Akbayan: Officials in fertilizer fund scam will be absolved

The recent recommendation by the Office of the Ombudsman to file plunder charges against erstwhile Agriculture officials, including former Secretary Luis Lorenzo and former Undersecretary Jocelyn Bolante, for the P728-million fertilizer fund scam was not meant to pin them down but actually to absolve them in the end. This was the allegation made by the party-list group Akbayan, which is among the groups that form the Oust Merceditas Gutierrez (OMG) coalition, at a press conference in Quezon City on Thursday. Former Akbayan Rep. Risa Hontiveros said the timing of the plunder recommendation — which came almost six years after the Ombudsman investigated on the controversy — convinced them that it was actually part of a “grand design to clear the names of allies of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo." Gutierrez has been perceived as an ally of Mrs. Arroyo, whose husband Jose Miguel Arroyo, was the Ombudsman’s batch-mate at the Ateneo Law School. Assistant Ombudsman Jose de Jesus, who usually speaks to media on behalf of Gutierrez, could not be immediately reached through his mobile phone. Gutierrez will face impeachment trial at the Senate next month on allegations that she did not act on several high-profile cases. Weeks after she was impeached by the House of Representatives, her office released several recommendations to charge officials in the fertilizer fund scam, a move seen by her critics as a “defense strategy" she would be using once trial starts. Akbayan, however, interpreted the Ombudsman's move differently. “Contrary to popular perception, the fertilizer fund scam charges weren’t filed to deodorize the image of the Ombudsman... It was actually part of a grand design to clear the names of allies and allow them to go unpunished," Hontiveros said. Lawyer Mauro Reyes, a private legal counsel tapped to join the prosecution team in the impeachment case, said during the same press conference that respondents in the case are most likely to elevate the cases filed by the Ombudsman and use the “Tatad doctrine" to provide a backdoor exit for Arroyo allies. The so-called Tatad doctrine is based on a March 1988 doctrine laid down by the Supreme Court to dismiss a case against former Public Information Secretary Francisco Tatad, who was charged before the Legal Panel of the Presidential Security Command (PSC) on October 1974 for graft and corruption. The Ombudsman, which handled the case in 1979, did not file charges with the Sandiganbayan until June 1985, or almost 11 years after the filing of the original complaint. The case was ultimately dismissed because the "undue delay on the part of the Ombudsman to resolve a case violates the constitutional right to speedy disposition of cases," Reyes said. Reyes said he believes the cases against Bolante, Lorenzo, and other Agriculture officials implicated in the fund mess would all end up like Tatad's case. “So we might as well treat the plunder charges filed by the Ombudsman in the fertilizer scam as mere trash. Bolante et al will surely elevate the case to the Supreme Court, where it'll be dismissed, and those who illegally enriched themselves from the multi-million project will go scot-free," he added. Lawyer Stephen David, another private prosecutor in Gutierrez’s impeachment trial, told GMA News Online they would no longer be surprised if Bolante and other Agriculture officials would ultimately not get convicted. “Wala na talaga iyang kila Bolante. Kaya ang habol na lang talaga namin dito ay si Ombudsman, na siya ay ma-impeach at mapanagot siya criminally and administratively sa mga ginawa niya ," David stressed. (Bolante's case is like a done deal. That's why we are just after the impeachment of Gutierrez, so that she could then be held criminally and administratively liable for her wrongdoings.) Reyes said that invoking the Tatad doctrine would be a double-edged sword for Gutierrez because that would mean she would also be acknowledging that the case suffered a delay while it was still at her office. This would then support one of the six articles of impeachment against her, specifically the one about her supposed dismal performance as evidenced by low conviction rate under her tenure. Pattern of deceit To prove the existence of a so-called "pattern of deliberately delaying" a case’s resolution at the Ombudsman-level, Akbayan showed to media a supposed leaked copy of a yet-to-be-released decision by the Ombudsman on a grave misconduct complaint against former Agrarian Reform Secretary Roberto Pagdanganan and other government officials. The case against Pagdanganan stemmed from the alleged misuse of a multi-million-peso fund meant for the construction of a coconut processing plant but used to put up a private corporation. The case was filed with the Ombudsman on June 20, 2004 and as early as April 22, 2006 graft investigators recommended Pagdanganan’s dismissal. On May 23, 2006, the recommendation was even reviewed and later approved by Assistant Ombudsman Pelagio Apostol on June 5, 2006. However, the Gutierrez — through then Deputy Ombudsman Mark Jalandoni — only approved the dismissal on March 9, 2011 or almost seven years after the original filing. Jalandoni earlier this month resigned from his post in light of several complaints against him lodged before the Office of the President. Akbayan blamed Gutierrez’s “centralized procedure" for the delay which allows the final release of a resolution only after Gutierrez or Jalandoni has approved the ruling. “So even if the investigation and all the necessary spadework for pending cases have already been finished by the investigators and officials of the Ombudsman, Gutierrez and Jalandoni could practically sit on these cases," Reyes said. Hontiveros claimed that apart from Bolante and Pagdanganan’s case, “there are hundreds more" of decisions that the Ombudsman is allegedly withholding “until they're ripe for dismissal" with the help of the Tatad doctrine. - KBK, GMA News