SC won’t junk Expo scam raps

The Supreme Court (SC) denied with finality yesterday the appeal of former Vice President Salvador Laurel to stop the Ombudsman from indicting him for his alleged involvement in the P9.6-billion Centennial Expo scam in 1998.

Justice Santiago Kapu-nan, the proponent of the ruling, dismissed the arguments Laurel presented before the court’s five-member first division, paving the way for the Ombudsman to file corruption charges against the former chairman of the National Centennial Commission (NCC).

The SC stopped Ombudsman Aniano Desierto from indicting Laurel in October 2001 after the former vice president obtained a temporary restraining order (TRO) but the high court lifted the TRO on April 24. Laurel filed a motion for reconsideration.

The first division also denied with finality Laurel’s plea to present his arguments to the SC en banc.

"Accordingly the motion for reconsideration and referral to the Court en banc is denied. This denial is final," wrote Kapunan, who also wrote the April 24 decision lifting the TRO.

Justices Reynato Puno and Consuelo Santiago concurred with Kapunan’s six-page decision while Chief Justice Hilario Davide Jr. and Ma. Alicia Austria-Martinez abstained.

In their ruling, the justices branded as "irrelevant" Laurel’s assertion that his case has "serious constitutional repercussions" because the defunct NCC included senators, Cabinet members and even SC justices.

"Such serious constitutional repercussions do not reduce the force of the rationale behind this Court’s decision," they stressed.

Laurel also argued that the charges against him were "politically motivated" and blamed jailed former President Joseph Estrada and former Sen. Anna Dominique Coseteng for instigating the charges.

Although the former vice president did not identify Coseteng by name, Laurel held that the speech delivered by a "disgraced former lady senator and abetted by a disgraced former president now in jail" were the reasons why three separate investigations were conducted on the Centennial Expo controversy.

The Expo Filipino controversy was investigated by the Senate Blue Ribbon committee, the Ombudsman and a probe Estrada ordered to be conducted by former Sen. Rene Saguisag.

He claimed that Coseteng instigated the investigations against him because she asked for something the NCC could not accommodate.

"The lady senator asked the NCC something beyond its capacity to give. Disappointed, she delivered an angry speech. She became even angrier when the Blue Ribbon found her own chief aide indictable for criminal extortion," Laurel claimed.

Laurel said that this chief of staff, whom he did not name but is known to be Ponciano "Chito" Roque, was "established" to have "succeeded in extorting P150,000 from a former official of the Clark Development Corp."

But the SC held that Laurel was a public officer when he was named chairman of the NCC and that he was accountable for any act he committed which may fall under Republic Act 3019, or the Anti-Graft and Corrupt Practices Act.

The court held Laurel liable for alleged irregularities involving the P1.165 billion Freedom Ring project, a portion of the P9.6-billion Expo which was built for the nation’s centennial anniversary.

Graft probers Mary Ann Corpus-Mañalac, Emma Suarez and Ma. Lina Llagas-Vicente stated in their findings that Laurel awarded the Freedom Ring project to Asia Construction Development Corp. without the benefit of a public bidding.

They also found that the former NCC chairman "prematurely" issued a notice to proceed with the construction project in December 1996 when the contract itself was signed four months later, or in April 1997.