Botched hatchet job (Senate; Lacson)

E·N·Q·U·I·R·Y
DEMAREE J.B. RAVAL

Botched hatchet job
Sunday, 06 08, 2003

Taking advantage of the absence of many senators in the minority, the majority in the Senate tried a fast break on the eve of the sine die adjournment, to take up Committee Report No. 66 on the alleged criminal activities of Sen. Ping Lacson. A sponsorship of the report, without a closure, would have given enough fodder for public speculations during the entire break of the Senate on the fate of a senator of the Republic. But it was not to be. Thanks to the efforts of senators Nene Pimentel and Sonny Osmeña, the fast break was stopped in its tracks and the majority came out pitifully embarrassed.

The Senate rules do not allow a matter to be taken up unless it is in the calendar for ordinary business and transferred to the calendar for special orders. At the time the majority tried to sneak in the report for floor deliberations, it was still doing the rounds of the senators for their signature, having been recommitted to the committees in July last year when the new democratic majority took over the chairmanships of the committees. The majority violated all rules and precedents by plucking out the report from the committees straight to plenary debates. By sheer force of numbers, they could have approved the report. But the members of the minority had the rules on their side and the acting majority leader at that time was only exposed for his ineptitude. The minority invoked the quorum call as their tool to thwart any further debates and cited also the Sotto Doctrine that call for the shelving of any matter that affects any senator who is not in the session hall to defend himself. The majority will have to wait until July 28, when the Senate resumes its sessions, to take up the report.

Going now to the report. The dissent of Senator Ed Angara sums it all up: “P.S. Resolution 49 which initiated the investigation calls for an inquiry into the claims and statements of principal witness Ador Mawanay linking high ranking officials of the defunct PAOCTF, to organized criminal activities. It should be noted that the committees themselves have found Ador Mawanay unreliable; but, strangely, the corroborating testimony of Mary Ong was given credence in the report. If the testimony of the principal witness was found to be wanting in truth, then it is difficult to believe that a case will be established by a mere corroborating witness.”

The committees relied heavily on the testimony of Ong, who failed a simple debriefing procedure conducted by US authorities to determine her credibility as a witness. In that debriefing, US Customs officials branded Ong’s statements as “full of inconsistencies, half-truths and half-lies.” Ong was called upon to corroborate the testimony of Mawanay, whom the committees found “unreliable and without credence,” that resulted in his testimony being expunged from the record. Considering that none of the statements made by the main witness was ever considered by the committees, one wonders why, indeed, as Angara points out, a corroborating witness whose function was merely to substantiate what the main witness was testifying to was relied upon the committees in making their unfounded conclusion.

In the course of the hearings, witnesses tried their very best to implicate Lacson. They showed their utter disregard for the solemnity of their oath or affirmation. The recantation of Mawanay is proof that the witnesses presented were rehearsed, coached or eve bribed to ensure their appearance before the committees.

The agenda against Ping, involving for one the sneaking in of the report while he is not around to defend himself, is very obvious: bury him under a barrage of unsubstantiated charges to the point where he will be totally preoccupied defending himself. The unfounded and baseless accusations against Lacson are, to many observers, more political than anything else. By the way Lacson is being handled, mishandled and manhandled, he can only grow in stature. It would be well for the attack dogs against Lacson to remember that one of a martyr’s scourges is to end up being canonized by the very persons who burned him. Lacson will just have to bear it, but still fight on to vindicate himself.

It is regrettable that the Senate committees were used to ventilate fabricated charges against Lacson and tasked to submit a report that was totally unnecessary after the committees found the main witness “unreliable and without credence.” The fact that the charges were already the subject of separate proceedings before the Ombudsman, Department of Justice and the courts, with not one of these forums indicting Lacson, would have been reason enough for the committees to recuse themselves from investigating.

By all means, when the Senate resumes its sessions in July it can take up the report. But already given the clearly unreliable witnesses and the political motivation for the filing of the charges, there is no way for the report to be approved. And, most probably, the Senate will go beyond the admonition and strong reprimand they heaped on Col. Victor Corpus of the Isafp for presenting Mawanay, by recommending the filing against him of administrative charges for conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman before the Judge Advocate General’s Office, and that appropriate charges be filed against Mawanay and Ong for lying under oath.

000---000

Somebody told us this actually happened during the recent deliberations on the “Anti-Trafficking of Persons Act of 2003.” A neophyte senator reportedly stood up to ask this question of Sen. Loi Estrada, the sponsor: “Your Honor, hindi po ba magbibigay ang batas na ito ng karagdagang trabaho sa MMDA?” Either that senator was joking or is a descendant of the senator who, in the late 1980s, when interpellating on the bill regarding mail-order brides, asked if the law will not clog our postal system.



For comments about this website:Webmaster@tribune.net.ph

The Daily Tribune © 2003