Palace hand seen in Lozada arrest

MANILA, Philippines - Several militant lawmakers on Wednesday scored the Arroyo administration over the arrest of Rodolfo “Jun" Lozada Jr, the star witness in the allegedly anomalous $329-million NBN-ZTE deal. Gabriela party-list Rep. Luzviminda Ilagan said the arrest of Lozada was Malacañang’s way of silencing him from implicating more personalities in the said deal between the government and China’s Zhong Xing Telecommunications Equipment (ZTE) Corp. “The arrest of Jun Lozada is politically motivated. [Lozada] had the temerity to expose brazen corruption of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and her cohorts. He is in possession of information that points to the immoderate greed of the first family," Ilagan said in a text message to reporters. Another Gabriela representative, Liza Masa, expressed dismay over the irony that under the Arroyo regime people who expose the truth were being gagged while state criminals were being freed. “This only goes to show that under the Arroyo administration, whistle blowers and critics who are exposing corruption and anomalies in the government are systematically gagged and neutralized while criminals, executioners and rapists are shamelessly freed and rewarded, Maza said. Operatives from the Manila Police District (MPD) arrested Lozada Wednesday afternoon in connection with the perjury charge slapped against him by Michael Defensor, the erstwhile presidential chief of staff. Defensor said Lozadas arrest was not politically motivated, stressing that the Arroyo administration is not after Lozada. But Akbayan party-list Rep. Risa Hontiveros refused to believe Defensor, saying it was obvious that his actions had the blessing of the President. - Aie Balagtas See, GMANews.TV