Miriam: Cabinet exec behind death threat, petition for disqualification

(UPDATED - 2 pm) Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago is claiming that a member of the Arroyo Cabinet was behind the death threat that she received and the filing of a petition to disqualify her in the 2010 elections. The senator said on Tuesday that once the Senate session resumes, she would use her “parliamentary immunity," to reveal the identity of the “notorious" Cabinet official who allegedly hired a public relations firm to malign and threaten the lawmaker. Santiago told media that while she was at her residence in Quezon City on Monday, she received a telephone call from a man who had threatened to harm her if she would continue speaking during political rallies for the 2010 elections. The senator said that during the recent political rally of the Nacionalista Party in Tondo, Manila, she divulged before the public various corruption scandals in the government such as the airing of the government-paid infomercials of public officials eyeing elective posts; the controversy involving the so-called “Euro-generals," and the alleged malversation of funds from the road users’ tax. She said the threat would not stop her from holding public speaking engagements. The senator challenged the Cabinet official to hire an assassin and kill her while she speaks on the stage instead of just issuing threats against her. Unsound mind? Santiago said she was confident that the Commission on Elections (Comelec) would dismiss the petition for disqualification filed against her by lawyer Nombraan Pangcoga who claimed that the senator should be barred from seeking another term because of her “unsound mind." Santiago said her camp would file a disbarment complaint before the Supreme Court against the petitioner and his counsel, Bonifacio Alentajan, for "deceit, malpractice, violation of the lawyer’s oath, and other unethical conduct."
For the latest Philippine news stories and videos, visit GMANews.TV Pangcoga claimed that in the Senate, Santiago had always exhibited “unparliamentary" behavior. “She repeatedly abused her position and power as senator to defame and slander people." He likewise alleged that Santiago was guilty of graft and corruption for having stolen a Toyota Supra sports car from the custody of the Bureau of Customs in 1990, and benefiting from the then Bureau Immigration and Deportation (BID)’s alien legalization program. The lawyer also accused Santiago of committing “apprehension" and “prosecution of a criminal offense" when her son, Alexander Robert, supposedly committed suicide at their La Vista house in 2003. Dirty low blow According to Santiago, the petition was “no ordinary smear campaign," as it was part of a plot hatched by the Cabinet official who delivered a “a dirty low blow." "It is political sadism, intended to make me rewind my maternal anguish," the senator said. Santiago said the allegations in the petition were a mere rehash of all smear campaigns against her since 1992 when she ran for president. She said that under the Comelec Rules of Procedure, any petition to deny due course or to cancel a certificate of candidacy must be based on the exclusive ground that any material representation in the certificate of candidacy is false. “The petition did not even include any ground for alleged material representation as required by law. Instead, the petition is a collection of the classic lies of character assassination. Thus, it is clear that the petitioner and counsel do not even know their law," the senator said. - GMANews.TV