Senate summons Lacson, PLDT head in wiretapping investigation

The Senate impeachment tribunal summoned yesterday Philippine National Police chief Director General Panfilo Lacson and Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. chief executive Manuel Pangilinan to shed light on allegations that police are spying on judges and prosecutors in the corruption trial.

The special hearing started several hours ahead of the trial after reports said the Estrada administration had ordered the police to monitor some of the senators, prosecutors and even journalists, particularly through wiretapping.

Christine Herrera, a reporter of the Philippine Daily Inquirer, testified that a senior police source had passed to her and fellow reporter Carlito Pablo the five-inch-thick "call detail records," also known as "screen prints from online billings," of the personalities allegedly being monitored.

She said that when confronted with the documents, Pangilinan confirmed their authenticity.

Pangilinan was also "outraged we had those documents when they should be private and confidential," Herrera added.

Lacson said on local television that the allegations were "incredible and at times ludicrous," adding that the police only conducted surveillance on "criminal syndicates" and not against law-abiding ci-tizens.

He said the PNP will come out with its own report identifying the people behind this controversy.

Lacson’s assistant, who was accused of heading a special team monitoring telephone conversations of the opposition, denied being involved in such wiretapping activities.

Superintendent Diosdado Valeroso said he has ne-ver been designated to head such a team.

He also laughed off reports that the PNP and the Intelligence Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (ISAFP) recently acquired modern spying equipment.

"I think it is the result of watching too much James Bond movies," he said in a statement.

For his part, PNP spokesman Senior Superintendent Nicanor Bartolome said allegations that Valeroso is engaged in wiretapping are "way off-mark, aside from being unfounded and reckless."

On the other hand, some of Valeroso’s former classmates and comrades in the underground movement Young Officers Union said the police officer is involved in such an illegal activity.

"He is from the intelligence community, and communication is part of their mastery. Monitoring and surveillance operations are also part of their trait," said Capt. Baron Cervantes, spokesman for YOU.

Cervantes told reporters that he learned about Valeroso’s expertise in the YOU, which figured in seven failed coup attempts against the Aquino administration.

After graduating from the Philippine Military Academy in 1982, Valeroso was assigned to various intelligence units, Cervantes said.

He also said that YOU has learned of a select group of police and military personnel which is monitoring telephone conversations of Mr. Estrada’s political enemies. He refused to name names.

"We do not want to call them members of the dirty tricks department but basically there are moves to discredit the opposition," Cervantes said.

Lacson, Pangilinan and Armed Forces vice chief of staff Gen. Jose Calimlim, who is also ISAFP chief, were summoned to testify about the allegations. The special hearing resumes today.

The Inquirer had carried reports that the Estrada administration was monitoring the calls of prosecutors as well as the senator-judges in the impeachment trial.

There were about a hundred names in that computer printout, and among those in the list were public relations man Salvador "Bubby" Dacer, who has been missing for almost a month.

Others were Quezon City Rep. Feliciano Belmonte, the lead prosecutor in the impeachment trial, Makati Rep. Joker Arroyo, Ilocos Sur Rep. Salacnib Baterina and Sen. Loren Legarda.

One of the prosecutors in Mr. Estrada’s trial said in a radio interview that he believed his lines were being tapped, remarking that he noticed a strange echo when he used the phone.

Quezon Rep. Wigberto Tañada also said that several faxes and e-mails sent to him had not arrived, adding that he believed they were being intercepted.

"There is something unusual going on here," he said.

Legarda was apparently infuriated by what the police have been doing since June this year, prompting her to file a resolution which asks a proper Senate committee to go deeper into the Inquirer story.

"I condemn this Gestapo-like surveillance. This dastardly act is a blatant violation of our constitutionally guaranteed privacy of communication and correspondence," Legarda said.

"What is more alarming than this blatant violation is the claim of this senior police intelligence officer that the surveillance went on a ‘full-blown’ mode when the impeachment proceedings started at the House of Representatives," she said.

Inquirer’s Herrera told the tribunal that the newspaper’s source told her that two PLDT employees, each getting at least P40,000 a month from the police, had turned over the telephone records to Lacson’s Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Task Force.

The source then "smuggled" the papers out of the task force’s office and gave them to the Inquirer, she said. The paper agreed to turn over the documents to the Senate today.

Herrera also denied a suggestion by Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile that the Inquirer obtained the documents from PLDT itself as part of a ploy to discredit the police.

"The Inquirer does not make up its stories," she said.

Chief Justice Hilario Davide, acting as presiding officer of the trial, said the wiretapping allegations "if true would indeed put a bad light (on), and even would affect the rights of the members of the court."

Such wiretapping "also tends to degrade … the dignity of the performance of the acts and the duties of the court," he said.

Davide said that based on the outcome of the hearings, the tribunal could declare the culprits in contempt of court. – Perseus Echeminada, Jaime Laude, Christina Mendez