Prosecutors raring to grill Erap

Government prosecutors are eager to grill detained President Joseph Estrada once he takes the witness stand to rebut allegations that he embezzled a total of P4.1 billion from government coffers during his 31 months in office until his ouster in January 2001.

Chief Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa Ignacio suggested that the deposed leader make himself available for the scheduled Monday-Wednesday hearings this coming July, but defense lawyer Jose Flaminiano, who earlier vowed to produce his client, has remained non-committal.

"They can call the former president here. We are even daring them (Estrada’s lawyers) to present the former president. They are running out of witnesses. To my mind, the accused will be a significant witness," the prosecutor told justices of the Sandiganbayan.

Villa Ignacio told the special division — the three-member panel hearing the plunder case against Estrada — that "significant or relevant" witnesses would either be Estrada himself or his co-accused, Edward Serapio, his former personal lawyer.

The prosecution has been taunting the defense team, claiming it has produced witnesses whose testimonies are immaterial to the large-scale corruption charges leveled against the ousted leader, now under house arrest at his 15-hectare estate in Tanay.

Villa Ignacio observed that for the past three months, all the defense panel had done was present witnesses who had nothing to do with Estrada’s ill-gotten wealth. "They are just trying to kill time, your honors. In basketball parlance, this is dribbling the ball."

"They have presented notaries public, authors of books, defense lawyers like Raymond Fortun… journalists and the like. Their testimonies have nothing to do with jueteng, the Jose Velarde account and the Belle shares, your honors," said Villa Ignacio.

But Flaminiano insisted to Justice Teresita Leonardo-de Castro, Francisco Villaruz and Diosdado Peralta that the defense would "never waste the precious time" of the anti-graft court. "We will never present a witness if we consider him insignificant."

He argued that Villa Ignacio had no right to brand their witnesses as irrelevant, as it was the special trial court that had allowed their testimonies to be heard, and that he had no right to tell them what to do, reiterating they have "several witnesses" to be called.

Also yesterday, the defense panel called this writer and Philippine Daily Inquirer reporter Nelson Flores as witnesses to affirm articles written during Estrada’s impeachment hearings, which included statements by lawyers of both parties.

Meanwhile, Ilocos Sur Gov. Luis Singson, the whistle-blower in the jueteng scandal that led to the ouster of Estrada, yesterday strongly urged the Supreme Court to stop the "moro-moro" of the defense in the deposed leader’s plunder trial at the Sandiganbayan.

"The Supreme Court must put a stop to this mockery of justice being perpetrated by the defense panel which has been presenting all sorts of witnesses. One time the panel presented a prosecution lawyer as its witness. Now they are presenting members of the media covering the trial. And I fear that pretty soon, they will be presenting even those who are merely there to witness the proceedings," he said.

"Obviously," Singson added, "the defense is waiting for something big to happen, to explode. That’s why they’re doing everything to delay the trial. I urge the Supreme Court to do something to compel the defense panel to present whatever evidence it has now, if it has any, so that the case can be resolved, one way or another, as soon as possible."

He said so much depends on the case’s resolution –"our economic and political stability and our unity and peace of mind as a people."