One for foes, another for allies

EDITORIAL

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04/19/2008

Graft charges filed against former Justice Secretary Hernando “Nani” Perez by Ombudsman Merceditas Gutierrez was clearly intended to be so weak for it to result in an eventual dismissal of the case.

Thus, the filing of these charges was merely another ploy to make Gloria Arroyo and her Ombudsman look good — in the area of their “serious” drive fighting graft and corruption. But if they were truly serious in their claim of their being no “sacred cows” as the law applies to both political allies and foes, why was Perez not charged with plunder instead of mere graft?

The tell-tale signs of this graft charge being a moro-moro are present. For one, the stage for the Perez case dismissal has been set, with Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez pointing out that the case against Nani is weak, and more evidence is needed to convict him on graft charges, stressing that Mark Jimenez had already given an affidavit of desistance last year, which means he had already dropped his complaint against Perez, which had already been planned earlier to save Nani’s, and of course, Gloria’s hides.

Now you know why the Ombudsman took too long in filing charges against Perez, despite the strong documentary evidence pointing to this crime as far back as 2002.

Gonzalez’s statement was echoed by the Sandiganbayan Special Prosecutor Dennis Villa-Ignacio, also implying that the case has been weakened, but adding that the Ombudsman was right in not charging Perez with plunder since there was just a “single transaction” involved, even if the plunder threshold was breached, with the $2 million that traveled all the way from Caymans to New York, to Coutts Bank in Hong Kong.

Then too, the Ombudsman came up with yet another reason for not charging Perez with plunder, saying the money came from the private funds of Jimenez and not from government coffers.

But wasn’t former President Joseph Estrada convicted on plunder for jueteng whose funds certainly don’t come from the public coffers? Even the so-called commissions from the sale of Belle shares that went into the Jose Velarde account of Jaime Dichaves, can hardly be considered public funds, yet on these charges, Estrada was convicted by the Sandiganbayan Special Division justices, two of whom have been richly rewarded by Gloria, for following her wishes to have Estrada convicted even when the prosecution failed to prove its case, and even when the justices ignored the documentary evidence that the Velarde account was owned and controlled by Dichaves, while relying on the so-called jueteng ledger that was concocted by Chavit Singson, which was hardly authenticated by independent witnesses or even jueteng lords.

Also, the same puppet justices of the anti-graft court, it will be recalled, claimed that the jueteng money deposited to the account of the Erap Muslim Youth Foundation, which was clearly separate and distinct from Estrada, was also his and therefore was part of the plunder loot.

So what is to stop the Ombudsman and the court from using the same standards in prosecuting Perez and his co-accused?

If as the court said it believes the true beneficiary of the Velarde account is Estrada, what’s to stop the court, Villa-Ignacio and Gutierrez from stating that Perez is the beneficial owner of the Ernest Escaler Coutts account?

It won’t surprise anyone if there was more than the $2-million transaction of Perez made through the Escaler account, which was used to launder money. That account and its deposits and withdrawals should be made public. But this certainly isn’t going to happen, since making public the Escaler transactions would also bare that more than the $2 million was transacted and could even bare the $11 million for the Malacañang tenants from the Impsa kickback, in exchange for Gloria and Perez’ approval of a sovereign guarantee.

Now you know why Villa-Ignacio was pushing, during the trial of Estrada, the silly argument that it was Estrada who had approved a sovereign guarantee for Impsa.

But neither the Ombudsman nor Villa-Ignacio nor the courts will be applying the same standards applied to Estrada on his plunder conviction because as sure as hell, the Perez case will be dismissed before Gloria is out of Malacañang.

After all, once out, the rules will change and Perez won’t have his protector after 2010 and he may just rot in jail for plunder.

The Sandiganbayan justices will not do as Gloria wishes? Says who, when these justices know that rewards and promotions await them if they do Gloria’s bidding?

It’s all one great big palabas of Gloria and her image builders to make her look good. But few, if any, are buying the zarzuela.

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