Abalos faces impeachment
Battered by damning allegations of bribery and corruption at the Senate in connection with the national broadband network (NBN) deal, Commission on Elections (Comelec) Chairman Benjamin Abalos faces another appointment with lawmakers, this time at the House of Representatives where an impeachment complaint has been filed against him.
Iloilo Vice Gov. Rolex Suplico filed the complaint yesterday – a day after Commission on Higher Education chairman Romulo Neri accused Abalos at a Senate hearing of offering him P200 million in exchange for an endorsement of the $329-million NBN contract with ZTE Corp. At the time of the alleged bribe offer, Neri was director-general of the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA).
Suplico’s impeachment complaint accuses Abalos of culpable violation of the Constitution, graft and corruption, bribery and betrayal of the public trust.
“These are four of the five grounds for impeachment enumerated in the Constitution. The fifth is treason, which can be committed only in times of war. We are not charging him with treason because there is no war,” Suplico, a former congressman, said.
But Abalos blamed “a sustained and well-funded campaign to destroy me” for his troubles.
Three House members, Teofisto Guingona III of Bukidnon, Teodoro Casiño of the militant party-list group Bayan Muna and Maria Isabel Climaco of
“This is an open and shut case. We hope to send it to the Senate for trial as soon as possible,” he said.
He said they are confident of getting the required 80 votes or one third of all House members to transmit the complaint directly to the Senate before Congress goes on its first break on Oct. 13.
“There is thus bipartisan support for Abalos’ impeachment since the endorsers come from the minority and the majority. Rep. Climaco is a member of the pro-administration Laban ng Demokatikong Pilipino,” Guingona said.
Only Guingona and Casiño personally signed their certificates of endorsement. Climaco was to send hers by fax.
House Minority Leader Rep. Ronaldo Zamora said aside from impeachment, lawmakers were studying other options, including filing criminal charges against Abalos.
Suplico said many of his former colleagues in the House wanted to endorse his case but that they were in their districts because there was no session yesterday.
“One of them is Manong Caloy (Nueva Vizcaya Rep. Carlos Padilla), who has denounced in a privilege speech the participation of Chairman Abalos in the ZTE-NBN contract,” he said.
He said “two major pieces of evidence” were the affidavit of businessman Jose “Joey” de Venecia III and the Senate testimony of Neri.
De Venecia, son and namesake of the Speaker, accused Abalos of trying to bribe him out of the broadband project with $10 million. The younger De Venecia is co-founder and majority stockholder of Amsterdam Holdings Inc. which lost to ZTE in the bid for the broadband project.
Suplico added the Senate testimonies of Finance Secretary Margarito Teves and Transportation and Communications Secretary Leandro Mendoza on their NBN-related meetings with Abalos would also be included as evidence.
In his affidavit, Joey III claimed that based on several meetings with Abalos in the country and in
Joey III also stirred a hornet’s nest when he accused First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo of shoving a finger in his face and ordering him to “back off” from the broadband project. Abalos and Arroyo have since denied Joey’s claims.
Neri, in his Senate testimony made under oath, said he reported the bribe offer to President Arroyo who told him not to take it but to approve the project anyway. Asked to reveal more details of his conversation with Mrs. Arroyo, Neri declined, invoking “executive privilege.”
Suplico said their evidence showed that Abalos had “financial interest and direct and indispensable participation in the facilitation of the NBN contract.”
Asked why he chose to file an impeachment case instead of just waiting for the Comelec boss to retire on Jan. 31 next year, Suplico said public officers should be made to account for their actions, even if they are set for retirement.
“The issue here is accountability,” he stressed.
He admitted that the involvement of the Speaker’s son might give political color to his case.
But Sergio Apostol, Mrs. Arroyo’s chief legal counsel, believes an impeachment case against Abalos will not prosper.
“Impeachment is quasi-judicial and quasi-political. It is a matter of numbers,” Apostol said.
“I think he would be able to evade this because they would have a hard time getting the numbers,” he added.
When the complaint reaches the Senate, it will need two-thirds vote to seal an impeachment.
As head of a constitutional body, the Comelec chairman may only be removed through impeachment.
Marcos loyalist lawyer Oliver Lozano filed the first impeachment complaint against Abalos but no endorser came forward.
Smear campaign
The embattled Comelec chairman blamed his troubles on a well-funded smear campaign even as he rejected calls for him to step down.
“There is a sustained and well-funded campaign to destroy me,” the 73-year-old poll official told reporters after justifying to lawmakers Comelec’s P8.6 billion budget for 2008, P2.1 billion of which is allocated for the Oct. 29 barangay and youth council elections.
Abalos said that while it was the “prerogative” of Suplico to seek his impeachment, he was saddened by the development because he thought the former congressman was a friend.
