PROSECUTION TEAM SEEN IN PALACE /
CONSPIRACY TO OUST CJ NOW OUT IN THE OPEN
MANILA,
MAY 18, 2012
(INQUIRER) By Cathy C. Yamsuan, Michael Lim
Ubac, Norman Bordadora - Five days before Chief Justice Renato Corona's
testimony at his trial in the Senate impeachment court, members of the House
prosecution panel were seen in Malacañang.
Caught on camera on Thursday by an Inquirer photographer were Quezon Rep.
Lorenzo Tañada, Mario Bautista and Cavite Rep. Joseph Emilio Abaya.
Secretary Edwin Lacierda, President Benigno Aquino III's spokesperson, said
the prosecutors had met with Executive Secretary Paquito Ochoa Jr.
Asked what the discussions were about, Lacierda said, "I don't know."
In a text message, Tañada said the meeting was over when he got to the
Palace.
He said Abaya told him that the group had asked Ochoa if there was a way to
verify certain information related to the trial.
"I was not in the meeting. By the time I got there, Jun Abaya was about to
leave. He briefed me that they met with ES Ochoa," said Tañada, one of the
spokespersons of the prosecution panel.
'See you next year'
Meanwhile, Corona, accompanied by his wife Cristina and three children,
attended Mass at the Supreme Court grounds Thursday, also his second anniversary
as Chief Justice. Asked by reporters what his message was to his critics, he
said, "See you next year."
Corona met with his lawyers Thursday afternoon to plot their strategy when he
faces the impeachment court on Tuesday.
Tranquil Salvador III, one of his counsels, said the group tackled the
allegation that Corona owns 82 dollar accounts and some $12 million in deposits.
He said Corona brushed off the accusation and vowed to present contrary evidence
at the witness stand.
"They'd be lucky if they could prove that he has at least four accounts,"
Salvador told the Inquirer after the meeting, referring to prosecutors, who are
banking on a computer-generated report submitted by the Anti-Money Laundering
Council (AMLC) to the Ombudsman.
A mad rush to select the most competent lawyer from the prosecution panel has
ensued following the defense's announcement on Wednesday that the Chief Justice
would be taking the stand next week.
The 11-member House prosecution panel is being assisted by 58 private
lawyers.
The lead prosecutor, Iloilo Rep. Niel Tupas Jr., said the choices were
limited to him and four others: Deputy lead prosecutor Rodolfo Fariñas and the
private lawyers assisting the House panel: Bautista, Arthur Lim and Jose
Justiniano.
Prosecutor Bautista
Bautista appears to have the upper hand over the other private lawyers
following his skillful cross-examination on Monday of Ombudsman Conchita Carpio
Morales, said sources close to the Inquirer. Bautista, the lead private
prosecutor, is the managing partner of the Poblador Bautista and Reyes law
office.
He first shot to national prominence when he, along with then Makati Rep.
Joker Arroyo, now a senator, presented banker Clarissa Ocampo as the star
witness in the aborted impeachment trial of then President Joseph Estrada.
Tupas, however, played coy about it, saying: "Any five of us can cross. We've
already prepared the cross on the Chief Justice even during the six-week Lenten
break. We thought that the Chief Justice is the defense's only witness, so all
five of us are prepared (to conduct the cross)."
The Iloilo lawmaker, however, broached the possibility that he and a private
lawyer would jointly conduct the cross-examination on Corona.
"We will decide by the weekend. We will assign by Monday," said Tupas.
Three main issues
The cross-examination by the prosecution will zero in on "three main issues,"
he said.
Tupas said Corona would be quizzed on his bank accounts, both peso and
dollar; real properties (undervaluation and non-declaration in some of the years
in the SALN); and his participation in the Basa-Guidote corporation's ownership
battle between his wife, Cristina, and the latter's cousins and aunts.
Tupas said the questions to be propounded by the prosecution would largely
depend on the answers of Corona during the direct examination by the defense,
which precedes the cross-examination.
