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Wednesday, November 23, 2005
Wife says he’s in Mindanao, bares terms for surfacing
Former election commissioner Virgilio Garcillano is tired of hiding and is willing to come out to clear his name, his wife said yesterday.
Grace Garcillano told ABS-CBN News Channel that her husband has returned to the country but she declined to say where exactly Garcillano is staying in Mindanao.
She said her husband wants to dispute inaccurate media reports on the “Hello Garci” scandal that linked the former Commission on Elections (Comelec) official to alleged vote-rigging in last year’s presidential polls.
Garcillano will tell his side of the story as long as he will not be arrested and all wiretapped conversations are made public, Grace told ANC reporter Ricky Carandang.
He also wants to make sure that he will not be maltreated by legislators, the way they treated National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales during a Senate committee hearing on Malacañang’s deal with a US lobby firm.
Coached
Garcillano may have already been coached, that’s why is coming out, opposition Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr. said.
The Arroyo administration was rocked by the wiretapping scandal last June when audiotapes of the alleged conversations between Garcillano and the President surfaced.
The two allegedly discussed rigging the votes in the presidential race.
The President later admitted and apologized for calling up an election official at the height of the canvassing of votes. She described it as a “lapse in judgment.” She did not name the election official, though.
The controversy resulted in three impeachment complaints against Arroyo, but the House of Representatives junked these during a plenary vote last August.
Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita yesterday said he knows nothing about the whereabouts of Garcillano.
Sen. Panfilo Lacson earlier also said that Garcillano is back in the country and had been sighted in Mindanao.
Malacañang has continuously denied any knowledge of the whereabouts of Garcillano, despite reports that it helped the election official leave the country.
Warrant
A report last month even alleged that Garcillano stayed in Arroyo’s house in Iligan City at the height of the “Hello Garci” controversy, a report that was dismissed by Ermita.
Garcillano was reported to have slipped out of the country for Singapore via Subic in early July. He later flew out of the city-state to an unknown destination.
He has a standing arrest warrant after being held in contempt by a House joint committee looking into the “Hello Garci” tapes. (With Sunnex)
(November 23, 2005 issue)
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