MINORITY PRESENTS MEMO ON ETHICS PANEL’S HANDLING OF VILLAR CASE
Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. (PDP-Laban) today cautioned the
majority in the Senate against preempting the proposals of the minority bloc
to resolve the flaws in the ethics committee probe of the complaint against
Sen. Manuel Villar.
Pimentel criticized Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile for his public
statement that he will not allow the majority to be dictated upon by the
minority with regard to its demand for a revamp of the composition of the
ethics committee. He said this in effect implies outright rejection of the
minority’s suggestions even before it could submit its memorandum or
position paper to the Senate president today as had been agreed upon during
the caucus last Tuesday.
“We have not yet submitted our memo, and yet it appears that Manong Johnny
has already made his decision,” he said in his radio program “Pimentel
Reports” over RMN-DZXL.
“It’s like what happened at the ethics committee. Even before the committee
had met, there was already an order signed by some of its members.”
He was referring to the order signed by Sen. Panfilo Lacson, committee
chairman, and three members – Richard Gordon (vice chairman) Majority Leader
Juan Miguel Zubiri and Gregorio Honasan a day before the committee actually
met April l5.
Villar was directed by the committee to answer the charges against him
within five days upon receiving the order. The committee supposedly
concluded that the complaint against the former Senate president in
connection with the controversial C-5 road project was “sufficient in form
and substance.”
Pimentel said the Senate leadership should not show an adverse attitude
toward the position of the minority on the issue because both sides should
find a way to sort out the problem by seeing to it that the rules and
procedures of the committee in conducting investigation are faithfully
complied with.
At this stage, he said the matter of the guilt or innocence of Mr. Villar is
not at issue. He said what the minority is questioning now is the procedural
process because “due process has been interpreted by our courts as not only
substantive due process but also procedural due process.”
“In other words, even as we are in the minority, we do not think that the
issue of changing the chairmanship and membership of the ethics committee
should be decided by the sheer number of the majority overwhelming us. We
are appealing to their sense of delicadeza and fairness. That is why we are
bringing it for the decision of the Senate as a whole,” the minority leader
said.
“We believe that the ethics committee should be ethical above all in its
procedures. In our memorandum I emphasized that ethical considerations are
never arbitrated by numbers.”
Commenting of Villar’s refusal to submit himself to the jurisdiction of the
ethics committee, Pimentel said that is his right if he believes that most
of its members, who are his rivals in the presidential race, are biased
against him and disposed to nail him down.
Cognizant of Villar’s objection, Pimentel said the minority bloc is
requesting for the removal of Lacson as chairman and his fellow
presidentiables as members of the committee.
He said the issue could not be settled by the majority asserting its
numerical superiority because it transcends partisanship.
Date: April 26, 2009
Ref: Omeng Maglangit / (02) 5526733 |
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