Aurora Rep. Juan Edgardo Angara, a prosecution spokesperson, said the
prosecution hoped Corona would answer all questions posed to him and would not
invoke his right to self-incrimination.
He also said Corona's decision to testify was not borne out of confidence,
but of necessity. "They have no choice because there are sectors in the public
that already convicted him," he said.
He said the most dramatic thing Corona could do is to issue a waiver allowing
access to all his bank accounts. If he would do this, and it would be seen that
there are no secret accounts, then there is a chance the Chief Justice may be
acquitted outright.
Angara also said Corona could not issue a general denial because that would
be a weak defense. The chief magistrate would have to be more specific, he
added.
Denial weak defense
He said a general denial could not debunk the records of his bank
transactions from the AMLC that formed part of the Ombudsman's testimony.
"They can disprove that but it must be a more specific denial backed up with
documents," he said.
Tañada said the prosecution would not embarrass the chief magistrate.
"Of course, if he does not answer any questions, he will be put in an
embarrassing position and that is not anymore the fault of the prosecution," he
added.
He also said that while the prosecution was ready to cross-examine Corona,
its questions would be limited by what is presented in the direct examination.
Senator-judges, on the other hand, have no limitations on the kinds of
questions they could ask, he noted.
More than anything else, Corona must explain the $12 million in "fresh
deposits" that the AMLC allegedly found in 82 dollar accounts that belong to
him.
"The best way is to come clean and give senator-judges and the Filipino
people a clear explanation why these exist and why they were not included in his
statement of assets, liabilities and net worth (SALN)," said Sen. Gregorio
Honasan.
The Chief Justice is scheduled to testify at his own trial in the Senate
impeachment court on May 22.
Honasan said the presentation made by Morales using data provided by the AMLC
to prove Corona's purported dollar accounts "has the presumption of regularity"
due to a waiver that the Chief Justice had signed in his SALN.
The waiver authorizes the Ombudsman to determine from other government
agencies like the AMLC any assets, liabilities and business interests from the
time Corona joined the government up to the present.
The dollar deposits worth $12 million that allegedly belong to Corona are not
included in his SALN. Corona declared only P3.5 million in cash and investments
in his SALN for 2010.
"The Chief Justice must be able to reconcile any misdeclaration,
nondeclaration or exclusion of these dollar accounts with the data that the
Ombudsman got from the AMLC," Honasan told the Inquirer.
Honasan said the suggestion did not mean he was "superseding my judgment over
the legal strategy of the defense."
In her testimony before the impeachment court on Monday, Morales said she had
asked certified public accountant-lawyers to "analyze" the data given to her
office by the AMLC.
She said an examination showed that Corona kept 82 dollar accounts in various
branches of five banks in Metro Manila. The AMLC also recorded a total of 705
transactions from April 2003 up to early this year.
Morales said those who analyzed also noticed increased activity in the dollar
accounts during the 2004 and 2007 elections and in the week that Corona was
impeached by the House of Representatives in December.
Honasan and Sen. Vicente Sotto III said in separate interviews that it was
likely that questions to be fielded to Corona would focus on item two of the
articles of impeachment that accuses the Chief Justice of failure to disclose
certain assets in his SALN.
Mike Arroyo defense
A more skeptical Sen. Sergio Osmeña, however, said that Corona might resort
to the "Mike Arroyo defense" in explaining the existence of assets traced to him
by House prosecutors.
Asked whether Corona would identify someone as the real owner of his alleged
properties like Arroyo who claimed that the Jose Pidal account was owned by his
brother Iggy, Osmeña replied through text: "I couldn't think of any other reason
he could use."
Sotto said Corona's lawyers have "more or less" justified the existence of
Corona's high-end properties with the presentation of witnesses from condominium
developers who explained the delays in the turnover of these units to Corona and
his wife.
"And even the properties being traced to them that are not really theirs have
already been explained. And it is obvious that the properties belong to other
people already," Sotto noted.
The senator was apparently referring to the Corona property in Marikina sold
to Demetrio Vicente, a bonsai artist.
