Manila Archbishop Gaudencio Cardinal Rosales yesterday said that all parties should have been considered in the decision to pardon former President Joseph Estrada and the forfeiture order on his property.
In a brief interview over the Catholic Church-owned Radio Veritas 846, Rosales said, “When you administer justice, you just don’t take one isolated case. You have to look at all the injustices being done.”
Apart from President Arroyo, the camp of former President Estrada and the Sandiganbayan, another party that has direct interest in the case would have been the prosecutors led by Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio.
The Cardinal said the case of the digraced president could have taught Filipinos a lesson.
“There were lessons to be learned from this, although it did not happen because they were so much in a hurry. Now there are those who are asking about the kind of justice we have,” the Cardinal said in Filipino.
When President Arroyo extended executive clemency to Estrada, he no longer had to serve the prison sentence imposed by the Sandiganbayan. The only form of punishment he had, apart from the six years he spent in detention in his Tanay resthouse, was to forfeit his ill-gotten wealth.
So far, the government has already recovered P215.8 million from the Erap Muslim Youth Foundation and this has already been transferred to the anti-graft court.
Sheriff Edgardo Urieta earlier sent a notice advising lawyer Gerardo Banzon, head of the Legal Advisory and Research Department at Banco de Oro, to issue two checks with a total amount of P215.8 million.
Last Friday, Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal urged the disgraced president in a meeting to abide by the conditions of the pardon granted to him by Mrs. Arroyo.
A close friend of Estrada, Vidal also advised the pardoned plunderer to keep away from politics and instead focus on doing charity work.
Estrada promised the cardinal that he would no longer seek any elective position in 2010, an issue emphasized in the pardon letter issued by Malacañang.