EDITORIAL - It’s time to stop the NBI probe

Before his impeachment, President Estrada had ordered an investigation of reports that he was maintaining mansions for his mistresses. Tasked to investigate the ownership of at least five properties was Interior and Local Government Secretary Alfredo Lim.

As soon as Mr. Estrada issued the order, doubts were raised about the impartiality of any probe that would be carried out by a member of his official family, who serves as an alter ego of the President. Lim later tossed the probe to the National Bureau of Investigation which he used to head.

The NBI has announced that it has finished its probe and submitted its findings to Justice Secretary Artemio Tuquero. Lim, however, said recently that the probe would be expanded.

There have been complaints from certain quarters that NBI investigators were scaring away potential witnesses. The properties and upkeep of the President’s women are among the issues that are being tackled in his impeachment trial, and those witnesses could give the nation glimpses of the truth. They must be protected from any form of pressure or intimidation by government agents. With the impeachment trial soon to enter its third day, it’s time for this administration probe to stop.

Lim, however, said the other day that the investigation would continue unless the President or the Senate would issue an order stopping the probe. This order must be issued immediately. With investigators announcing no results after several weeks, there are speculations that the principal aim of the government probe, as critics had feared, was to whitewash the case.

Apart from ordering the NBI to stop its probe, the bureau must inform the public of its findings. The NBI investigation was conducted at taxpayers’ expense and was supposed to prove the President’s critics wrong. Properties acquired illegally were supposed to be forfeited in favor of the government. The public deserves to know whether the state will get custody of any such pieces of real estate.

Since the jueteng scandal erupted, President Estrada has maintained his innocence and has vowed that an investigation would vindicate him. Is the NBI ready to give the President this vindication in the case of the mansions? The NBI must stop its probe now, and it must inform the nation of its findings.