“A committee is a group of the unwilling chosen form the unfit, to do the unnecessary.”
- Author unknown.
I’ve been fascinated with the revelations in the Senate hearings on the NBN deal. Abalos has been revealed as one greedy bastard who was willing to have the government spend millions of dollars to get $132 million on a shady deal. Watching Lozada’s testimony, I was struck at the sincerity of the man, dropping names of the most powerful officials in the land without blinking. In the Philippines, that’s an act of suicide, which almost happened to Lozada when he was “taken for a ride.”
But his testimony stood, especially compared to the testimonies of Atienza and Atutubo. Atienza tried to use his trapo charm and blabbing nonsense about how he cared so much about his underling (Lozada was the CEO of the Philippine Forest Corporation at the time of his flight to Hong Kong). In fact, he cared so much about his underling that he never bothered to take a cursory look at his planned travel to London. That’s dereliction of duty, IMO. As the Secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, he should take care that all his underlings spend the people’s money wisely.
General Atutubo of MIAA was put in a bad spot. He either had to admit being a moron or being a criminal. He allowed Lozada to be taken away without even seeing immigration. He allowed them to circumvent the most basic security procedures, claiming only “special arrangements”. So the question is, did he allow Lozada to be taken away because he was ignorant (something he vehemently denied when asked by Biazon) or was he a willing accomplice?
Director-General Razon of the PNP is saying that the mission was accomplished. Lozada is alive and well, and that was the only concern of the PNP. However, why was the security team unwilling to give Lozada the chance to see his family? Why did the security team need a “MAKAPILI” (in the colorful words of Senator Escudero) to point out the person they need to protect? He also has to explain why the PNP coddled a person who was vague about the threats to his life, who openly mentioned his aversion to attending the Senate hearing. Why should the PNP waive the necessary intel work to validate the threats to Lozada’s life. As a taxpayer, that’s an arbitrary use of power given to him, using state resources to protect someone who may or may not need protecting.
But what about the Senators? Miriam was a disappointment. While she is obviously biased towards the administration, I expected better than the feeble attempt to discredit Lozada. She simply asked about anomalous deals which Lozada willingly owned up to. Enrile had this funny notion that the Senate was wasting time because they were investigating the entire day, leaving only 30 minutes for legislation. I don’t know how much of that is an attempt to scuttle the investigation, but it seemed petty to carp about parliamentary procedure in view of the case being discussed. They’re not talking about requests for new toilets from a government agency. Arroyo raised a what-if scenario: What if the Court of Appeals’ findings varies from that of the Senate hearing? I think he’s trying to imply everything here was a waste of time. He interrogated Lozada about some other legal points. While pertinent, I think these questions should have been raised much earlier. Escudero provided some comic relief, asking Mike Defensor if he can rely on Defensor to give him 50,000 pesos without being asked. Escudero and Biazon skewered the government witnesses, although I concede that it doesn’t take much talent to do so.
To sum up, serious charges are being laid on the table. There is the question of whether Lozada was kidnapped. Obstruction, as government officials conspired to allow Lozada to evade the warrant of arrest issued by the Senate. Corruption, big-time corruption to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. More smelly deals, with the Southrail project now being exposed as an anomalous deal.
Even if we take the testimony of the government officials at face value, they practically admitted to defying the law and their willingness to aid anyone who wished to avoid attending Senate hearings in aid of legislation. I’ll update this or post another article when I find the time to digest the info in the hearing.
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