MANILA, Philippines - Senate President Franklin Drilon offered to broker a truce yesterday between Minority Leader Juan Ponce Enrile and Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago following their bitter exchange of accusations.
Drilon said that with Santiago and Enrile having vented their disdain for each other in privilege speeches, it was time for the two senior senators to bury the hatchet and end hostilities as Christmas approaches.
“Senator Johnny and Senator Miriam have already aired their grievances. Christmas is coming and there is a cooling period,†Drilon said in an interview over dzRH.
“Maybe when we return after New Year’s Day, heads will be cooler and we will try to get our two colleagues to reconcile,†he added.
Sen. Jinggoy Estrada earlier offered to reconcile the two fighting senators in a bid to save the Senate’s reputation from further damage.
Estrada said that he and his father, former President and now Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada would work together to bring their two friends and allies to the same side again.
But despite Drilon’s and Estrada’s peace initiatives, Santiago proceeded to ask the Department of Justice (DOJ) to conduct an investigation into the alleged “crimes†of Enrile in the past.
In a letter, Santiago asked Justice Secretary Leila de Lima yesterday to direct the National Bureau of Investigation to look into Enrile’s activities that may be considered criminal under the Revised Penal Code.
“This is to respectfully appeal for you to order the NBI to investigate Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile for crimes under the Penal Code,†Santiago said in her letter to De Lima.
“In due course, the NBI report could indicate if further action should be taken against Enrile by other concerned agencies, such as the Commission on Human Rights, Ombudsman, Pagcor, BIR, etc,†she added.
In her privilege speech last Wednesday, Santiago called for criminal prosecution of Enrile for what she called his crimes under the Penal Code including command responsibility for the deaths and disappearance during martial law of some 4,000 activists as well masterminding the biggest plunder case so far in Philippine history. She was referring to Enrile’s allegedly having pocketed P1.189 billion pork barrel funds from 2005 to 2013 in connivance with businesswoman Janet Lim-Napoles whose dummy corporations cornered P641.65 million.
Santiago also alleged in her speech that Enrile was running a smuggling and gambling empire in the Cagayan Economic Zone Authority, whose creation he had spearheaded in 1995 as a congressman of the province.
She said even the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. has no jurisdiction over “interactive gaming†activities in Cagayan’s Port Irene.
She also accused the Senate minority leader of running an illegal logging empire established during martial law when then President Ferdinand Marcos granted him the largest logging concession covering 95,770 hectares secured by the so-called “Lost Command†allegedly responsible for the massacre of 45 people.
In her speech last Wednesday, Santiago also called Enrile a “sex addict†notorious for taking liberties with women including his househelps. She said Enrile should be held liable for adultery and concubinage as well as tax evasion.
‘Unparliamentary’
While Santiago’s spiels against Enrile may have provided good sound bites to the media, they were “unparliamentary†and should be stricken off the records of the Senate, according to some of her colleagues.
“Almost all of her speeches are offensive because she tends to make things personal and you’re not supposed to attack anyone personally. If you want, do it outside the Senate,†Sen. Sergio Osmeña III told reporters yesterday.
“I wouldn’t want anybody to read that. I wouldn’t want anybody in America or Europe to read those type of things,†he added when asked why he wanted parts of Santiago’s speech deleted from Senate records.
Osmeña said he also found Santiago’s gestures while delivering her speech very offensive, especially when she pointed a finger at Enrile to stress a point.
“She went to personality, she called him a serial this, a serial that, it had nothing to do with legislation. Number two – there was no proof,†he said. “She did not present any proof, she made it seem that we have to accept what she said with or without proof and that’s just not right,†Osmeña said.
“She likes to boast that she was a judge and I don’t think a judge is supposed to accept as truth allegations that are not substantiated, not supported by evidence, whether factual evidence or witnesses with personal knowledge. So that’s another issue that we have against the speech itself,†he added.
He said that Senate President Drilon should have intervened and declared her out of order. Osmeña said that while he understood Drilon’s situation, the Senate president should have made it clear at least that such behavior would not be tolerated in the chamber.
“You have to do that so that the next one who will attempt to do that will be very careful,†Osmeña said.
Osmeña said that he would personally move to strike off the offensive portions of the speeches of Santiago and even that of Enrile delivered a week before.
Enrile said his privilege speech last week was in response to Santiago’s attacks launched in various occasions within and outside the Senate.
In his privilege speech, Enrile – without mentioning Santiago’s name – claimed she almost flunked the Bar exams. He also accused her of using a sports car seized by the Bureau of Customs. The Senate minority leader also derided her mental state and mockingly asked her to seek help from psychologists.
Santiago struck back last Wednesday, calling Enrile many names including “the very heart of darkness.â€
Reviewing JPE’s speech
Osmeña said he would review the speech of Enrile to see if there are portions that need to be removed.
“Maybe we’ll just simplify it and move to delete both from the records of the Senate,†he said.
“We don’t tolerate unparliamentary language. You want to stick to the facts and you want to keep a dignified Senate,†he added.
Sen. Francis Escudero, for his part, said that some of the words used by Santiago in her speech cannot be tolerated in any parliament in the world.
“I think the record should be reviewed to find out what words are unparliamentary and should be stricken off the records. It would not look good if 10 years, 20 years down the road people would go back to the records of the Senate and would find words like ‘G-A-G-O’ and other similar words there,†Escudero said.
Both Escudero and Osmeña said that any member of the Senate may file a complaint against Santiago for unparliamentary behavior before the ethics committee.
Escudero said that the penalties could range from a mere reprimand to suspension or even expulsion, in which case a vote of two-thirds of the members of the Senate is needed.
However, Osmeña noted that an ethics committee has not yet been organized because no senator wants to head such body.
“If you want to go that far you may refer it to the ethics committee, if you want to file charges for unparliamentary behavior. The committee may suspend or expel a member by a two-thirds vote,†Osmeña said.
Meanwhile, retired Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz said the verbal tirade between Santiago and Enrile may have tarnished the prestige of the Senate.
“Enough is enough. The two senators have spoken out their mind and they are both governed by a privilege of speech and therefore they have already said enough,†he said.
“Please remember that the senators are called ‘honorable and honorable’ – they should be honorable, they should talk honorably, they should speak honorably,†Cruz said.
“The Senate is definitely losing a lot of prestige and honor which it should have being one of the main branches of government,†he said.
He advised the two senators to focus on their legislative work for the welfare of the Filipino people.
“It is a norm of reason that when two people are working in the same department with the same purpose, they should be collaborating for the same intention and not fighting one another,†he said. with Evelyn Macairan