Sotto said no senator-judge had indicated an intention to question Corona.
"They want to hear first what he has to say," he said.
Honasan warned that Corona must brace himself for hours of questioning from
prosecutors, senator-judges and his own defense panel. With
a report from Christian V. Esguerra and Leila B. Salaverria
FROM MANILA STANDARD
SENATORS: AQUINO MAY DO A CORONA TO US
Posted May 18th, 2012 by Christine F. Herrera & filed under
Feature.
• 'What govt is doing is alarming and worrisome'
• Conspiracy is being done openly as public policy
[PHOTO - It's not the time: President Aquino covers what appears like a
half-smile during a program marking the 18th anniversary of the Commission on
Higher Education in Diliman, Quezon City. A smiling Senator Edgardo Angara
beside him is not interested in looking at his watch and getting the
time.]
THE senator-judges in the impeachment trial of Chief Justice Renato Corona on
Thursday declared there was no longer any mystery to the "grand conspiracy" to
oust the top magistrate because it had become a public, state-sanctioned policy
to persecute the administration's perceived enemies.
They warned the government that its "overzealousness" had cast doubt on the
admissibility of the evidence that had been presented so far, particularly on
the chief justice's bank accounts.
"What grand conspiracy? There is no mystery there," Senator Ferdinand Marcos
Jr. told the Manila Standard.
"There were not even false pretenses. The grand conspiracy has become public
policy. The entire administration is not bothering to hide it anymore that
nothing is more important to them than the impeachment trial and the conviction
of Chief Justice Corona. Everything takes a backseat."
Senate President Pro Tempore Jinggoy Estrada said the administration had only
proved that the vice president, the senators and all politicians down to the
lowly government employee could be vulnerable to attack once they offended
President Benigno Aquino III.
"What this government is doing is alarming and worrisome," Estrada said.
"The scheme that the entire government machinery can be used against just
about anyone without regard for the law makes the perceived enemies vulnerable
to attacks.
"Imagine: the Ombudsman can just ask, without a court order, the Anti-Money
Laundering Council to obtain the chief justice's accounts? And who else prepared
those PowerPoint presentations? The Ombudsman and the Commission on Audit? The
documents came from AMLC. Everybody is into it.
"If they can do that to the chief justice, then all of us have a reason to
worry. Even if you have nothing to hide, they will throw everything at you."
Marcos said the government had not done anything about the more compelling
problems such as the electricity shortage in Mindanao, job generation, and the
peace-and-order situation because even the Senate had been caught up in the
full-blown impeachment trial.
Even Presiding Judge and Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile felt offended and
insulted at the rate "spurious documents" were being thrown at the impeachment
court.
Marcos said it started with the prosecution's "little lady" who allegedly
gave the bank documents to prosecutor and Oriental Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo Umali.
Another anonymous source left the same documents at the gate of prosecution
finance officer and Quezon City Rep. Jorge Banal, prompting him to ask the bank
manager to confirm if, indeed, it was authentic.
The bank documents purportedly contained $700,000 in Corona's name.
On Wednesday, Enrile, Marcos, Estrada and Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago
castigated Kaya Natin lead convenor Harvey Keh, a hostile witness summoned by
the defense, for "trying to influence the impeachment court" with
unauthenticated documents he had downloaded from the Internet.
Marcos said that, by cutting corners, the prosecution had cast doubt on the
evidence they had presented.
"The senators are expected to sort through the evidence. But everything that
was presented became highly questionable because the method by which they
acquired the evidence left doubts," Marcos said.
He said nothing good could come from what the administration was doing.
"Granting the prosecution could pull this off, What happens after? The
institutions have been destroyed," Marcos said.
(Published in the Manila Standard Today newspaper on /2012/May/18)
Chief News Editor: Sol
Jose Vanzi
© Copyright, 2012 by PHILIPPINE HEADLINE
NEWS ONLINE
All rights reserved
PHILIPPINE HEADLINE NEWS
ONLINE [PHNO] WEBSITE
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