Malacañang says ‘Batasan Five’ cannot rest easy

Top Palace officials warned yesterday that the so-called "Batasan Five," or the left-leaning party-list congressmen, cannot rest easy despite being able to go out of their sanctuary at the House of Representatives and having rebellion charges against them dismissed.

Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita and National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales, in separate interviews, strongly maintained that the rebellion charges filed against Bayan Muna Reps. Teodoro Casiño, Satur Ocampo and Joel Virador, Anakpawis Rep. Rafael Mariano, and Gabriela Rep. Liza Maza were not thrown out by the court.

"I don’t think they should be too confident of their situation right now," Ermita said in a telephone interview. "They know that the case was dismissed on a mere technicality. I think they should be careful in their actions now after experiencing being holed up in refuge at the Batasan (Pambansa complex) to avoid arrest because of the rebellion charges against them."

He said authorities would have a stronger case against the five party-list lawmakers, who were accused of plotting to overthrow the Arroyo administration in a coup in collaboration with rightist military officers last Feb. 24.

The lawmakers claimed parliamentary immunity and hid in the House premises starting on Feb. 27 to escape a government crackdown that followed the coup attempt. They emerged from hiding last week after the Makati City regional trial court dismissed the charges against them but also ruled that new charges could be filed.

Ermita said Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez assured that authorities would be able to finally put these five lawmakers behind bars for various crimes, particularly attempts at a violent takeover of the government.

Gonzales said the Batasan Five should not be "too smug" after their "temporary gain." He explained that because of the events last February, many more Filipinos became very much aware of the leftist ideology of the lawmakers and the atrocities committed in the name of communism.

He said the government has long been building up cases against the five congressmen, as well as other communist leaders, and the attempted coup last February put some complications in the investigation but did not weaken the charges.

"We have a continuous buildup of the cases against them so I think they remain very apprehensive of the accounting the law will make on their actions," Gonzales told The STAR.

He added that the congressmen’s "cover and fronts have been blown as far as the public is concerned. The people are very much aware of what their true agenda (is,) using lawmaking as a cover."

Gonzales said unlike in the past when rebellion charges were dismissed due to politics and for the sake of unity, the government is determined to impose the law on groups and individuals who refuse to go through legal and constitutional processes of changing governments.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) filed new rebellion charges last Friday against the party-list lawmakers along with 41 others.

Ocampo, one of the five party-list lawmakers charged anew with rebellion, said the case against him and his colleagues is a "demolition job," claiming that the government would use the case to turn them "into scapegoats for political killings."

The former communist leader reacted to a statement of Gonzalez that the new rebellion case "will even solve the mystery of the present killings."

Gonzalez was referring to the killing of more than 500 members of militant groups like Bayan Muna and Anakpawis.

On Saturday, Manuel Nardo, a Bayan Muna coordinator in Barangay Quebiawan, San Fernando, Pampanga, was shot dead at about 9:30 a.m. He was the 93rd Bayan Muna and 566th militant leader to be killed since President Arroyo assumed office.

Militant groups are blaming the administration for the killings.

The insinuation in the Gonzalez’s statement is that the Left is conducting a new round of purge similar to the one it carried out years ago.

"The cat is out of the bag," said Ocampo, referring to Gonzalez’s statement.

He said the rebellion case as a "propaganda vehicle for blaming the left for the continued killing of activists under the Arroyo administration and exculpate state security forces that appear circumstantially to be the perpetrators."

Ocampo said Gonzalez’s statement should be taken together with the "theory" of Chief Superintendent Jesus Versoza, head of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group of the Philippine National Police, that it is the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army that is killing activists.

He added that it was Versoza who filed the complaint against them with the Department of Justice.

"All these make the (rebellion) case a veritable demolition job against the progressive party-list organizations represented by the Batasan Five. It is not ‘impartial justice,’ as declared tongue-in-cheek by Bunye," Ocampo said.

Ocampo and his colleagues walked out of the Batasan premises Monday last week after seeking refuge there to avoid being arrested without a warrant for more than two months.

They could be subjected to a warrantless arrest if the government insists that rebellion is a continuing crime. — With Jess Diaz, Marvin Sy