Filtered By: Topstories
News

Enrile: SC decision on Villar ethics case 'too late'


The Supreme Court (SC) decision allowing the Senate committee of the whole to probe Sen. Manuel Villar Jr.’s role in the C-5 road extension controversy was released "too late," Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile said Tuesday. "Wala na, huli na yun, it's too late," Enrile told reporters in an interview on Monday. On Monday, the SC allowed the Senate committee of the whole to pursue the ethics complaint against Villar, who supposedly maneuvered budget allocations in 2008 to allow the “double insertion" of P200-million in order to accommodate the C-5 road extension project. However, the SC said that the Senate committee of the whole has to publish its Rules first so that the ethics committee's referral of the complaint against Villar can take effect. But Enrile explained that the case can no longer be taken up because it is already the 15th Congress and many of the senators who were previously part of the investigation are not in position anymore. "The case can no longer be taken up. That was done in the previous Congress so that's already moot and academic," he said. He likewise said that they have already done their job regarding the issue. "We have done our duties. We have done our jobs. Let it rest there," he said.—Kimberly Jan T. Tan/JV, GMA News

LOADING CONTENT