Lozano trains guns on Ombudsman; Abalos says impeach suit ‘rehashed’

A day after re-filing an old impeachment complaint against three officials of the Commission on Elections, Marcos loyalist lawyer Oliver Lozano trained his guns yesterday on Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez.

Lozano filed by mail with the House of Representatives an impeachment complaint against the embattled Ombudsman even before the chamber could receive his petition — which he mailed on Tuesday — against Comelec Chairman Benjamin Abalos and Commissioners Resurreccion Borra and Florentino Tuason Jr.

Abalos dismissed the impeachment bid against him as a "rehashed complaint" that will not prosper. He said he does not expect any congressman to endorse it for action.

In his complaint against Gutierrez, Lozano charged the Ombudsman with betrayal of public trust and grave abuse of discretion for clearing Abalos, other election officials and private individuals behind the P1.3-billion contract for the procurement of automated counting machines that the poll body awarded to the MegaPacific Consortium.

He said Gutierrez’s office made the decision despite a January 2004 Supreme Court ruling voiding the Mega Pacific contract since it was "not only in clear violation of law and jurisprudence, but also in reckless disregard of its (Comelec’s) own bidding rules and procedure."

Lozano said while that the high court ordered the Ombudsman to file charges against Comelec officials and private persons responsible for the nullified deal, Gutierrez chose to clear these individuals.

She thus committed grave abuse of discretion, he added.

Lozano chose to resort to filing through the post office because Roberto Nazareno, House secretary general, is under instruction from Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr. to reject any complaint that is not supported by an endorsement from any least one member of the chamber.

Majority Leader Prospero Nograles summoned Nazareno yesterday to reiterate the Speaker’s instruction.

"Return those mailed Lozano complaints as soon as they arrive," Nograles told the secretary general.

He said he doubted whether any of his colleagues would endorse the recycled case against Abalos, Borra and Tuason and the complaint against Gutierrez.

Nograles has described the complaint against Abalos and his colleagues as a "mere scrap of paper unless it is endorsed."

He said the rules on impeachment prohibit the House from receiving or acting on a complaint that lacks an endorsement.

Sought for comment, Nazareno said he has no choice but to return the complaints even at the risk of incurring Lozano’s ire again.

Meanwhile, Abalos appeared for the first time yesterday before the Presidential Electoral Tribunal (PET) to debunk allegations by former senator Loren Legarda of massive cheating in the May 2004 elections.

Abalos focused his testimony on allegations that the certificates of canvass (COC) for Lanao del Sur had been tampered with to give President Arroyo and her running mate Noli de Castro a significant lead over chief rivals Fernando Poe Jr. and Legarda. Former Supreme Court associate justice Bernardo Pardo presided the hearing.

Lawyer Sixto Brillantes had said the difference in the serial numbers of the COCs from the House of Representatives and the Comelec was an evidence of fraud.

Abalos said the serial numbers were different because the first copy of the COCs represents the incomplete result of the regular election in Lanao del Sur and the other contained the result of the special elections held in seven municipalities in Lanao del Sur. — With Mayen Jaymalin, Jose Rodel Clapano