Disband Ombudsman ZTE panel

MANILA, Philippines – A lawyer asked the Office of the Ombudsman yesterday to replace a panel tasked to investigate allegations that First Gentleman Jose Miguel Arroyo is involved in anomalies surrounding the national broadband contract with Chinese firm ZTE Corp.

In an urgent omnibus motion, lawyer Ernesto Francisco Jr. said the preliminary investigation on the case of Arroyo and former elections chairman Benjamin Abalos and several others is being carried out in violation of the Office of the Ombudsman’s own rules of procedure.

“It has all the makings of a moro-moro, so to speak,” he said.

“Unless rectified this early, this proceeding may only lead to the respondents being absolved of complicity in the ZTE-NBN scam by the simple expedience of excluding the testimonies given before the Senate by witnesses like respondent Jose de Venecia III,

respondent Commission on Higher Education Chairman Romulo Neri, columnist Jarius Bondoc, engineer Rodolfo Lozada Jr., and many more,” he said.

Francisco said the present investigating panel was created without calling for a fact-finding investigation of the seven consolidated

cases filed by various complainants against the same respondents.

The body did not even try to secure records of the Senate investigation on ZTE-NBN controversy between September 2007 and Jan. 30, 2008, he added.

Francisco questioned Ombudsman Gutierrez’s act of asking for Senate records, specifically pertaining to Lozada’s testimony allegedly for herself.

“Such actions point to the idea that the Office of the Ombudsman is going to investigate Lozada instead of the ZTE-NBN deal,” he said.

Francisco accused Gutierrez of not turning over the Senate records to the investigating panel whose members maintain that they do not have the documents yet.

“Ombudsman Gutierrez should be asked, why did she request for the records pertaining to engineer Lozada alone?” he asked.

“Why is it that she herself was the one who requested for the records pertaining to engineer Lozada, just a few days after the latter first testified on Feb. 8, 2008?

“If the Ombudsman was already investigating the ZTE-NBN scam on Feb. 11, 2008 and even earlier, why is it that it was she and not the head of the panel supposedly investigating the same who requested for the said records?”

Quoting Senate records, Francisco said the investigating panel, while repeatedly declaring to the nation that the Ombudsman has requested for the Senate records, the agency had actually no intention of securing the complete records.

“The lies and misrepresentations started with Ombudsman Merceditas N. Gutierrez, claiming in her opening statement during the Feb. 18, 2008 hearing wherein she announced her supposed inhibition,” he said.

“The former chairman of the investigating panel, Overall Deputy Ombudsman Orlando C. Casimiro, after consulting with other members of the investigating panel, continued with the lies and misrepresentations during the Feb. 18, 2008 hearing when he

categorically and repeatedly claimed that ‘this Office has been asking for transcript of records of any proceedings in the Senate in connection with these cases;

“that we have a request for the proceeding but same has not yet been furnished this Office; that we are likewise coordinating with the Senate insofar as the transcript of stenographic notes is concerned;’ and so on and so forth.

“The current Chairman of the Investigating Panel, Deputy Ombudsman Emilio A. Gonzales III, also lied and misrepresented during the hearing on March 4, 2008 that the Ombudsman already sent a request to the Senate for the complete records of the Senate investigation.”

A new investigating panel must issue subpoenas against De Venecia III, Neri, Bondoc and Lozada, for them to appear before the panel and affirm under oath their testimonies given before or affidavits submitted to the Senate, Francisco said.