Pimetel: Zubiri digging his own grave

BAGUIO CITY -- Senator Aquilino Pimentel III on Sunday said senatorial candidate Juan Miguel Zuburi will be digging his grave "deeper" if he makes good on his threat to reveal witnesses that will support his wife battery accusation against the senator.

"You know that is already perjury. Can you force someone to admit something that never happened?" Pimentel told reporters before the Team PNoy sortie here.

Zubiri alleged earlier that Pimentel is beating his estranged wife, Jewel May Lobaton-Pimentel. But the former beauty queen has denied Zubiri's allegations and appealed to the former lawmaker not to use the issue of their marriage in the political campaign of the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA).

Pimentel said he has already instructed his lawyers to draft the libel complaint that they will be filed against Zubiri.

In reaction to Pimentel's threat of libel charges, Zubiri said he is considering asking former President Joseph Estrada and UNA campaign manager Tobias Tiangco to stand as witnesses because Jewel also confided to them when he was being allegedly battered by her husband.

Pimentel laughed off Zubiri's allegations and said that he and his estranged wife are still trying to fix their marriage.

"She said she has no problem and here comes a happily married husband forcing her to say there's something wrong…These are already very unchristian and anti-family," Pimentel added.

The Team PNoy candidate further said that while he has forgiven Zubiri, he will not stop making an issue out of the electoral fraud allegedly committed by Zubiri in the 2007 senatorial elections. Zubiri was then running under the Team Unity of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

"How could a candidate say an election fraud is not a legitimate issue in an election?" Pimentel, chairman of the Senate Electoral Reforms and People's Participation, said. (Kathrina Alvarez/Sunnex)