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Wednesday, February 11, 2004
Gwen dares John: take lie test
By Karen M. Flores & Garry A. Cabotaje
Sun.Star Staff Reporters
CANDIDATE Gwen-dolyn Garcia yesterday challenged Vice Gov. John Gregory Osmeña to a lie detector test to determine who between them is lying in the Perdido Lex Foundation Inc. issue.
Gwen, upset upon learning of Osmeña’s allegation during his privilege speech that she was the one who referred the bogus foundation to him, said that “while we’re at it,” they might as well take a drug test together “immediately.”
Whoever fails in either of the tests should withdraw immediately from the gubernatorial race, said Gwen during a news conference she called yesterday noon.
“You, Vice Gov. John Gregory Osmeña, are a pathetic liar. Bakakon kang dako. You have lied to the Provincial Board and the Cebuano people. Let us take a lie detector test together and see which needle will go crazy,” she said.
In a phone interview, Osmeña at once accepted the challenge to take a lie detector test but declined to comment on the drug test. He already took one a few weeks ago and the revival of this issue will only “deflect” people’s attention away from Perdido Lex.
But in accepting Gwen’s challenge, he set four conditions, one of which is the participation of former congressman Celestino “Junie” Martinez Jr., another gubernatorial candidate.
Guv at NBI
Hours after his daughter lashed out at Osmeña, Cebu Gov. Pablo Garcia submitted his affidavit and other Perdido Lex documents to the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) 7 at 3 p.m. yesterday.
To prove Osmeña’s “direct personal involvement” in Perdido Lex, the governor attached to his affidavit the vice gover-nor’s memorandum dated April 4, 2003 to Provincial Accountant Marieto M. Ypil.
In that letter, Osmeña ordered Ypil to dispense certain government requirements and release in full the P3 million financial assistance to Perdido Lex.
The vice governor also assured Ypil that he would take full responsibility for the requirements later.
“Why did the vice governor take such strange and unusual interest in securing for Perdido Lex the release of the subsequent financial assistance of P3 million?” the governor pointed out in his four-page affidavit.
The governor also submitted, among others, to the NBI:
l a March 15, 2003 letter from Perdido Lex to Osmeña, thanking him for attending the foundation’s presentation;
l another Perdido Lex letter (bearing the same date) containing the progress statement, approved by Osmeña;
l a letter from Os-meña, dated May 26, 2003, accepting the Perdido Lex feasibility study “A Demographic Survey of Computer Education in the Province of Cebu” and;
l a letter from Government Information Solutions Inc. dated April 4, 2003 to Perdido Lex, noted and accepted by Osmeña.
With these documents, Garcia told NBI 7 Regional Director Reynaldo Esme-ralda that it would not take a Sherlock Holmes or a crack NBI investigator to identify the personalities “in these now notorious Perdido Lex transactions.”
Since the ombudsman is now probing the case, Esmeralda said his office will submit the governor’s affidavit and other documents to the anti-graft office today.
Buck-passing
Gwen said the vice governor should have checked before delivering his privilege speech, where he passed on some of the blame to her on how an allegedly bogus foundation could have gotten away with P5 million of Capitol funds.
First, at the time Osmeña alleges that Gwen suggested to him a computerization program (“early 2002”) that he can claim as his project, there was “no such talk at all.”
Gwen said the computerization idea only came up the following year when her father issued an executive order on March 7, 2003 that created the information systems planning team.
Osmeña had said that while the idea initially came from Gwen in one of their “casual conversations,” she allegedly suggested that the funding be placed in the account under his office because anyway, he was “chairman of the newly created information technology committee.”
There was never such a committee, Gwen said. As for the information systems planning team, Osmeña was vice chairman while Governor Garcia was chairman.
Next, Gwen said the vice governor cannot wash his hands of the budget that was released to Perdido Lex because it was he who asked for an “augmentation” of the funds under “grants, aids and subsidies” in his office.
4 conditions
In a letter to Provincial Budget Officer Eduardo Habin, Osmeña requested that P3 million be transferred from the appropriation for subsidy to local governments to grants, aids and subsidies.
Further, Gwen denied that she referred Perdido Lex president Milagros Herera to Osmeña as he claimed in his privilege speech last Monday.
For his part, Osmeña said he wants the following “provisos” when he takes the lie detector test:
l It should be held in a “neutral spot” like Manila so authorities will not be accused of being “pressured” by one group;
l Gwen should go first “so she doesn’t just get the answers she wants”;
l Questions should not be limited to Perdido Lex issues and should cover “anything and everything under the sun so we can open up everything and do this right”; and
l Former congressman Martinez should also be asked to take a test and answer questions on issues against him.
Although Martinez is not involved in the Perdido issue, Osmeña said it would be “unfair” if he and Gwen would get into a “gladiatorial combat” while Martinez would just wait to see which survivor he would face.
“It cannot be that he becomes the beneficiary of an event where Gwen and I wash our dirty laundry in public,” Osmeña said.
(February 11, 2004 issue)
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