By BOOMA CRUZ
EXPERTS predict a whitewash or coverup in the investigation on former agriculture undersecretary Jocelyn “Joc Joc” Bolante, with the Arroyo administration apparently shielding him from media scrutiny and the Ombudsman sitting on recommendations that he be charged in court.
Lawyer Raul Pangalangan, former dean of the University of the Philippines College of Law, said he believes the Office of the Ombudsman will “water down” the case and simply charge Bolante, alleged architect of the P728 million fertilizer fund scam, with a “minor” offense, “the way it was done with previous corruption scandals.”
“In other words, enough to satisfy the public hunger for an indictment but not quite really to mention the real crime which had been committed,” said Pangalangan.
In what appears to lend credence to Pangalangan’s analysis, the Office of the Ombudsman junked Friday graft charges filed by slain journalist Marlene Esperat against Bolante, former Agriculture Secretary Luis Lorenzo Jr., former National Food Authority chief and now Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap and 10 other agriculture officials for allegedly buying from the Philippine Phosphate Fertilizer Corp. (Philphos) in 2003 P232 million worth of fertilizer at an overprice.
Esperat, who was also agriculture action officer of the resident Ombudsman, failed to prove charges of overpricing, according to the Ombudsman. The case Esperat filed is separate from the P728 million fertilizer fund scam Bolante is still being investigated on.
Lawyer Harry Roque, who has made it a personal crusade to find truth and justice in the fertilizer fund scam, said, “I hope that (Ombudsman) Merceditas Gutierrez can explain that to the children of Marlene Esperat who all witnessed her gruesome murder. Merceditas Gutierrez is a disgrace to her office and to this country.”
He warned that the dismissal of the Esperat case against Bolante, Yap and other officials “is a precursor of what will happen to the rest of the complaint.”
The P728 million fund, distributed to local government officials as project proponents two weeks before the 2004 elections, was believed to have been diverted to the campaign kitty of President Gloria Arroyo.
Bolante, a close associate of First Gentleman Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo, fled to the U.S. at the height of the Senate hearings on the fund in 2005 and has not been charged in court despite criminal complaints filed against him before the Office of the Ombudsman. He arrived in Manila on Oct. 28 after U.S. authorities refused his petition for asylum and deported him.
An international law expert, Pangalangan said the Ombudsman’s inaction is consistent with its poor record of going after the so-called big fish. Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez, a classmate of Mr. Arroyo, is perceived to be soft on known allies of President Arroyo accused of graft.
“The past two years have shown that unless really pressured, it took them a long time to file a case against (former justice secretary Hernando) Nani Perez,” Pangalangan said. “The other one was (retired Maj. Gen. Carlos) Garcia, the AFP controller who eventually…was charged (with a minor offense).”
So far, the biggest crook caught and successfully prosecuted by the Office of the Ombudsman is ousted president Joseph Estrada who was convicted of plunder. President Arroyo, however, granted Estrada pardon even before he could serve his prison term.
Citing Bolante’s “prolonged” stay at the St. Luke’s Medical Center, Pangalangan said “the attempt to avoid telling the truth” by the former agriculture undersecretary is too obvious to miss.
Bolante has been confined at the hospital since arriving from the U.S.
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For his part, political scientist Felipe Miranda, head of the respected survey group Pulse Asia, smells an elaborate coverup. “It is being done right now. Ang coverup started not at the time na dumating dito si Bolante. Noon pa (The coverup started even before Bolante returned to Manila),” he said.
Records tend to support Miranda’s observations.
A recording of the oral argument during the review of the decision to deny Bolante’s asylum petition indicated apparent collusion.
Urging the panel that was hearing the case not to give weight to the arrest warrant issued by the Senate against her client, Bolante’s American lawyer stressed that it was the Office of the Ombudsman that had the absolute authority to prosecute the case.
“It would be up to the Ombudsman, and the Ombudsman, which is clear here, has not undertaken and will not undertake any charges,” the lawyer said. How she knew of the Ombudsman’s future plan “not undertake any charges” was not explained.
Bolante’s lawyer also described the arrest warrant of the Senate as illegal because, she said, an executive order issued by President Arroyo had already declared the investigation proceedings illegal.
She said Bolante was not evading prosecution but persecution because the “corrupt opposition” wanted him to help overthrow the Arroyo government. And because of his alleged refusal to work with the opposition, Bolante’s life was allegedly in danger.
Ombudsman’s inaction
Well-placed sources at the Office of the Ombudsman claim that as early as July 2006 the field investigation unit of the anti-graft body had already finished no less than 20 fact-finding reports that recommended the filing of charges against Bolante, among other allegedly erring officials.
The report, prepared by Task Force Abono, was forwarded to Ombudsman Gutierrez who sat on the recommendations, neither approving nor disapproving them.
The sources said the preliminary investigation, which would give the accused the chance to answer the charges, should have been conducted after the fact-finding report. They said the delay in the process must have been deliberate to help Bolante’s petition for an asylum which was then under way.
One of the first directives of Gutierrez upon assuming office was to centralize operations at the Ombudsman. According to a January 2006 memorandum, all decisions, orders, resolutions and directives must pass the Ombudsman’s desk for final approval.
According to Ombudsman sources, heads of the investigating team that handled the gathering of evidence on the fertilizer fund scam and other big cases had either been reassigned or put in the freezer. Some were forced to resign in the middle of the investigation.
The Senate blue ribbon committee resumes the fertilizer fund probe on Monday despite a warning from Sen. Edgardo Angara, chair of the agriculture committee, that this could lead to a legal challenge because the Ombudsman has started its preliminary investigation on the case.
Angara has refused to reopen the investigation of the fertilizer fund scam because, he said, the committee had already closed the case and pronounced Bolante “guilty.”
(Download the full text of the Senate agriculture committee findings on the fertilizer fund scam during the 13th Congress and other related documents.)