Palace hoping Trillanes, others released by Christmas

A top Palace official on Thursday said Malacañang is hoping Congress will approve the revised proclamation granting amnesty to detained Senator Antonio Trilianes IV and about 300 other mutineers before Christmas so they can spend the holidays with their families. Executive Secretary Paquito "Jojo" Ochoa Jr. said they have given instructions to the Department of National Defense (DND) to "expedite" the process of granting amnesty to those who apply for it once Congress approves Proclamation No. 75. Proclamation No. 75 is the revised version of Proclamation No. 50 which grants amnesty to Trillanes and over 300 mutineers who participated in the 2003 Oakwood Mutiny, 2006 Marine Stand-off, and the 2007 Manila Peninsula siege. "That’s (approval before Congress) what we are hoping for and my impression is both Houses of Congress are also bent on doing that — hinahabol nila talaga rin (they're rushing to do that)," Ochoa said in an interview with reporters. "Sana naman maka-spend siya (Trillanes) ng time niya with his family before Christmas and that’s one of the primary considerations here," he said. Trillanes is facing coup d’etat charges before the Makati Regional Trial Court (RTC) branch 148 in connection with the Oakwood mutiny and rebellion charges before the Makati RTC branch 150 for leading the siege of the Peninsula Manila hotel in November 2007. Malacañang transmitted Proclamation No. 75 earlier in the day to the Senate. The same document was sent to the House of Representatives on Wednesday. It was not the first time that a legal issuance by Malacañang had to be revised. Memorandum Circular No.1, issued after Aquino took oath on June 30, had to be "fine-tuned" because its wording confused some government employees affected by the circular. Ochoa, however, refused to call the mistakes in the legal issuances "legal flaws," saying instead that Malacañang is just open to suggestions to improve its legal issuances. "These are not legal flaws, these are opinions of people, comments of people na we had to hear out," he said. "We welcome the suggestions of everybody as always and if it will be a suggestion that is really valid, reasonable and pwede naman, why not? We have no qualms in making adjustments to those parts of suggestions. Kasi, after all, we are a democracy and everybody has a say, everybody has a comment on anything," Ochoa said. — RSJ, GMANews.TV