Doy blames Estrada, ex-senator for Centennial Expo dilemma

Former Vice President Salvador "Doy" Laurel tagged ousted President Joseph Estrada and a former lady senator as those responsible for his predicament in connection with the so-called Centennial Expo scam.

In a 30-page appeal filed in the Supreme Court, the former chairman of the National Centennial Commission (NCC) said the Expo investigations, which led to the filing of graft charges against him, were all politically motivated.

Graft charges were filed in November 2000 after three separate probes found out that the Freedom Ring project of the 1998 Centennial Expo had been awarded to Asia Construction Development Authority without a public bidding.

The probes were conducted by the Senate Blue Ribbon committee, the Ombudsman and a special body headed by former Sen. Rene Saguisag.

Laurel said all three probes stemmed from a speech delivered by a "disgraced lady senator abetted by a disgraced president now in jail."

"It started when the lady senator had asked the NCC for something which was beyond its capacity to give. Disappointed, the senator delivered an angry speech. She became even angrier when the Blue Ribbon found her own chief of staff indictable for a criminal offense," he said.

The former vice president did not name the lady senator and her aide.

Laurel revealed that the chief of staff was established "to have succeeded in extorting P150,000 from a former official of the Clark Development Corp."

The appeal came after the SC’s first division rejected last month Laurel’s argument that he could not be held liable because he was not a public official.

Laurel had contended that he could not be held liable since he was not a government official, having received no salary as chairman of the NCC and chief executive officer of Expocorp., the contractor given the task of finishing the Expo project in Pampanga.

Justices said the NCC was a public office because it clearly performed sovereign and executive functions being created by then President Fidel Ramos.