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Saturday, October 27, 2007
Estrada: I did not steal from government
MANILA -- Former President Joseph Estrada emerged from more than six years of detention a free man Friday afternoon, while the lawyers who prosecuted him began preparing to challenge his pardon before the Supreme Court.
“I may have committed mistakes in my career as a public servant, but I assure you that corruption was never one of them,” Estrada told his supporters at his San Juan residence.
Malacanang's pardon order
Post comments here on President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's grant of pardon to former President Joseph Estrada.
For her part, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo spent part of the day defending her grant of executive clemency to the former President.
In a speech to business leaders, she said her decision “will be debated, welcomed, criticized and given all sorts of meanings and motives. But in the end, justice was done.”
Arroyo pardoned the 70-year-old former actor on Thursday, just six weeks after the Sandiganbayan found him guilty of stealing millions from the state’s coffers and sentenced him to life in prison.
She said the decision to grant Estrada a “just” pardon had come after legal and humanitarian analysis taking into account his age, time already served in detention and the condition of his sick 102-year-old mother.
Challenge
Estrada’s assurance that he will not attempt to recover stolen money or seek executive office again were also factors in the decision, President Arroyo added.
Meanwhile, the online magazine Newsbreak reported that lawyers who prosecuted Estrada in his plunder trial will challenge before the Supreme Court the pardon granted to him.
“There’s definitely a plan to question, if not the wisdom of the pardon, the process by which the pardon was granted,” said John Jericho Balisnomo of the Villaraza and Angangco law firm, a volunteer lawyer who assisted special prosecutor Dennis Villa Ignacio in prosecuting Estrada. “We might need to work over the weekend break to prepare our case.”
The anti-graft court issued the release order at 4:45 p.m., less than one hour after it received a copy of the pardon attached to the endorsement letter of Acting Executive Secretary Ignacio Bunye.
Confiscation
In the same order, however, the court ordered the issuance of a writ of execution for the civil aspect of its September 12 decision, which is not covered by the executive clemency.
Lawyer Renato Bocar, the Sandiganbayan’s executive clerk of court, said the writ will serve as the basis to confiscate more than P734 million that Estrada received as illegal gambling kickbacks and commission from the purchase of Belle Corporation shares by two government pension funds.
Earlier in the day, justices of the Sandiganbayan Special Division deliberated on the forfeiture of Estrada’s assets, after being informed that the bank accounts said to have contained the jueteng payola as well as the Jose Velarde account “have been depleted and decimated.”
Estrada has already declared that the government is welcome to confiscate any of the properties identified in the Sandiganbayan judgment, insisting that none of them were his anyway.
Estrada sought full and unconditional pardon from President Arroyo after his lawyers withdrew last Monday the motion for reconsideration they filed before the Sandiganbayan.
Humanitarian
Acting Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera defended the legality of President Arroyo’s decision.
Devanadera said the issue of impeachment does not at all figure in the grant of pardon, since the former President was convicted of the criminal case of plunder and not for violation of the Articles of Impeachment.
“It was primarily legal and I put in some humanitarian component. (Granting pardon) is a prerogative that is solely the President’s. From our discussions and study, all bases were covered. I think the differences in reaction are more of some people’s expectations, impressions and personal view,” Devanadera said.
Disappointment from both administration and opposition lawmakers surrounded the news of Estrada’s release.
“We have made a mockery of the judicial system,” said administration Senator Joker Arroyo. “It rendered the trial so inutile. Remember, Estrada was convicted of a political offense, he was not convicted of a common crime.”
Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr. said that the President will now have to “explain why she had him prosecuted, then pardoned,” adding that the move was obviously for political survival.
‘Noise’
Estrada was removed from office in 2001 amid allegations of massive corruption, in what he described as a coup backed by the church, the business elite, and the military.
In a trial that lasted six years, Estrada was found guilty.
President Arroyo said the issues surrounding the Estrada case caused a great deal of “political noise and controversy.”
“Now is a period of healing,” Arroyo said. “In the end, we had to make a decision that was bound to please and displease, impress or confound, unite and divide, but we must move on as a nation.”
Hundreds of fans massed in San Juan to await the arrival of the actor-turned-president from his villa in Rizal, where he has been under house arrest since July 2004.
Estrada announced his support for Arroyo, although he earlier said he would not cut any deal with Arroyo to secure his freedom.
“I thank Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo for granting me full, free and absolute pardon midway through her term,” the statement said.
“As an elected leader of the Philippines, I am fully aware of the tough times and agonizing choices she went through before deciding to grant pardon,” he said. “But I believe history will vindicate not only this executive action, but my innocence as well with regards to those charges.” (Sunnex/AFP)For more Philippine news, visit Sun.Star Zamboanga. (October 27, 2007 issue)
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