EDITORIAL - Preventing more scams

Jocelyn “Jocjoc” Bolante is expected to return to Manila next week. There is no certainty that his return will bring the country closer to the truth about the fertilizer subsidy amounting to P729 million that critics say was used by the Department of Agriculture for the administration’s campaign in the 2004 presidential race.

Bolante, an undersecretary of agriculture when the funds were disbursed, left the country after the Senate ordered his arrest to compel him to testify about the fertilizer scam. With his deportation from the United States now looming, Bolante has asked the Supreme Court through his lawyer to stop the Senate from enforcing the arrest order. His evasive acts do not bode well for efforts to ferret out the truth about the fertilizer funds, some of which were believed to have been given to politicians with no farming constituencies.

Senate President Manuel Villar is still studying whether an arrest warrant issued by the 13th Congress remains valid in the 14th. The Senate can summon Bolante anew upon his return and issue a fresh arrest warrant if he snubs the hearing. But with a Senate witness as uncooperative as Bolante, this case looks headed for the courts.

If the Senate fails to wring any information from Bolante, it can focus on something else: passing laws that will discourage the diversion of public funds especially for partisan political purposes. The Senate should pay particular attention to disbursement and procurement laws and regulations involving agricultural funds. Apart from the fertilizer scam, the Department of Agriculture has yet to explain what happened to the swine-breeding program of the Quedan Rural Credit and Guarantee Corp.

Bolante may have a change of heart — and a burst of courage — and decide to come clean on the fertilizer scam. He may yet disclose who ordered anomalous fund disbursements, and why. He may explain why his former boss, Luis Lorenzo, also left the country after the fertilizer fund scandal blew up. But if the Senate fails to extract anything from Bolante, the chamber can still pass laws that will prevent the misuse of public funds.