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THE
lawyer of resigned Commission on Elections (Comelec)
chairman Benjamin Abalos Sr., possibly in consultation
with his client, said the testimony of former Philippine
Forest Corp. president Rodolfo “Jun” Lozada Jr., before
the Senate blue-ribbon committee is part of the
machinations to bring down President Arroyo.
And the mastermind of the sordid affair is none other
than House Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr., the lawyer
broadly hinted. Lozada had linked Mike Arroyo, the
President’s husband, to the now-aborted national
broadband network (NBN) deal with China through former
Comelec chairman Abalos, whom Lozada tagged as the
intermediary.
This strongly worded statement of
Abalos counsel Salvador Panelo also put forward the view
that “the clear motive of whistle-blowers Lozada and
businessman Joey de Venecia III, son of the Pangasinan
congressman, is to come out with alleged anomaly in the
national broadband network deal to bring down President
Arroyo.”
Panelo, Abalos’ spokesman as well, also
said at an impromptu press meeting Sunday at the Max’s
Restaurant at the Edsa Central in Mandaluyong City that
“the math is actually easy in pinpointing” Abalos and
Mike Arroyo “to generally lead to President Arroyo.”
Panelo said: “The motivation, if you
will factor in his [Joey’s] father to the case, is to
link the First Gentleman. You link the First Gentleman,
and the one who will be at the receiving end is his
wife. If the buck stops at the wife, that is a very big
issue for them. They want to oust the government of
Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. That’s the entire motivation.”
Bad blood between the de Venecias and
the family of Abalos arose out of the testimony of the
young de Venecia at a Senate hearing in September, that
linked Abalos to the deal and to an attempted bribery of
the then-Neda chief, Romulo Neri.
Abalos said the “conspiracy” against him
and Mr. Arroyo is very clear as the de Venecias are
simply trying to destroy him because of their failure to
get the NBN contract for the younger de Venecia, whom he
described as having been “bad shot” or out of favor with
the Chinese, thus fully revealing his hand in the
statements of Panelo.
Abalos insisted the younger de Venecia
had a $10-million debt to ZTE for a past
telephone-related project that he was never able to
settle. During earlier interviews, de Venecia III had
denied the accuations.
Abalos told reporters that the
testimonies of the young de Venecia and last week,
Lozada, only goes to show a blatant desperation in
linking the ZTE deal with Mr. Arroyo.
“As you can see there is a great
desperation to link the First Gentleman here. They said
I got angry and called him [Mr. Arroyo] up and then the
next day, we got a letter from the Chinese Embassy that
everything is already okay,” he said.
Abalos, in trying to discredit Lozada,
said the statement issued by Lozada was “riddled with
inconsistencies.”
Abalos said Lozada claimed at the Senate
hearing that he met the former poll body chairman in
September 2006, during which Abalos allegedly tried to
force a loan agreement for the NBN project that would
include his $130-million kickback.
Abalos disputed Lozada’s testimony that
a day after the meeting with Abalos—where, he alleged,
the former Comelec chief exercised his influence by
allegedly calling up Mr. Arroyo to work out the deal—a
letter from the Chinese ambassador was sent to
Malacañang approving a loan package for the NBN deal.
Abalos debunked this claim, showing a
copy of the letter dated December 2, 2006, which
disproves Lozada’s claim that it was in September. “You
can see from here that Lozada’s statement should
crumble.”
Meanwhile, Panelo said they will file a
P100-million to P200 million libel case against Lozada
for directly linking Abalos to the bribes and
overpricing in the now-scrapped ZTE contract.
Panelo said all they are waiting for
are the response from the Senate, from whom they sought
for a copy of the videotape and transcript of Lozada’s
testimony. “We are preparing an affidavit complaint
against him [Lozada]. We will sue him for libel based on
his testimony imputing a crime against Mr. Abalos.”
--C. Mocon |
