the Pasay court ordered the payment which was subsequently upheld by the Supreme Court, Gingoyon was killed by still unidentified men in Cavite. The case has remained in the long list of unsolved killings.

Police are now looking into possibility that the killing of Ballacillo and the murder of Gingoyon could be related to each other.

Paranaque Police chief, Supt. Ronald Estilles said they are now comparing pieces of evidence gathered from the Gingoyon crime scene and statements of witnesses with those recovered from the Ballacillo murder especially the slugs. No witness has surfaced yet in the recent killing. Estilles said that if the slugs turn out to have come from the same gun, then the killers could be the same and the motive of the killing would be easily established.

Aside from litigating the expropriation case in the Pasay City Court, Ballacillo also represents the OSG and the Philippines in the $425 million investment claim filed by the Fraport AG with the International Court for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) against the government.

If the expropriation succeeded, the Philippine Gov’t would lose in the ICSID and in the $565 million arbitral case before the ICSID in Singapore. In the event the government loses in the two arbitral cases, the Philippines would be liable for almost a $1 billion for the terminal that is claimed to cost only $275 million as per Takenaka, the Japanese firm that built the terminal.

How true that the OSG has already realized the folly of pursuing the expropriation case and is planning to withdraw the case after being fully convinced that expropriation was a wrong legal remedy which was initially contemplated as the fastest and most expedient legal solution to the problem to extricate the government from complicated legal, financial and administrative tangles? This would jeopardize Piatco’s claim.

Police are likewise looking at the possibility that the murder of Ballacillo may have something to do with the disclosure of certain secret bank accounts in Hong Kong, money laundering schemes involving former government officials and leaks of confidential information on the arbitration cases.

Textbook dilemma

The Departments of Education (DepEd) and the Department Budget and Management (DBM) have both expressed serious concern over a court decision that held in abeyance due to alleged anomalies the delivery of around 12 million copies of new textbooks for elementary students in public schools nationwide.

The textbook procurement being questioned is financed under the Second Social Expenditure Management Project (SEMP-2), funded by the World Bank. The project, executed by DBM, has provided the government with textbooks, school buildings, vaccines, and other goods and services for the poor.

According to World Bank country director Joachim von Amsberg, the procurement reforms in the Department of Education have allowed government to significantly reduce the cost of textbooks.

The cost of books acquired in the past six years has reportedly been reduced by half, resulting in savings of at least P2.63 billion. The World Bank claims that each student now has a book of his own in Mathematics, Science, English, and Filipino. Before 2000, at least five children had to share one copy.

Secretary Lapus explained that the department wants to have the same improvement in textbook distribution for Social Studies, the textbooks being held through the court order. Sad to say, with this court order, five children have to take turns reading one textbook.

For his part, DBM Undersecretary Laura Pascua says that the injunction by the Manila Court will make it nearly impossible to sustain the same ratio of one textbook per child unless deliveries are completed on or before Dec. 31, 2006, the closing date of the project.

Earlier, the World Bank issued a statement which said that as the funder of the project, it has fiduciary responsibility to review implementation, including procurement, to ensure that funds are used for the intended purpose, and that agreed procurement procedures are strictly followed.

In line with the agreed procedures, it says it had reviewed the recent award of textbook contracts and insists that these awards were made in accordance with the applicable guidelines for procurement under World Bank financing and with the provisions of the legal agreement for the SEMP-2 project.

It will be recalled that Vibal Publishing won the contract to supply Philippine public elementary and high schools with textbooks under the second World Bank-backed SEMP-2. Of the $100 million earmarked for the project, $40 million was set for the purchase of textbooks in Science, English and Social Studies.

As it turned out, three disqualified bidders, namely Rex Bookstore, Daehan Printing and Publishing Co., and Kolonwel Trading, filed a complaint before the World Bank’s Department of Institutional Integrity based in Washington DC against three World Bank officials saying they exerted "undue pressure" to Philippine officials in giving the contract to Vibal.

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