Senate Blue Ribbon orders arrest of Binay son, 5 others

MANILA, Philippines - The Senate Blue Ribbon committee has ordered the arrest of Makati City Mayor Jejomar Erwin Binay Jr. and five other individuals for failing to attend the hearings being conducted by its subcommittee on the alleged irregularities involving Vice President Jejomar Binay.

However, its implementation is on hold as Senate President Franklin Drilon said he has not yet received a copy of the order, which should be signed by him as provided by the rules of the Senate.

Sen. Teofisto Guingona III, chairman of the Blue Ribbon committee, announced the decision to cite in contempt Mayor Binay, Makati City administrator Eleno Mendoza, former city administrator Marjorie de Veyra, city assistant engineer Line dela Peña, Bernadette Portallano of Omni Security and Eduviges Baloloy, the alleged bagwoman of the Vice President when he was still mayor of Makati.

Guingona, citing committee rules, pointed out that with the concurrence of at least one member, the chairman can cite in contempt any witness who refuses to appear before its hearings.

According to Section 18 of the rules of the committee, “A contempt of the committee shall be deemed a contempt of the Senate. Such witness may be ordered by the committee to be detained in such place as it may designate under the custody of the sergeant-at-arms until he or she agrees to produce the required documents or to be sworn or to testify or otherwise purge himself or herself of that contempt.”

Present at the meeting yesterday were Guingona, Senators Antonio Trillanes IV and Aquilino Pimentel III.

The Blue Ribbon committee came out with its decision in response to the recommendation made by Pimentel, who chairs its subcommittee, to cite in contempt Binay and six other individuals.

University of Makati president Tomas Lopez was supposedly included in the list prepared by Pimentel.

However, in a letter to the committee yesterday, Lopez, who also sits as a director in the Home Development Mutual Fund (HDMF) or Pag-IBIG Fund, expressed his willingness to attend the next hearing of the subcommittee.

In his letter, Lopez said he did not ignore the invitations and subpoena to attend the hearings conducted by the Blue Ribbon subcommittee.

“Upon the advice of my lawyers, I have merely requested that I be furnished the questions that the panel would like to ask so I could prepare beforehand,” he added.

“In view of the fact that these requests have been rejected by the subcommittee and against the advice of my lawyers, I would like now to manifest my intention to appear in the next hearing of the Blue Ribbon subcommittee,” he added.

Upon learning of the letter of Lopez, Pimentel said that he would no longer include him among the persons to be cited in contempt.

With no objections raised to the recommendations of Pimentel, Guingona agreed to cite Mayor Binay and the other five officials in contempt and ordered the Senate sergeant-at-arms to carry out their detention.

“The sergeant-at-arms is directed to serve the detention order and to coordinate if need be with the Philippine National Police (PNP),” he said.

Guingona noted that the rules provide that the sergeant-at-arms should implement the order within 24 hours of its issuance.

However, during yesterday’s plenary session, Minority Leader Vicente Sotto III questioned the procedure taken by the Blue Ribbon committee.

Sotto argued that the matter discussed, being “very controversial,” should have been taken up by at least nine members or half of the total membership of the committee.

Even Drilon admitted that he was not aware of what took place during that meeting and that from what he knows, he should sign the order to carry out the detention of the six individuals.

As such, the Senate President has ordered Senate sergeant-at-arms Jose Balajadia to “hold implementation” of the order.

He explained that the implementation of orders, such as that issued by the Blue Ribbon committee, have to go through the Senate President.

Drilon clarified that this is different from the decision to come out with the order itself, which resides with the committee.

Sotto and Sen. Francis Escudero as well cited a provision of Section 18 of the same rules, stating that “a majority of all the members of the committee may, however, reverse or modify the aforesaid order of the contempt within seven days.”

Escudero raised the matter in plenary, asking if there is a need to wait for seven days before the order to detain Mayor Binay and the others is implemented.

Drilon referred the matter to the Committee on Rules, headed by Senate Majority Leader Alan Peter Cayetano, for its resolution.

Cayetano, for his part, said that he will call a meeting of the committee today to tackle the issues raised.

He said that although he believes the Blue Ribbon committee did not err in coming out with the order, it would not hurt to be prudent on this particular issue.

Cayetano said that the Senate sergeant-at-arms has also been directed to monitor the movements of the persons covered by the order to ensure that they would be around if and when a decision to implement it is made.