He said he is unfazed by the prospect of facing impeachment proceedings in the House, whose leader is the father of one of his Senate tormentors.
“I rely on the integrity and independence of each congressman. I know as a Speaker, he has many loyalists. I know ultimately congressmen have conscience, too,” he said. “I don’t believe that all of them can be dissuaded. I know that impeachment is a numbers game.”
Sorsogon Rep. Jose Solis, an arch critic of De Venecia, openly voiced at the House appropriations committee hearing his stand against the impeachment of Abalos.
“So you already have one vote less. I won’t vote for it. I don’t judge the merit of the case. It’s because most people want you out of office. You are retiring in February (2008), that’s why. Not only because you are my friend,” Solis said at the hearing.
“It’s very relieving to hear that. Now I can go home with comfort in my heart,” Abalos retorted.
On calls for his resignation, Abalos said: “Why should I? I think this is just a repeated call. I was expecting that.
“I leave it for the people to judge. When you know that your conscience is clean, you should not be bothered about it,” he said. He said he even slept soundly after his Senate appearance last Wednesday.
Abalos also revealed that his lawyers are preparing numerous counts of libel against Joey III, and that they are also planning to sue Neri for his damaging Senate testimony.
“I still don’t know, maybe around P10 or P20 million. There will be several counts of libel cases. The amount does not really matter, it is the damage to my family and honor,” Abalos said of the libel cases his lawyers were preparing against Joey.
“All of these are just part of his (Joey’s) hallucinations, probably because of taking drugs which he himself admitted,” Abalos said. “What reason would I have to approach him when there is already a designated supplier?”
He said he didn’t regret attending the Senate hearing where he was severely pilloried.
“I don’t have any regret. It was a lion’s den. Before I came in the fight was already over. They already have a prejudgment of me,” he said.
Committee chairman Edcel Lagman commented: “Unlike in the Senate, this is a more tempered forum. This is not only the bigger body, this is also the better body.”
“I have to face the Senate because I know I have not committed any crime. My wife has been very affected by this,” Abalos later told Congress reporters.
Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said the lawyers of Abalos are now studying which legal action to take against Neri.
Neri told senators on Wednesday that he presumed the “200” promised to him by Abalos was P200 million.
The alleged bribery took place during a golf game at the Wack Wack Golf and Country Club in
Jimenez said the controversy hardly affected Comelec officials and employees because they were “busy preparing” for the barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan elections scheduled on Oct. 29.
Comelec commissioner Rene Sarmiento said that “as a father of the institution (Comelec),” Abalos deserves his support in these “difficult times.”
“But I have to qualify that in the matter of truth, justice and principles, the welfare of the country is more paramount,” he told The STAR.
Sarmiento declined to say who between Abalos and Neri gave the more convincing testimony.
“The statement (Neri) made under oath is serious. But at the same time, Chairman Abalos denied his allegations also under oath. I just hope that the truth will finally come out,” he added.
He urged Comelec officials and personnel not to be distracted by the controversy and instead focus on the elections next month.
“We should continue with our work, to fulfill our mandate to ensure a peaceful and credible election. We should all keep doing our work,” Sarmiento said.
But for Nueva Ecija Rep. Eduardo “Edno” Joson, the only way for Abalos to clear his name is to leave the Comelec. “Resignation is the only graceful exit left for him,” he said.
Joson suggested that the embattled Comelec chief should avoid another Senate trial as this “would be disastrous” not only for the elections chief “but more so for President Arroyo.”
He said that if Suplico’s complaint reaches the Senate, opposition senators “would have a field day raking up all the muck Abalos has been involved in all his years as Comelec chairman.”
“The collateral damage to Mrs. Arroyo would be unavoidable,” he stressed.
‘Mistress’ disowns poll chief
Evelyn Silagon, the woman rumored to be Abalos’ mistress and by whom he reportedly has a lovechild, denied that she had ever been a lover of the poll chief.
On Wednesday, Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr. called Abalos’ attention to text messages of his alleged romantic involvement with Silagon with whom he reportedly sired a daughter who turns nine next month. Abalos has since denied the rumor.
“I come out only to protect the interest of my child who is turning nine years old on Oct. 4. It was too unkind to hear from an old Senator Aquilino Pimentel that he dragged my name during yesterday’s (Wednesday) Senate inquiry. Mr. Pimentel’s insinuation was wrong and malicious,” Silagon said at a press conference yesterday at a
“I am a private person. I am a single mother and raising my child alone. I don’t have any personal relation with chairman Benjamin Abalos,” she said.
She also dared Pimentel to check her daughter’s records with the National Statistics Office. She added she is open to Senate scrutiny of her assets. – With Delon Porcalla, Marvin Sy, Sheila Crisostomo, Jose Rodel Clapano, AP
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