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Thursday, June 23, 2005
Clavel offers her own tape
While President Arroyo again thanked Cebu-anos for the vote margin that sent her back to Malacañang, one of her local allies asked Congress to play a tape that suggests not all of those votes may have been honestly obtained.
“I campaigned for President Arroyo,” said Rep. Clavel Asas-Martinez (Cebu, 4th district). “Now, looking back, I wonder if I did right. But I’m still a member of the majority and I want the truth to come out.”
Martinez’s offer to submit a tape—which allegedly reveals manipulation of the Cebuano vote—prompted other administration allies to call for adjournment of Day 2 of the House inquiry. Others tried to question the quorum.
Their tactics failed.
Martinez did not get a chance to explain how she got the tape or if it has been authenticated. But she suspected it revealed Elections Commissioner Virgilio Garcillano speaking about the poll results with Winston Garcia, chairman of the Government Service Insurance System.
Garcia’s sister Gwen-dolyn defeated Martinez’s husband Celestino Jr. for governor of Cebu in last year’s elections.
Both the Garcia and Martinez camps supported President Arroyo, who eventually gained a margin of some one million votes in Cebu over actor Fernando Poe Jr.
Told about the hearing’s developments in a phone interview, Governor Garcia said: “I would rather not comment on the statement of one who will say anything because her husband lost. Sometimes, desperation causes one to do anything.”
Tape today
Martinez will submit her tape today, “but will leave it to the discretion of the committee (whether to play it or not). It is up to those who are seeking the truth to join me.”
Deputy Speaker Raul del Mar cautioned that before any tape is played before the House committees, the tape’s authenticity and origin have to be verified.
“The person who taped this must appear before the committee and testify, so we can determine if this tape is in violation of the Anti-Wiretapping Law,” said del Mar (Cebu City, north district).
He expressed surprise at Martinez’s claim of a tape about alleged electoral fraud in Cebu.
“We have already gone on record as stating, after the elections, that the elections in Cebu City were fair and square and that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo won,” said del Mar.
He also recalled that he and Congresswoman Martinez were among those who defended President Arroyo’s win in Cebu, during the protracted congressional canvassing of votes last year.
Martinez, however, interrupted: “I’m now feeling sorry for what I did.”
NBI infighting?
Also yesterday:
* Former Central Visa-yas director Reynaldo Esmeralda of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) was identified as the source of Malacañang’s version of the wiretapped tapes.
* Esmeralda, however, denied whistleblower Samuel Ong’s allegation. He said the former NBI deputy director was angry that Esmeralda had uncovered Ong’s role in the presentation last year of 10 masked witnesses, who supposedly saw how the vote was rigged in Cebu.
* Ong, ex-deputy chief of the National Bureau of Investigation, skipped yesterday’s hearing. He said through his lawyer that he would not risk leaving his hideout because of alleged threats to his life.
The hearing heated up while President Arroyo was in Cebu for a half-day visit, which included a courtesy call on Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal and a pep talk before investors in the information and communications technology industry.
Pressure has been mounting on President Arroyo to break her silence on the wiretapped conversations, with a broad coalition of groups threatening to stage massive protest rallies tomorrow and Saturday.
The national police placed its 113,000-strong force on full alert.
Ong’s threat
Five House committees are investigating the authenticity of the tapes, in which a woman sounding like Arroyo apparently tells a senior poll commissioner to manipulate votes in her favor in the 2004 election.
Ong has said the tapes were given to him by military intelligence agents who tapped Arroyo’s phone. Wiretaps are illegal without a court order, but Ong said the agents were fed up with corruption in government.
For the second day running, Arroyo’s spokesman Ignacio Bunye was subjected to intense grilling by legislators. He maintained that the authenticity of the tapes could not be ascertained and said he was not sure whether his boss was the woman speaking on them.
Ong’s lawyers offered yesterday to “have the mother of all tapes played and heard during the hearings” provided this was done in public.
Otherwise, the lawyers threatened to play the tapes at a press conference, which legislators would be invited to attend.
Rep. Teodoro Locsin, who is co-chairman of the House inquiry, said
the legislature “will not accept conditions for the appearance or non-appearance of witnesses.” (With AFP)
(June 23, 2005 issue)
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